The Application of the Functional Equivalence in the Translation of Chinese Tourist Guide 英语毕业论文.doc

PAGE  PAGE 19 The Application of the Functional Equivalence in the Translation of Chinese Tourist Guide 1 Introduction Tourism has become a prosperous industry all over the world. Since the early 1980s, with the development of the reform and opening-up policy, also thanks to the rich tourism resources — high mountains, great rivers and mysterious culture, China has attracted a large number of foreign tourists. The growth of tourism requires not only the rich tourism resources but also an appropriate language to publicize it. Thus, the translation of Chinese tourist guide is especially important. The translation of Chinese tourist guide serves as a bridge between China and the rest of the world. Appropriate translation can arouse the tourists’ interest, so it will be helpful for publicizing China. However, in the process of translation, owing to the cultural differences between China and the Western countries, there must be some difficulties in understanding the translation. Accordingly, great importance has been attached to the translation of Chinese tourist guide. Many translation theories have been put into practice. Among these theories, Nida’s functional equivalence is regarded as an effective way to overcome barriers in the mutual-understanding. Eugene A. Nida is a distinguished American translation theorist. His translation theory has tremendous influence on the Western as well as Chinese translation studies. His functional equivalence, which is developed from dynamic equivalence, was introduced into China in the 1980s. Nida gave a clear definition of “dynamic equivalence” in the book The Theory and Practice of Translation in 1969. In this book, dynamic equivalence is defined as “in terms of the degree to which the receptors of the message in the receptor language respond to it in substantially the same manner as the receptors in the source language” (Toward a Science of Translating 24). In this definition, dynamic equivalence is defined with “receptor