从语篇分析看商务英语翻译策略

Thesis for 2008 Master's Degree

Discourse Analysis and Business English Translation Strategy

Name Supervisor Major Field of Research Department Research Duration

Lu Jingxin Zheng Yangcheng English Language and Literature

EST and Translation School of Foreign Languages September,2005-June, 2008

June,2008

山西大学

2008届硕士学位论文

从语篇分析看商务英语翻译策略

作者姓名: 指导教师: 学科专业: 研究方向: 培养单位: 学习年限: 卢晶鑫 郑仰成教授 英语语言文学 科技英语及翻译 外国语学院

2005年9月一2008年6月

二00八年六月

Abstract

Ever since its emergence in the 1960s, the discipline of ESP, having experienced a comparatively full development both in theory and practice, has by far acquired the status of a international `lingua franca' in almost every field of study, for on the one hand the success of the English language along with its frequent use has turned it into a vehicle for international communication; on the other hand the orientation of linguistic studies toward language as communication in social contexts has largely promoted the dignity of ESP studies in the theory that English in different fields bears particular features and calls for special techniques.Business English is an area of ESP that is relatively poorly researched. Rigorous linguistic analysis is fragmented and is more frequently based on the written forms of language such as correspondence, annual reports, and articles in business journals. Some kind of analysis has been carried out with respect to the language of meetings and discussions. With the fulfillment of the reform and opening policy in China, especially since China joined WTO in 1997, the communications between China and the abroad have been strengthened. Business English is an effective tool in fulfilling international cooperation and communication exist in hi-tech and trade economy fields. The international business can't operate without BE. BE will play more and more important a role which is worthy of much more researches. While students in colleges or universities gain their knowledge of business largely from books and, as a result, such knowledge will be incomplete and theoretical rather than practical. They will be less aware of their language needs in terms of communicating in real business situations.

Business English (BE) is now attracting more and more attention from the whole society. In the last two decades, Business English has attracted increasing interest and awareness. Business English courses are offered by many language schools worldwide. Yet despite this enormous interest,Business English is an area often neglected by linguistic researchers, who prefer to work on other- more easily defined- areas of special English.

BE ( Business English ) is currently the fastest growing form of ESP. It shares the important elements of needs analysis, syllabus design, course design, and materials selection and development which are common to all fields of work in ESP. So it must be seen in the overall context of ESP Business English implies the definition of a specific language corpus and emphasis on particular kinds of communication in a specific context. However, Business English differs from other varieties of ESP in that it is often a mix of specific content (relating to a particular job area or industry), and general content (relating to general ability to communicate more effectively, albeit in business situation).

In actual use, the previous concerns on Business English are effective communication and negotiation, technical and business writing, work place idioms and vocabulary, and business customs and culture. When \"its translation is concerned, some research has been done discussing how different cultures make effects on translation. While in its discourse, Business English has its specific features, which attract us to pay attentions to seek the links between discourse analysis and translation strategy. With the translation theory, contrastive linguistics and discourse analysis growing immensely in the last twenty years or so, translation research has been given a new perspective, a tentative studey on the relationship between Business English discourse analysis and translation equivalence is justified.

The present thesis, basing on discourse analysis, studies Business English-Chinese translation

and answers how the translation strategy will be affected. It aims at making a tentative study on the relationship between Business English discourse analysis and translation strategy. This is just the author's intention of focusing on the subject as her graduation thesis topic.

Roughly speaking, discourse analysis refers to attempts to study the organization of language above the sentence or above the clause, and therefore to study larger linguistic units, such as conversational exchanges or written texts. It's a branch of linguist. In recent years, interdisciplinary research began to be carried out between linguistics and translation fields. Doing discourse analysis without a contrastive base is as incomplete as doing contrastive analysis without a discourse base and that translation is an optimally appropriate framework within which the entire enterprise of languages in contrast may be usefully dealt with. A careful consideration of what actually happens to a given text when someone attempts to mediate in communicating its `import' across both linguistic and cultural boundaries is one way of making sure that we do not settle for a partial view of what goes on inside that text. To bring entire systems of mother-tongue linguistic as well as rhetorical conventions to bear on the act of textual transfer and to match them with those of another language, which is precisely what happens in a process such as that of translating, can only be illuminating and rewarding. Translation can thus add depth and breadth both to contrastive linguistics and to discourse analysis.

In this thesis, the author gives detailed concepts of `discourse' and `discourse analyses, and describes the links between discourse analysis and translation. All the relative research theories in both China and the west are also explained. By analyzing Business English discourse features, the corresponding translation strategies can be concluded. What is also analyzed are from the aspects of coherence and cohesion.

