论文总字数：29650字

摘 要

模糊语言现象普遍存在于自然语言中，模糊语在广告翻译中的应用使得广告语言更加生动灵活，从而吸引消费者的关注。德国功能学派的目的论为翻译打开了新的视角，也为广告翻译提供了新的角度。本文分析了模糊语言的特点，汉语广告英译中存在的语音模糊和语义模糊现象，并从目的论的角度分析了广告模糊语翻译的方法，包括直译、意译和创译。

关键词：模糊现象 汉语广告 目的论 翻译

Contents

1. Introduction 1

2. Fuzziness on Advertisement 2

2.1 The Origin and Effect of Fuzzy Language 2

2.2 The Characteristics of Fuzzy Language on Advertisement 3

3. The Skopos Theory 6

3.1 The Definition of Skopos Theory 6

3.2 The Rules of Skopos Theory 7

4. The methods of Advertisement Translation 8

4.1 Literal Translation 9

4.2 Free Translation 9

4.3 Creative Translation 10

5. Conclusion 11

Works Cited 12

1. Introduction

From the dialectical point of view, although there is accurate language, fuzziness of language exists. In fact, fuzziness is quite common in all aspects of the natural world, human life and language. Fuzzy language is one of the language fuzziness. It is thought that accurate language express more clearly, however, fuzzy language, not like linguistic ambiguity, as a common character in human language, which can reflect the fuzzy conception of the objective world and human complex emotion.

Nowadays, advertisement, as an important way of marketing, has attracted more and more attention. Advertisement is aimed to fostering a good product image and attracts consumers’ attention, so the use of advertisement language, especially fuzzy language which has wide extension and unclear definition, plays a very important role in it.

Nevertheless，because of the difference between English and Chinese, advertisement translation should consider cultural background on the basis of understanding original meaning in order to reflect the effects of fuzzy language in advertisement. This paper analyzes the fuzziness of voice and semantics in translation.

Nowadays, with the further development of globalization, the degree of economic globalization is speeding up and getting deeper; our country’s commercial exchange with other countries in the world is becoming closer and closer. Many products from foreign countries are imported into Chinese market, and at the same time, Chinese enterprises also go abroad to participate in the international economic and technological competition actively. However, it is not easy to be admitted and accepted by other countries if Chinese products want to have a place in the international market. Thus these enterprises not only emphasize the quality of the goods and service, but also pay much attention to the propaganda of own advertisements and building our national brand, because it is also very important to introduce the goods to the consumers of the target market, make them know the product better, and emerge the consumers accept the brand more easily.

Different counties have their own style in the aspect of language and thinking modes, and as a result, many western people can easily misunderstand the goods and service of China. As a consequence, it is particularly important for us to do a good job in publicity, and to accurately translate the Chinese advertisement into the target consumer’s original language. Good advertisement translation will be refreshing, arousing the target language consumers’ desire to purchase the items, so as to achieve the purpose of the advertisement language itself. The vague language of advertisement is considered as a research object in this paper. This paper will analyze the characteristics and application of vague language in advertisement from on two aspects, which are phonetics and semantics. And on the basis of analyzing the advertising translation of vague language methods, such as literal translation, free translation and creative translation, we are further to study the purpose of translation, from the perspective of skopos theory.

2. Fuzziness on Advertisement

2.1 The Origin and Effect of Fuzzy Language

It is considered that fuzzy theory was produced in the 20th century, but people started to recognize language fuzziness long before. In 1908, Marty, a German linguist, mentioned in his work that fuzziness refers to such a phenomenon that the ranges of certain names use are not strictly defined. British philosopher Bertram Russell published Vagueness (1923) and mentioned "language is fuzzy more or less ", thus the famous "baldheaded paradox" produced from it.( Li Qianju, 2007: 27) Blake indicated that the fuzziness of words refers to the limited scope and lacking clear provision in the use of words, in his thesis published in 1937. Cassirer, the German philosopher, also talked about the fuzziness of language in his Essay About Human (1944). “fuzzy” has became a term began by L. A. Zadeh, a cybernetics expert of University of California; he put forward the concept of “fuzzy sets” in his fuzzy sets (1965). (Li Qianju, 2007: 31) Then, fuzzy linguistics and other academic discipline have been developed.

Fuzziness is common in language which makes language more versatile and flexible. Fuzzy language has very strong communication and wide practicability; fuzzy language can make words more polite, plump and beautiful, bright and dark, fascinating.

Also in advertisement, the application of fuzzy language makes words more vivid and persuasive, and also indicates more meaning under simple words, which stimulate consumers’ imagination, attract their attention and raise their interest in order to enhance the advertising impressions.

