English-Chinese Translation Strategies Of Classroom Discourse From The Interpersonal Perspective Of Systemic-Functional Linguistics

Language,as a tool of communication,is called "classroom discourse" when is used in the classroom situations by teachers and students.According to Halliday's theory of Systemic Functional Grammar(SFL),language has three meta functions,one of which is the interpersonal function.From the perspective of interpersonal function,the speaker establish relationship with the audience,and affect the audience's attitude or behavior.Teachers use classroom discourse to establish a positive relationship with their students.Therefore,the interpersonal function needs to be highlighted when translating classroom discourse.However,in most of the books about teaching nowadays,translators usually translate the classroom discourse literally,which held no practical value in the real situation of Chinese classroom.For now,there are not many case studies about how interpersonal function affect the translation of classroom discourse.Therefore,the author picked a book about exploring how teachers communicate with students,and studying the translation strategies.First,the author reviewed the strategies from the previous studies on interpersonal perspective of SFL.In previous studies,three strategies are discovered.They are concretization,elucidation and foregrounding.Concretization uses the explicit and intuitive expression;Elucidation decomposes the meaning of the vocabulary to make it more transparent;Foregrounding adjustment word order to outline the important information.These three strategies are all able to highlight the interpersonal function of the source language.Then he paper makes an analysis on how to use these three specific strategies in the translation of classroom discourse.Finally,the paper discusses how these strategies can guide the translation in general.The study finds that:(1)Concretization is often used on emotional words which serve as a statement.The English language uses modality and tone to reflect the speaker's emotions,therefore,concretization strategy can concrete the modality and the tone of the original tone to highlight the interpersonal function.(2)Elucidation is often used on commands towards lower grade students,because they may be misguided when there is too little or too much information.When there is too little information,the translator can elucidate the meaning by adding words.When there is too little information,the translator can elucidate the meaning by separating clauses.(3)Foregrounding is often used when a teacher is evaluating a student,especially when pointing out his or her mistakes.The translator adjusts the word order and change the focus of information and avoiding to be an personal attack,protecting student's self-esteem.It is proved that from the interpersonal perspective of SFL,concretization,(?)elucidation and foregrounding can be employed when translating emotional statements,commands towards younger students or teacher's evaluations.They can highlight the interpersonal function when keeping the discourse practical and valuable in Chinese.To achieve an interpersonal equivalence,the translator can use the three strategies on classroom discourse according its function.However,when translating classroom discourse of other functions like praising or encouraging,translation strategies are still to be further explored.