On the whole, supported by the data and literatures collected, this thesis is expected to serve as an aid for Business English practitioners. It is in the meanwhile assumed to be of an unprecedented significance to fill up a gap in this field in China, so that the specific purpose will be likely accomplished, consequently offering some constructive guidance for BE practice.

Of course what is covered in this thesis is far from enough. A further development, the application of contrastive text linguistics to translation studies, is long overdue. The combination of the two perspectives is only just beginning.

Key Words: Business English translation; Discourse analysis; Translation strategy

中文摘要

二战后，新技术革命蓬勃兴起，经济全球发展，国际交流日益频繁，英语这门 语言因英、美两国在世界领先的科学技术和强大经济实力而成了国际间交流的通用 语言，称为“混合国际语言(lingua franca)\"。在不同领域涉及到的英语言语表达 具有该领域独特的语言风格与特点，要求人们掌握不同的技巧和达到一定的水平。 二十世纪六十年代，“专门用途英语ESP”应运而生，开始在各行各业发挥重要作用， 并迅速发展成为一门新兴、实用、革命性的学科。近四十年来，这一学科不仅在理 论而且在实践上全面、快速发展，在各个领域发挥着重要作用。然而据调查，近年 来，在中国外语界，尽管人们己经开始意识到英语的重要性，英语教学界关于外语 教学理论的专著不少，但对ESP的研究尚未达到完善的地步，仍然缺少与之相关的 比较全面、系统的研究与有效的应用。

商务英语在ESP中较少被涉足研究，在以往不多的研究中，仅仅以信函、报告 及商务期刊的书写模式被关注，或就商务会议、谈判进行某些分析。随着中国改革 开放政策的实施，特别是1997年中国加入wT0，与国外的联系日益频繁，在进出口 贸易、旅游、广告中商务英语的使用越来越广泛，至此商务英语开始得到社会各界 的关注。但是商务英语的学习者大多从书本获取商务及语言的相关知识，这些知识 是很不足够的，而且重理论远远大于实践，在实际的商务交往中，领会语言所传达 的意图是至关重要的，这是一个难以把握的关键点。因此商务英语的翻译关键在于 完整无误地传达笔者意图。考虑到语言交际发生的实际场景，语言自身的规则以及 各国的文化差异，为确保交际内容的准确传达，商务英语的翻译研究势在必行。 然而据本文作者调查，我国对商务英语的翻译研究大多从国家之间的文化差异 着手，本篇文章将独辟蹊径，以语篇分析为基础，通过对商务英语特有的语篇特征 进行分析，以大量的商务英语文本示例，探讨商务英语的翻译策略，这也是作者着手 此篇文章的动力所在。

简单讲，语篇分析是指对于会谈或书面文本，学习其高于句子或短语层面的语 言结构，即以更大的语言单位为研究对象。本文从商务英语的总体语篇特征、以及 语篇中发生的衔接、连贯等着手，佐以实际的例证，并且从商务英语传达意图的几 大特性，去分析针对商务英语的语篇特征，分别采取相应的翻译策略，并且不同的 翻译策略与商务英语翻译中的动态对等的相互关系。

总之，该文作者旨在突破、弥补中国商务英语翻译研究方面的一个空白，在查 阅研读了诸多相关翻译理论文章后，从理论入手，以相应的实例，尽可能综合全面 地展示商务英语语篇特征的细节以及对翻译策略的影响因素，从而促进商务英语翻 译不仅在英语教学领域，而且在真正的操作实践中真正得到发展和提高。

语篇分析是语言学的一部分，近些年，跨学科研究开始在翻译学与语言学两个 领域建立，将这两个视角融合在一起，是一个良好的开端。今后，以篇章进行对比 的翻译理论成果还将会不断应用于翻译中，跨学科研究还有待更深地展开。

当然，由于作者站在特定的角度，难免对某些问题或某个方面疏漏或理解不深入 透彻，还值得进一步深入、广泛的探索研究。 关键词:商务英语翻译;语篇分析;翻译策略

Contents

Abstract in English...............................................…...i Abstract in Chinese..............................................…...v

Chapter 1 Introduction...................................................................1 Chapter 2 Discourse Analysis........................................................3

2.1 lts History and Developments.................................................…. ..3

2.1 .1 The Concept of `Discowse' and `Text'...................................................3 2.1.2 The Concept of `Discowse Analysis'.....................................…...4 2.1.3 The Superiority of Discourse Analysis over

Traditional Grammar Studies.................... .4

2.2 The Up-to-date Studies on Discourse Analysis.......................……5 2:2.1 Studies on Discourse Analysis in the West........................5 2.2.2 Studies on Discourse Analysis in China.......…....................……6