2.2 The Characteristics of Fuzzy Language on Advertisement

2.2.1 Phonological fuzziness on advertisement translation

Phonological fuzziness is an essential attribute of language; it won’t obstruct social communication, but can make unexpected contribution if it is used in correct forms. The phonological fuzziness refers to voice compatible phenomenon which is hard to definite, exists in phonetic form, the carrier of semantic content. (Ye Xin, 2010: 30) The common phonological fuzziness in advertisement is homophony and rhyme. Phonological fuzziness used in advertisement can make language more beautiful and charming in acoustic perception, and enhance expressive and appealing language which makes advertisement impressive.

For example:

(1) Like “More smoke” advertisement, “I’m more satisfied”. One translation of the advertisement is “我更加满意”; it is simple and correct in meaning. However, it ignores the fuzzy language. “More” in the advertisement not only means the brand “More” but also expresses the meaning, that is: the product makes people feel good, and this meaning is not reflected in Chinese translation. Under this condition, free translation is better than literal translation because the latter one can’t express the fuzzy language properly. Thus, another version “’摩尔’令我更满意” is more suitable.

(2) Fresh up with 7-up.

A soft drink advertisement, “Fresh up with 7-up”, is translated into Chinese “君饮七喜，提神醒意”. Two “up” are fuzzy language in the advertisement. The phrase “come up with” has one meaning that proposes something suddenly or it has another explanation about active or wake up; meanwhile, 7-up is the brand of the production. The phonological fuzziness here makes the advertisement full of rhythm. The Chinese translation uses the two words, “喜” and “意”, which correspond to the two “up”. Thus, this version expresses the original meaning and style properly.

2.2.2 Semantic fuzziness in advertisement translation

Semantics always go with the development of language, and it can be said that the birth of semantic fuzziness is caused by the existence of language. (Ye Xin, 2010: 31) The semantic research is not easy to definite, but it never ends. There are many words with fuzzy attributes in natural language, like verbs, adverbs, numerals, especially adjectives, so the fuzziness of language is reflected in such words mostly.

(1) Adjectives

Adjectives in advertisement are used to describe goods or services; however, the main function of adjectives is to modify nouns, and mostly nouns in advertisements are brands or trade name. Adjectives usually include fuzzy words, and they almost have no clear boundaries, (Guan Jialin, 2010: 92) so the commendatory adjectives used in advertisements can build good image for products and persuade people of these advertisements.

For example:

Dove Chocolate, Silky Smooth Milk.(Dove chocolate)

This advertisement uses adjectives, “smooth” and “silky”, to highlight the feeling and taste of the chocolate; the adjectives that are full of fuzzy imagination make consumers want to have a taste.

If the advertisement is turned into Chinese by literal translation, it would be “德芙巧克力，丝般光滑的牛奶”. Obviously, it will make people feel puzzled about what is the good, “chocolate” or “milk”; so this Chinese version is ambiguous. Thus the advertisement should be translated liberally and put emphasis on the two fuzzy words “silk” and “smooth”. In the Chinese translation of the advertisement: “德芙巧克力：纵享丝滑”, “丝” and “滑” are employed to make people to think of the taste of chocolate with the touch of silk in subconscious; and make the advertisement more elegant.

(2) Verbs

Verbs used in advertisement, especially monosyllabic verbs, make the contents of advertisements clearer and easier to understand, and then the production can be accepted by people easily. (Guan Jialin, 2010: 93) However, some verb fuzziness can’t be ignored; in particular, some fuzzy words that are used to express the feeling of people, like feeling, look and so on; these words can indicate subjective thoughts, and persuade consumers to have unrealistic imaginations about the good by themselves. The tone of advertising is not so absolute that can quibble, because these fuzzy words create such feeling, “can’t see, can’t touch and can’t measure”.

For example:

Apple Thinks Different.（Apple computer）

It uses a concise and comprehensive sentence “Thinks Different” to show the advertising content simply. The verb “think” is monosyllable; however, this verb usually refers to human actions, so this point highlights the main character of Apple computer — artificial intelligence to customers, and the advertising meaning is clearer.

In addition, another verb “different”, which is subjective and abstract, makes the advertisement fuzzy, because different people have different explanation. Therefore, the fuzzy language arouses people’s desire of having a try.

The Chinese version of this advertisement is “苹果电脑，不同凡‘想’”. It makes a little change on “不同凡响” that turns “响”(sound) to “想”(think); this alteration keeps the same meaning meanwhile makes the translation new and fresh.

(3) Numeral

Numerals are often used to express fuzzy concepts. Using numerals in advertisement will increase the credibility of advertising, because numbers can give people a sense of sureness. However, the numerals appeared in advertisements are usually used as fuzzy language to express fuzzy meaning.

