A Report On The Translation Of An Inconvenient Apocalypse:Environmental Collapse,climate Crisis,and The Fate Of Humanity (Chapter One)

This is a report on the translation of An Inconvenient Apocalypse: Environmental Collapse,Climate Crisis,and the Fate of Humanity,co-edited by Wes Jackson and Robert Jensen,of which Chapter One “Who is ‘We’?” is the source text.The book is based on the authors’ reflections on today’s poor ecological environment,inequitable distribution of social resources,and ultimate destiny of humanity.Chapter One,the source text,focuses on the definition of “we” and discusses the human-carbon nature and the importance of environmental and geographical factors in history,including geographic determinism leading to social-cultural differences and social systems leading to wealth inequality and social injustice.According to Newmark’s Text Typology,the source text is categorized as informative text.The translation difficulties involve abstract words,long and complex sentences,and sentences with dashes in the source text.Since the source text is categorized as informative text,the translator adopts Newmark’s Communicative Translation Theory as the guiding theory and mainly uses translation techniques,such as addition,inversion,and shift,to solve the difficulties encountered during the translation process,so as to make the translation more in line with the customary expressions in Chinese and facilitate the readers’ understanding in the source text.Through the analysis of examples in the translation process,the translator believes that when dealing with this type of text,the use of communicative translation theory can provide the translator with greater freedom to interpret the original text,adjust the word order,and make the translation clear and easy to understand.