Chapter 3 Discourse Analysis&Translation Research..........8

3.1 Links between Translation Research and Linguistics...............……8

3_2.. Discourse Analysis and Translation............9

3.2.1 Roles and Factors of Translation.......……......................…...9

3.2.2 Phases of the Translation Process............................................……10 3.2.3 The Need for Discourse Analysis in Translation...........................……11 3.2.4 Development of the Research on Relationship between Discourse Analysis and Translation............................................ ...... 12 3:2.5 Superiority............................................. 15

Chapter 4 The Roles of Business English and Its Translation..17

4.1 The Roles of Business English........................................……17

4.1 .1 The Importance of Business English.............................„17 4.1.2 The Importance of Business English Translation…………………………18 4.2 The Business English-Chinese Translation Research in China……………..……19

Chapter 5 Business English Discourse Analysis and Translation Strategy...............................…...20

5.1 Business English Text Proper. ...„„。..............................„„20

5.2 Business English Translation Strategy...。.，.„，....................„„25 5.2.1 Coherence&cohesion ...........................................……25

5.2.1.1 Coherence...........„„。.............................„„，.............„„25

5.2.1.2 Cohesion......................................................................…...27 5.2.2 Business English Translation Equivalence............ ..............…. ..29

Conclusion........................................„...33

Bibliography................................................................35

Articles Published During the Academic Years for the Postgraduate Degree....…...37

Acknowledgements................................................….,.38

目录

英文摘要……………………………………….i 中文摘要………………………………………..vi

第一章 引言...........................................................1

第二章 语篇分析..................................................................3 2.1历史及发展............................................................ ... ..... 3

2.1.1“语篇”与”文本”的概念............................................................3 2.1.2“语章分析”的概念.........................................................4

2.1.3语篇分析比较语法分析的优势... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ....... ....4 2.2语篇分析的研究现状...........................................................5 2.2.1西方研究状况.............................................................5

2.2.2中国研究状况... ... ... ......... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ......... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... 6 第三章语篇分析与翻译研究.............................................g

3.1翻译研究与语言学的关联二。............................................. ... 8 3.2语篇分析与翻译..............................„„‘.........................9

3.2.1翻译的要素....................„„。......·········。························„„ 3.2.2翻译的过程„，................„„，.......„„，.„„，..„，.············„„10 3.2.3翻译研究中语篇分析的必要性..................„„、.‘、、„„，.„、„„11 3.2.4语篇分析与翻译研究结合的发展历程...................................„...12 3.2.5将语篇分析应用于翻译研究的优势............................„„。„，.....15 第四章商务英语的作用及翻译现状............................................17 4.1商务英语的作用二，....................................................„„17

4.1.1商务英语的重要性.„„，....................................................„„17

4.1.2商务英语翻译的重要性„„，..„„，............„„，.............„„。二18 4.2商务英语与汉语互译研究现状....................................„„19 第五章商务英语语篇分析及翻译策略.................................. 20

5.1商务英语语篇特征.... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... 20 5.2商务英语翻译策略... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... 25 5.2.1连贯与衔接...................................................................„...25 5.2.1.1连贯...............................„„。.................„„。.............„...25 5.2.1.2衔接............................................................................„...25 5.2.2商务英语翻译中的对等策略.............. ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ......29 结论.......................................................................33 参考文献..................................................................35

研究生在读期间取得的研究成果.....................................37 致献.............................................................:..........38

Chapter 1 Introduction

The present thesis aims to make a tentative study on the relationship between discourse analysis and the translation strategy of Business English, so as to offer an

overall perspective to people possibly concerned, and to lead them to consciously apply corresponding rules to solve some problems arising from Business English translation practice.

Business English is an effective tool in fulfilling international cooperation and communication exit in hi-tech and trade economy fields. Students in colleges or universities gain their knowledge of Business English largely from books and, as a result, such knowledge will be incomplete and theoretical rather than practical. In the last two decades, Business English has attracted increasing interest and awareness Yet despite this enormous interest, Business English is an area often neglected by linguistic researchers, who prefer to work on other-more easily defined-areas of special English.

In actual use, the previous concerns on Business English are most effective

communication and negotiation, technical and business writing, workplace idioms and vocabulary, and business customs and culture. When Business English translation is concerned, more discussion is about how different cultures make effects on translation. With the translation theory, contrastive linguistics and discourse analysis growing immensely in the Iast twenty years or so, translation research has been given a new perspective (discourse analysis). Business English has its specific characteristics in its discourse, which attract us to pay attentions to seek the links between discourse analysis and translation strategy, and a tentative study on the relationship between Business English discourse analysis and translation strategy is justified.

