A Report On The E-C Translation Of “Theory After Critical Theory” Guided By Newmark's Semantic And Communicative Translation Theory

This is a report on E-C translation practice of a treatise “Theory after Critical Theory”,which is contributed by William Rasch,Professor of German Studies at the Indiana University.In this treatise,he investigates current development and the main task of critical theory.He proposes that the main task of theory after critical theory is to make full use of existing observation modes,either revelation or rationality,to advance the science-based cognition of the world.The significance of the translation practice has the following two aspects: the first lies in academic realm.The author expects a better understanding of German philosophy and sociology mentioned by Rasch among Chinese-speaking readers through the translation activity.The second aspect is to explore proper strategies adopted in translation of academic text under the guidance of Peter Newmark's theory of Semantic and Communicative Translation.The report is composed of six parts.In the first part,it introduces the translation task.The second part reviews research on academic text translation in recent years.The third chapter is a brief of the translation process.Description of Newmark's Semantic and Communicative Translation Theory and its feasibility are put in Chapter Four,while the fifth part is case study based on the guiding theory.Conclusions on the application of Newmark's theory and relevant translation strategies to academic text translation are presented in the sixth chapter.It is summed up that Semantic Translation is an appropriate strategy for the translation of loan word,compound word and idiom;while Communicative Translation is more suitable for nominalization and passive sentence.In terms of terminology and long sentence,it requires combination of both strategies.Also in this part,after studying limitations of this practice from the aspects of both guiding theory and translated text,the author puts forward a suggestion about full integrity of translation theory and practice.