| This report is based on the translation of Grammar for the Soul—Using Language for Personal Change,written by Lawrence Weinstein of Harvard Writing Center.The book illustrates the meaning and usage of English grammar with vivid examples.It demonstrates that grammar is a tool of the mind which significantly impacts personal growth,interpersonal communication,and many aspects of life.A prominent feature of the source text is the use of abundant parentheses with flexible positions and different semantics,which makes it difficult to understand and analyze the meaning of parentheses and leads to parentheses disconnect original sentences,making the translated text incoherent.Therefore,it is necessary to focus on parentheses and summarize appropriate translation methods.This report takes cohesion theory as the guidance of translation.According to Halliday’s logico-semantic relations,parentheses are classified into three categories:parentheses representing semantic elaboration,parentheses representing semantic extension,and parentheses representing semantic enhancement.Based on the classification,the translator further analyzes the relationship between parentheses and their host sentences,the organization of the original information,and differences between Chinese and English to adopt appropriate translation methods to achieve coherence in the translated text.Furthermore,linear translation,preposing,postposing,embedding,splitting and omitting are summarized as the translation methods of parentheses.With translation practice and case analyses,it is found that logico-semantic relations between parentheses and host sentences are the premise of understanding and the key to translation,and cohesion theory provides theoretical guidance for the translator to recognize and summarize the semantic types of parentheses to understand better and analyze parentheses;the position and length of parentheses and differences in expressions between English and Chinese should also be taken into consideration to select suitable translation methods.Therefore,this report summarizes the above mentioned methods to provide parentheses translation references. |