For the convenience of presentation, the organization of this thesis goes as the following. A general description of the concept of `discourse' and `discourse analysis', and the situation of the discourse analysis studies at home and abroad, reveals and justifies the research objective as well as the reason for the research into Business English translation outlined here, i.e. to deal with the question of `Why the study on discourse analysis'. All

the factors in translation and the translation processes are all given descriptions on the basis of discourse. Meanwhile, representative advocators/scholars, their works combined

with the characteristics are taken into account and correspondingly illustrated in a possibly detailed way. The links between translation and discourse analysis explains why we should introduce discourse analysis into Business English translation studies. The author collects lots of examples in practical problems and offers possible solutions accordingly. Under the consideration of different communicative situation, different examples are described. This will be an aid in practical Business English translation.

In general, this thesis is intended to be informative, and practical to as many people as possibly being involved in this area. What's more, some practical questions and modes are supplied, and are expected to be useful and valuable to whoever lays his fingers on it and help the author obtain the original intention to supply a gap in the world of Business English translation studies.

Chapter 2 Discourse Analysis

2.1Its History and Developments

2.1.1Concepts of `Discourse' and `Text

The concepts of `Discourse' and `text' aroused much disputes among scholars. Some classified `discourse' and `text' into being oral and written, while others disagreed with that. Translation Terminology gives the explanations as the following,

`Discourse is a connected series of utterances or a text. In contrast to language itself, which is the raw material involved. discourse defines an interaction between two subjects (the author and the target audience) that takes place under specific circumstances and with a specific objective. In oral discourse, the author and the target audience are each in the presence of the other, and find themselves in the same communication situation. In written discourse, production and reception almost always take place at two different times and places. Both the author and the addressee are mental representations rather than concrete realities. A text seen from the point of view is of the conditions under which it was produced and its reception in a given socio-cultural context.

Text is a written document of variable length that constitutes a whole when viewed from a semantic perspective.”

In a penetrating study of ideological structures in discourse, Kress(1985:27-28) defines `discourse' as `a mode of talking'. In essence it points to the fact that social

institutions produce specific ways or modes of talking about certain areas of social life--- That is, in relation to certain areas of social life that are of particular si娜ficance to a social institution, it will produce a set of statements about that area that will define, describe, delimit, and circumscribe what it is possible and impossible to say with respect to it, and how it is to be talked about.

Different definitions have been given from different perspectives. In this essay, discourse is seen as a concept beyond text in an abstract sense and it consists of one or more texts. It's a `hyponym' of text.

2.1.2Concept of `Discourse Analysis'

Linguistic communication always appears in textual form ( Wilss 1982:112 ).The text can only be understood and analyzed within and in relation to the framework of the communicative act-in-situation. Discourse analysis can be defined as the analysis of texts beyond and `above' the sentence-the attempt to find linguistic regularities in discourse. The subject now tends to be swallowed up in text linguistics. Its main concepts are

cohesior}the features that bind sentences to each other grammatically and lexically-and coherence-which is the notional and logical unity of a text.\" Discourse analysis took off as a subject in linguistics about fifteen years ago, partly as an expression of dissatisfaction with sentence-based grammars, possibly also stress communication rather than the study of language and reference isolated from their users. Beaugrande said, `text linguistics would constitute the verbal domain of semiotics, dealing with the entire range from one-word texts to texts as vast as The Divine Comedy.'

The term `discourse analysis' has come to be used with a wide range of meanings which cover a wide range of activities. It is used to describe activities at the intersection of

disciplines as diverse as sociolinguistics, psycholinguistics, philosophical linguistics and computational linguistics. Scholars working centrally in these different disciplines tend to concentrate on different aspects of discourse.

`Discourse analysis' is a term which has come to have different interpretations for scholars working in different disciplines. For a sociolinguist, it is concerned mainly with the structure of social interaction manifested in conversation; for a psycholin加st, it is primarily concerned with the nature of comprehension of short written texts; for the computational linguist, it is concerned with producing operational models of text-understanding within highly limited contexts.

2.t.3 Superiority of Discourse Analysis over

Traditional Grammar Studies

The essential difference between traditional grammar analysis and discourse analysis lays on that grammar studies sentences, which is seen as an abstract unit in language system and isolated from the communicative situation, while in discourse analysis, text is concrete in communication situation. Compared with the stiff grammar studies, in which the corpus is usually created by linguists, it can be said that discourse analysis is a

dynamic process surpassing mere sentences knowledge. The more important is that grammar studies on the language products. Iaying stresses on language rules and its accuracy, but discourse analysis studies on the lan}:uage patterns and regularities, exploring for the process of text construction.

