Applicability of Functionalist Translation Theory in Legal Translation

By WuLina

In partial fulfillment of the requirement

For the B. A. degree

Department of English

School of Languages and Cultures

Nanjing University of Information Science amp; Technology

May, 2016

Applicability of Functionalist Translation Theory in Legal Translation

By：WuLina

School of Languages and Cultures

Nanjing University of Information Science amp; Technology

Abstract: This paper applies the functionalist translation theory in analyzing the translation of legal text, in which the macro-level translation skopos and text function are integrated into the micro-level syntactic structure and lexical expression. At first, the paper discusses the history of legislation and the development of legal translation, which shows legal translation’s important role in our daily life. Then the paper addresses the features of legal language in terms of its lexical features and syntactic features and the features of legal text. In addition, the paper introduces the theoretical framework of functionalist translation theory including rule of skopostheorie and functional plus loyalty principle. And it shows the applicability of the functionalist translation theory in legal translation. At last, this study reveals that the functionalist translation theory can be the guideline of legal translation.

Key words: The functionalist translation theory; Legal translation; skopos rule; coherency rule; fidelity rule

摘要：本文通过将宏观层面的翻译目的和文本功能与微观层面的句法结构和用词技巧结合统一，来阐述功能翻译理论在法律翻译中应用的可能性。文章首先介绍了法律产生的历史和法律翻译的发展情况，表明法律翻译在我们如今生活中的重要性。其次，文章通过法律语言的词汇特征和句式特征来阐述法律语言的特点和法律翻译的特点。接着，文章介绍了功能翻译理论的理论框架，包括目的理论和忠实原则。并且文章证明了功能翻译理论中的目的论、连贯和忠实原则在法律翻译中的适用性，最后得出功能目的理论作为法律翻译策略在法律翻译中有着导向作用的结论。

关键词：功能翻译理论；法律翻译; 目的原则；连贯原则；忠实原则

Acknowledgements

　　I would like to express my gratitude to all those who helped me during the writing of this thesis. I gratefully acknowledge the help of my supervisor, Mr.Chen Zhijie who has offered me valuable suggestions in the academic studies. In the preparation of this thesis, he has spent much time reading through each draft and provided me with inspiring advice. Without his patient instruction, insightful criticism and expert guidance, the completion of this thesis would not have been possible.

　　I also owe a special debt of gratitude to all the professors in Foreign Languages Institute, from whose devoted teaching and enlightening lectures I have benefited a lot and academically prepared for the thesis.

　 Last but not least, I owe much to my friends and classmates for their valuable suggestions and critiques which are of help and importance in making the thesis a reality.

Contents

1、Introduction 6

1.1 Significance of Legal Translation Study 6

1.2 The Background of the Study 6

2、The Legal Language and Legal Translation. 6

2.1 The Feature of Legal Language 6

2.1.1 Lexical Features of Legal Text 7

2.1.2 Syntactic Features of Legal Text 7

2.2 The Feature of Legal Translation 8

3、Theoretical Framework 9

3.1 Functionalist Translation Theory 9

3.2 Rules of Skopostheorie 10

3.3 Functional-plus-Loyalty Principle 11

4、The Applicability of the Functionalist Translation Theory in Legal Translation 12

4.1 Application of Skopos Rule in Legal Translation 12

4.2 Application of Coherence Rule in Legal Translation 13

4.3 Application of Fidelity Rule in Legal Translation 14

5、Conclusion 17

References 18

1、Introduction

1.1 Significance of Legal Translation Study

The development of global technology and economy has made the world more closely connected than before. Law has played a core role in the administration of countries. However,law is not only the tool to rule a country, but the tool to moderate the relationship between different countries.

The cultural communication and economic activities among countries become complicated owing to cultural and economic globalization. A variety of contradictions can be overcome and many problems can also be solved peacefully only because all of them are subject to laws, so it requires us to have a deep understanding and abide by the rule of laws. However, the study of English-Chinese legal translation is still in its early stage. Peter Newmark and Christiane Nord mentioned that legal texts focus on the information in their papers, but there were no more further explanations in their studies of the types of texts.

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