A Report On The Translation Of Social Science Academic Texts Based On Text Typology Theory

Under the guidance of Reiss’ s text typology theory,this report focuses on the translation of academic texts in social sciences.Taking the translation of Heritage Futures: Comparative Approaches to Natural and Cultural Heritage Practices(excerpt)as an example,this report discusses the language features of such informative texts in social sciences,explores the translation difficulties and effective translation methods,thus enriching the researches on text typology and providing some experience for future translation practice of the same genre.The selected material is an academic text in social sciences.According to text typology theory,texts can be divided into three types,namely informative,expressive and operative,each with different translation methods.The source text features characteristics of an informative text,which is mainly manifested by the fact that the focus of the text is on the content to deliver facts,information and opinions and the language of the text is highly logical.By recording the whole translation process,this report analyzes the problems of translating such texts on the lexical,syntactic and discourse levels and discusses corresponding solutions,hoping to provide inspiration for translators who are engaged in similar texts.There are some difficulties in translating academic texts in social sciences,including the mistranslation of proper nouns and terms on the lexical level,and the inaccurate translation of long and difficult sentences with complex grammatical structures on the syntactic level.Cohesion and context on the discourse level also affect the overall quality of the translation.All the above difficulties are not conducive to effective academic translation and communication.Samples of translation are analyzed to overcome the above difficulties and to explore translation methods for academic texts in social sciences.On the lexical level,literal translation,paraphrasing,annotation and addition can be adopted;on the syntactic level,division,conversion and restructuring can be adopted when translating long and difficult sentences with complex grammatical structures;on the discourse level,cohesive devices,idiomatic translation and explanation are adopted to ensure the readability and acceptability of the translation.