2.2. Up-to-date Studies on Discourse Analysis 2.2.1 Studies on Discourse Analysis in the West

Despite the fact that it's till recent years that discourse analysis became a main branch of linguistics. the relationship between language and its communicative situation has attracted enough interest in the history. During the first half of last century, a lot of works were printed as a preparation for today's discourse analysis. Zelling Harris is the first one giving this term its name. So the text linguistics, familiar to us for just two or three decades, is not completely new

In the age of ancient Greece and Rome, grammar and rhetoric were studied separately, the former focusing on language rules and the latter on how language was used in specific situation for a successful communication. Rhetoric, grammar, and logic were called trivium in mid-age.

The traditional stylistics has some similarities with text linguistic. Quintilian referred to four qualities of style as correction, clarity, elegance. and appropriateness, which reflected that the discourses have different degrees of quality due to different language process.

In literature field, discourse has always been paid much attention. When the

anthology explored the human cultures they also mentioned text or discourse. Enthnomethodology carried out researches on the relationship between speech pattern and the speaker roles. The interest on discourse analysis arose therefore.

In the year of 1952, Harris issued an article named Discourse Analysis. thus inventing this term of `discourse analysis'. By 1960s, more and more linguists realized that

language studies should go beyond sentences to learn how the discourse and the situation interact in reality.

The German linguist Weinrich created the term `text linguistics'. Introduction to Text Linguistics(1981)written by De Beaugrande and Dressier is the first important works in text linguistics history, which described 7 standards of discourse: cc}i}esiai}. coherence_ intentionality, acceptability, information, situationality and intertextuality Since 1980s, more works relating to discourse .such as Michael Stubbs's

Discoruse Analysis: A Social Linguistic Analysis on Natural Language(1982);Malcolm Coulthar's Introductions to Discourse Analysis(1985);van Dijk's Discourse and Literature(1985); Buy Cook's Discourse (1989); Michael McCarthy's Discourse Analysis for Language Teache (1991); Evelyn Hatch `s Discourse and Language Education(1992); Jamaes Paul Gee's An Introduction to Discourse Analysis: Theory and Method (1999). The relationship of language to discourse and ideology is one of the more promising developments which linguistic stylistics has recently begun to address.

2.2.2 Studies on Discourse Analysis in China

The discourse analysit on modern Chinese experienced four stages, the first focusing on text composing, the second analyzing text from the linguist's perspective, the third exploring Chinese structure and the fourth impotting western theories on studying Chinese

Before the May 4th New Culture Movement .discoure analysits was rarely influnced by westen western thoughts. With the writing style modern Chinese replacing classical Chinese and the westen rhetoric theory entering into China ,Chinese lingusists gradually stand in the group of the world research ers.

The discourse analysis in China mainly consisted of rhetoric studies and literal criticism until the modern 1城guist became a leading branch. But Chinese rhetoric can only be matched with stylistics in western countries. It's after the reform and opening policy that both the `stylistics' and the `rhetoric' were introduced into China_ In 1970s, some Chinese scholars, especially those who had been studied abroad, started to carry out discourse analysis and text analysis separately, which were divided into two branches in western countries at that time.

In China, the earliest works on discourse analysis appeared in 1982_ But till the year 1991，no more than 100 essays are on discourse research. So it's deemed that the fashion of discourse analysis came into being behveen 1992 and 1995. During the pear 2006, there were 426 relative essays appeared in various periodicals. And Discourse Analysis Seminar has been held in China every two years since May 1991 .These figures proved that the discourse analysis in China is in a development tendency.

Professor Hu Zhuanglin and Ren Shaozeng are the leaders in this field. Hu Zhuanglin has printed a book on discourse coherence and cohesion. He also carried out such researches as on application of discourse analysis in language teaching. Another three significant books: Linguistic Features and Discourse Semantics, Grammar and Discourse, and Conceptual Metaphor and Discourse Coherence are written by Ren Shaozeng. All these research achievements play a guide's role in discourse studies in China.

Chapter 3 Discourse Analysis&Translation Research 3.1 Links between 'IYanslation Research and Linguistics

Translation studies today are a cluster of overlapping perspectives (Neubert 1992:6). In the strict sense of the word ,translating is not a science but a technology, for it is built upon a number of scientific disciplines, including psychology, linguistics, communication theory, anthropology, and semiotics(Waard&Nida 1986).

Translation is a kind of transfer between two languages, so it relates direct to linguistics. When the structurism before 1964s studies descriptive grammar, it analyzed the direct components of a sentence and gave depictions about the language, which has little value for translation theory. Since 1960s, some translation researchers introduced the following studies, such as linguistics, psychology, information theory, cognition science and art science, etc, into translation research and began studying translation from new perspectives. It can be said that since then the translation studies became an interdisciplinary science.

