A Report On The Translation Of The Introduction And The First Chapter Of How To Kill A City

The source text of this translation practice report comes from the introduction and the first chapter of How to Kill a City written by Peter Moskowitz.This book mainly describes the massive,systemic gentrification which happened in New Orleans,Detroit,San Francisco and New York,and illustrates how people and the city are influenced by gentrification.As a typical social science book,it also explores America’s crises of race and inequality,the hot issues in America,and the world.The translation of the text will enhance people’s concern with cities’ development and changes,and help people know the problems caused by gentrification.Much can be gained for Chinese cities’ development from the book.Besides,it will promote Chinese readers’ comprehensive understanding of American society and enhance cultural exchanges between the two countries.This report analyzes the translation difficulties and strategies of social science texts based on Relevance Theory.Dan Wilson and Deirdre Sperber proposed Relevance Theory in 1986,and Ernst Gutt applies Relevance Theory to translation studies.It is believed that the translator should seek optimal relevance between two languages,which means to help readers get enough contextual effects with minimum processing efforts.The translator first analyzes the linguistic characteristics of social science texts,then discusses difficulties in the translation from lexical level and syntactic levels,such as culture-loaded words,polysemy,passive sentences,and lengthy compound sentences.At last,the translator explores some appropriate translation strategies applied to solve the above problems under the guidance of Relevance Theory.For example,appropriate selection of word meaning,annotation,paraphrase,amplification,conversion of the sentences’ voice,reconstruction,and segmentation are used in the translation to seek optimal relevance.This translation report has discussed the application of several translation strategies and methods under the guidance of Relevance Theory.It is expected that the report would provide some beneficial reference for the translation of social science texts.