A Practice Report On C-E Translation Of Social Science Paper Abstract

With the internationalization of academic exchanges,the demand for the translation of academic papers from Chinese to English is also growing gradually,especially for abstract translation.28 abstracts of social science papers,which are selected from my translation practice related to abstracts,are taken as the report materials to explore the essentials of abstract translation from Chinese to English,amounting to over ten thousand words.The contents involve history,literature,education and customs etc.On the translation,the whole process is described from preparation,translation to posttranslation.The preparation stage includes preparations of translation tools,bilingual texts,background searches,technical tools,the material usage,the theoretical basis,etc.The translation stage involves the specific description of the translation process and problem checking of the translated texts.The post-translation is mainly about the proofreading and revision for translated texts.On theoretical basis,the writing-oriented principle is used.Generally,a translation is analyzed with the guidelines of known translation theories.In the report,the writing-oriented principle,which is within the framework of general translation principles,is taken as the guideline to explore the translation of abstracts from Chinese to English.Some documents like Guidelines for Abstracts and How to Write a Good Scientific Paper are referred to the translation.On case analysis,22 typical cases,which are selected from the 28 abstracts,are analyzed one by one at lexical,syntactic and textual levels respectively.Abstract lexicons conform to accurate and precise translation,which are related to terminologies,category words.The syntaxes shall be concise and standardized,involving the passive voice,serial verb structures.The texts shall be in accord with structured and clear,including informative and indicative abstracts.For specific issues,the analyses involve the methods of searching and verifying the existing translation,solutions to translate category words,several ways to translate the passive voice,etc.Lessons are summarized from three aspects.The analyses show that translating is more than a creative process,it is a searching and verifying process;the writing ability is one of the foundations of the translating ability;writing-oriented translation is conductive to readers' acceptability.Through the analyses,some problems in the translation are also found from which lessons are drawn for future work.