While the literature on translation theory, contrastive linguistics and discourse

analysis has indeed grown immensely in the last twenty years or so, very few books have actually ventured into meaningfully fusing the three perspectives. The England scholar Basil Hatim established such links and explored areas of their common interests. He said: doing discourse analysis without a contrastive base is as incomplete as doing contrastive analysis without a discourse base and that translation is an optimally appropriate

framework within which the entire enterprise of languages in contrast may be usefully dealt with. A careful consideration of what actually happens to a given text when someone attempts to mediate in communicating its `import' across both linguistic and cultural boundaries is one way of making sure that we do not settle for a partial view of what goes on inside that text. To bring entire systems of mother-tongue linguistic as well as rhetorical conventions to bear on the act of textual transfer and to match them with those of another language, which is precisely what happens in a process such as that of translating, can only be illuminating and rewarding. Translation can thus add depth and breadth both to contrastive linguistics and to discourse analysis.

Both contrastive linguistics and text linguistics are now truly in their州me. However, the combination of the two perspectives is only just beginning. A further

development, the application of contrastive text linguistics to translation studies, is long overdue.

3.2Discourse Analysis and Translation 3.2.1Roles and Factors of Translation

In translating, one is transferring texts, not words nor meanings (Sorvali 1986). Translation takes place within the framework of a communicative situation and on the basis of lingustic units called \"text\": source text (ST) and target text (TT). Intercultural text transfer is special in that two cultures are involved and that the message transmitted between the sender or text producer and the receiver is formulated using the elements of

not one, but two codes (cf. Kallmeyer et al. 1980:12).

The starting point for a translation is a text written in the language S (=SL), which has to be translated into a language T (=TL) is such a way that it becomes part of a word continuum which can be interpreted by the receiver as \"coherent with his situation\" O}ermeer [1978] 1983:57). A translation process is usually initiated by a customer or `initiator', approaching a translator because they need a certain target text for a particular target addressee or receiver. It might also happen that it is precisely the initiator who wants to understand in the target language a certain source text written in a source language by a source language author or text producer or transmitted by a source-language sender under the particular conditions of the source culture. As a general rule, texts are not produced just in order to be translated but to fulfill certain communicative purposes for a specified source language audience.

The essential factors and constituents of the process of intercultural text transfer are: source text producer, source text sender, source text, source text receiver, initiator, translator, target text, and target text receiver. In addition, both the source text and the target text are determined by the communicative situation in which they serve to convey a message. The process of intercultural text transfer shows a source text situation and a

target text situation, both of which are divided into a text-production and a text-reception part. The initiator plays a crucial role in starting the process and determining its course. He will set the translating instructions. The translator alone decides whether the translation which the initiator asks for can actually be produced on the basis of the given source text and it is the translator who is the expert on translation. He is a receiver of the source text as well as the producer of the target text; TRL takes part in both the ST (source text) situation and the TT (target text) situation. As a text-producer in the target culture, he adopts somebody else's intention in order to produce a communicative instrument for the target culture.

The reception of a text depends on the individual expectations of the receivers, which are determined by the situation in which they receive the text as well as by their social background, their world knowledge, and/or their communicative needs. Holz-Manttari views the text as a mere tool for the realization of communicative functions. It has no intrinsic value, is totally subordinate to its purpose, and its sole raison d'etre is to meet the requirements of the situation. The text is so inextricably linked with its purpose that there appears to be no other responsibility whatsoever and absolute freedom as regards the source text. The translator, here, is unilaterally committed to the target situation. Translation is the production of a functional target text maintaining a relationship with a given source text that is specified according to the intended or demanded function of the target text. Translation allows a communicative act to take place which because of existing linguistic and cultural barriers would not have been possible without it. The translator is committed bilaterally to the source text as well as to the target-text situation, and is responsible for both the source text sender and the target text receiver. It's the reception that completes the communicative situation and defines the function of the text. It can be said that the text as a communicative act is completed by the receiver.

3.2.2 Phases of Translation Process

The translation process is divided into three steps: analysis (decoding, comprehension phase), transfer (transcoding), and synthesis (recoding). That is to say, the translator first analyzes the message of the source language into its simplest and structurally clearest forms, transfers it at this level, and then restructures it to the level of the receptor language which is most appropriate for the audience which he intends to reach (Nida 1975: 79f). The first step is the comprehension phase with a detailed analysis of the grammatical, semantic and stylistic elements of the text, which ensures that the translator grasps the full meaning of the information given both explicitly and implicitly in the text. In the second phase, the \"meaning of the received message\" is related to the \"intention of the target message\language either on the basis of an equivalence relationship between lexical items or, if the text function is to be changed, according to the target text function. This is where transfer competence comes into play, since the translator has to devise a kind of translation \"plan\" or \"strategy\".