(4) Adverb

Adverbs are used as adverbials in English; they can be used to modify verbs, adjectives or adverbs, and sometimes the whole sentence. Due to the flexibility of their positions and diversity of functions, the adverbs in advertising usually are used with fuzzy meaning.

For example:

Impossible made possible. (Canon printer)

In this case, “Impossible” and “possible” both are fuzzy language; what does "impossible" refer to is not clear and the advertising also does not give an explicit answer. “Impossible” and “Possible”, the two fuzzy words, can show the printer’s characteristics and advantages properly.

3. The Skopos Theory

In the middle of 20th century, the translation theorists begin to use linguistics to do research on translation due to the maturity of linguistic theory. And functional equivalence theory, whose representative is American translator Nida, became the core theory during this period of translation research. The core of this theory is the functional equivalence between the source text and the target text. Cultural criticism and research has spring up in the western academic theory from the 1970s. As a result, research on translation has turned up “cultural turn”, which frees translators from the regular instruction and study translation from diverse aspects. “Cultural turn” makes researchers of translation pay more attention to the translator, the target text and readers.

Functional equivalence theory rises in the 1970s and reflects the overall turn of translation. Catherina, who graduates from Germany University of Heidelberg, puts forward the Functional equivalence theory firstly and introduces the type of functions into translation theory. Later, her student Hans Fermi breaks the limitation of tutor and gets over the constraint of equivalence theory which considers the original language as the core. She establishes “skopos theory” which is the core theory of functionalism. She thinks that translation is a human activity which must have a certain purpose. She says that the purpose of translation activity decides the strategy of ways to achieve the expected purpose. (Vermeer, 1987)

3.1 The Definition of Skopos Theory

Skopos theory is the core theory of German functionalist school. The theory represented by Katherina Reiss, Hans J. Vermeer, Justa Holz-Manttari; Christiane Nord has witnessed four major stages of development: Reiss’s and Vermeer’s Skopotheorie, Manttari’s Action Theory and Nord’s Text Analysis and Function plus Fidelity Rules, among which the skopotheorie is the most influential core theory.（Zhang Xi, 2012: 10-11）

Hans Vermeer first proposed the Translation Skopos Theory in the book The Framework for a General Theory of Translation in 1978, based on the idea of the functionalism which was raised by Katherina Reiss. Vermeer thinks that translation is a human activity with purposes, and the status of original language is far lower than that of target language, which is complete different from the translation theory of the former Primitive Splitting. (Li Wenge, 2004: 146)

Skopos theory pays more attention to the aim of translation, which thinks that the aims of translation determined the strategy and method to translation. The evaluation criterion of translation version has changed from traditional equivalence in translation to the concern about whether the translation achieves communicative goal. Hence, we say about that skopos rule is the highest rule in translation, and all the other factors that are related to translation process have to follow this rule.

Skopos Theory is the core theory of the German functional translation. It was inspired from social behavior, and according to skopos theory, translation is a kind of human behavior, which occurs in a particular situation and has a certain intention and purpose.

Translation is a kind of communicative behavior, the result that it wants to get determines the whole process of the translation; it also can be called “The end justifies the means”, so translation strategies are decided according to the end that the translation want to have.

According to the skopos theory, translators should base on the analysis of original text, take the skopos rule as the basic, combine with the context and choose the best processing way during translation processes. Therefore, German functionalist theory, which takes Skopos (purpose) as the predominant principle to guide translation, has opened up a new perspective to the study of advertising translation.

3.2 Three Rules of Skopos Theory

According to Skopos Theory, “All translation follows three rules, and the three rules are ‘Skopos rule’, ‘coherence rule’, ‘fidelity rule’ ”. (Nord, 2001)

3.2.1. Skopos rule

As a core rule of skopos theory, skopos rule holds that each translation is guided by purposes. Vermeer thinks that the purpose determines method, and it means that the purpose of translation is the key to the whole process of translation behavior. Thus, the skopos rule reads as follows: translate in a way that enables your translation to function in the situation in which it is used and with the people who want to use it and precisely in the way they want it to function. (Nord, 2001: 29). When translators translate the vague language of advertisement, they should consider the translation’s reaction to the target language, which called effects.

3.2.2 Coherence rule

Coherence rule requires that translation should be comprehended by target readers, so it emphasizes the target culture and target readers’ communicative situation. Only by making sense in the culture of target readers, can translation play the communicative role. Therefore, what translators should do is to make translation and the information that translation want express be received by target readers under the background of the cultures of target readers.

3.2.3 Fidelity rule

剩余内容已隐藏，请支付后下载全文，论文总字数：29650字