In the third phase, the transferred ST items are restructured into a target text which conforms to the needs of the target text receiver.

The aim of translation is \"the realization of verbal communication between people who speak different language\" (Komissarov 1977:46, my translation). It therefore seems contradictory to maintain that the translator can be both source text receiver and target text sender at one and the same time. In a verbal communication between a source text (ST) author and a target text (TT) receiver, the ST author does not give up his or her role of sender, and the translator is a text producer following the sender's instructions. 3.2.3 The Need for Discourse Ana卜sis in Translation

Where does translation begin? Most writers on translation theory agree that before embarking upon any translation the translator should analyze the text comprehensively, since面s appears to be the only way of ensuring that the source text (S刀has been wholly and correctly understood.

Nida thought that translation begins with the analysis on ST, then surveys the information and obtains target text. (TT) (Nida 1982)

There is not a kind of meaning which exists in the discourse already and waits for people to detect it. Meaning is something which is negotiated between producer and

receiver and not as a static entity, independent of human processing activity once it has been encoded (Hatim, 1990). Translation-oriented text analysis should not only ensure full comprehension and correct interpretation of the text or explain its linguistic and textual structures and their relationship with the system and norms of the source language. It should also provide a reliable foundation for each and every decision which the translator has to make in a particular translation process.

The translation deals with not a sole word or a sentence, but a group of sentences, which relate to and control each other in fixed patterns for a special communicative intention. It's necessary to establish clear discourse awareness both in translating a text and in translation studies. Discourse awareness means the stress on discourse wholeness and unity in communicative situation. The text is the ultimate court of appeal, the sentence is the basic unit of translating (not of translation), and most of the cruxes are centred in the lexical units, if not the words (Newmark 1991:66).

To understand the discourse is to interpret it. A reader should make full use of his language competency and cognitive knowledge to explain the discourse. The more times one reads the discourse, the more deeply he will understand the source text.

3.2.4 Development of the Research on Relationship

between Discourse Analysis and Translation

The England scholar Basil Hatim majored in discourse analysis and translation in the late 1970s and got a Doctor's degree. He wrote with Ian Mason two books: Discourse and the Translator, and The Translator as Communicator. In 1997 he printed Communication across Culture: Translation Theory and Contrastive Text linguistics. In all his works Basil Hatim insisted his ideology that the translator is a communicator crossing language and culture. This idea, compared with Nida's, found no creativeness. But what Hatim devoted to the translation history is that he went deep into translation from a new perspective, i.e., text linguistics and discowse analysis. It can be said that Basil Hatim is the first to

combine discourse analysis with translation studies. In the book Discourse and the

Translator Bisil Hatim discussed about discourse at various levels, including communicative level, pragmatic level and semiotic level. The discourse factors such as cohesion, coherence, situationality and intertextuality are all taken into consideration. In about 1970s, American scholar Robert de Beaugrande put forward his points of view that

1) The unit of translation is not a word or a sentence, but the whole discourse; 2) To distinguish whether a translation strategy works well or not, the communication context should be taken into consideration.

3) Translation should go through 3 steps: analyzing the difference between two languages; choosing a specific style; using suitable words which fit the communicative situation.

Beaugrande wrote several books on translation and discourse analysis: Text, Discourse, and Process: Toward a Multidisciplinary Science of Texts(1980), Linguistic

Theory: The Discourse of Fundamental Works(1991)，Introduction to Text Linguistics ( 1981)，Language, Discourse, and Translation in the West and Middle East,(1994).In all his books, Beaugrande insisted his text linguistic view on language and translation. He played a role of a leader in this field and devoted no less than Basil Hatim. Peter Newmark·(1991:66 ) said, \"From a translator's point of view, I think the main descriptive units are a hierarchy: text, paragraph, sentence, clause, group, word,

morpheme.ranslating (not of translation), and most of the cruxes are centered in the lexical units, if not the words.\"

In the book A Textbook of Translation, Peter Newmark discusses on how to do the discourse analysis in translation. All the following factors he lists are taken into account: the intention of the text, the intention of the translator, text styles, the readership, stylistic scales, author attitude, text setting, the quality of the writing, and connotations and denotations. He concluded that a translation analysis based on its comprehension is the first stage of translation and the basis of the useful discipline of translation criticism. In fact, such an analysis is an appropriate training for translators, since by underlining the appropriate words they will show that they are aware of diffculties they might otherwise have missed. Thus in relating translation theory to its practice, a professional translator

would not usually make such an analysis explicitly, since he would need to take only a sample in order to establish the properties of a text. A translation critic, however, after

determining the general properties- first of the text and secondly of the translation (both these tasks would centre in the respective intentions of translator and critic)一would use the underlined words as a basis for a detailed comparison of the two texts. To summarize, one has to study the text not for itself but as something that may have to be reconstituted for a dii}erent readership in a different culture.

In the chapter The Unit of Translation and Discourse Analysis, Peter Newmark discusses on coherence, the SL text titles, dialogue cohesion, the referential synonyms, and the functional sentence perspective as well. He said, \"I have tried to show that, operatively, most translation is done at the level of the smaller units (word and clause), leaving the larger units to `work' automatically, until a difficulty occurs and until revision starts; in an expressive or authoritative text, there is a certain extra stress on the word; in an informative text, on the collocation and the group; in the vocative or pragmatic section of a text, on the sentence and the text as a unit.\"

There is at present a confusing tendency for translation theorists to regard the whole text, the basis of discourse analysis, as the unit of translation (UT), which is the opposite of Vinay's and Darbelnet's original concept. Vinay and Darbelnet define the unit of translation as \"the smallest segment of an utterance whose cohesion of signs is such that they must not be separately translated'，一in other words. the minimal stretch of language that has to be translated together, as one unit. The argument about the length of the UT, which has been put succinctly by W. Haas, `as short as is possible, as long as is necessary', is a concrete reflection of the age-old conflict between free and literal translation- the freer the translation, the longer the UT; the more literal the translation, the shorter the UT, the closer the word, or, in poetry, even to the morpheme. Free translation has always favored the sentence; literal translation the word. Now, since the rise of text linguistics, free

translation has changed its translation unit from the sentence to the whole text. In the last fifteen years the argument on UT has been revived by those who maintain that the only true UT is the whole text. This view has been underpinned by the vast industry in

discourse analysis, or text linguistics, which examines a text as a whole in its relations and cohesion at all levels higher than the sentence.

3.2.5 Superiority

The translation deals with not a sole word or a sentence, but sentences, which relate to and control each other in fixed patterns, for a special communicative intention. It's necessary to establish clear discourse awareness both in translating and in translation studies. Discourse awareness means the stress on discourse wholeness and unity in communicative situation. The whole discourse is the end point and the judge of a translation strategy.

Discourse analysis in translation research change the perspective from word and sentence to dynamic discourse analysis. It's also different from the usual methods by

which the source text and target text cultures are standpoint. By contrasting two discourses in different language, a discussion on transferring between source text and target text is conducted.

While the literature on translation theory, contrastive linguistics and discourse analysis has indeed grown immensely in the last twenty years or so, very few books have actually ventured into meaningfully fusing the three perspectives. Translation can add depth and breadth both to contrastive linguistics and to discourse analysis.‘Both contrastive linguistics and text linguistics are now truly in their prime; witness the conferences at Innsbruck on New Departures in Contrastive Linguistics in 1991 and at Brighton on Contrastive Semantics and Pragmatics, or the 4-volume Handbook of

Discourse Analysis edited by T. A. van Dijk(1985). However, the combination of the two perspectives (the contrastive and the textual), for which some of us have been pleading for many years, and whose computational implementation is now feasible, is only just beginning. A fiuther development, the application of contrastive text linguistics to translation studies, is long overdue.

Translations are texts. and translation is a textual process in which linguistic form and process are incorporated. Texts are the building blocks of communication in general, and of translation in particular(Neubert 1992:10). The text has to be considered as the primary object of translation study. Many linguists have made tries on discussing how and what a discourse analysis to be constructed in translation research. Among their printed works, Basil Hatims and Ian Manson wrote the noticeable Discourse and the Translator. In this book, they constructed a full theory concerning register, coherence, cohesion, type of discourse, and discourse structure. This book is a push in translation research history. It's useful in deciding a translation strategy or method. How do translators activate their textual knowledge during communication? How are ideas placed in texts, and how do listeners and readers receive the texts and recover the ideas they convey? Furthermore, how do pragmatic constraints affect the linguistic and semantic profile of the text? All the problems have been explored.

Basil Hatim's book not only addresses all these issues and controversies, but also

exemplifies them through the prism of Arabic, a language that has enjoyed a long and distinguished rhetorical tradition, but not the benefit of much modern theoretical work. The author is well qualified to undertake this difficult but exciting task. Ever since the days of his Exeter PhD he has explored the relevance of contrastive discourse analysis to English-Arabic translation and demonstrated it in his practical teaching. In the course of the unfolding argument in this book, authentic data from written, and occasionally spoken, English is used to add clarity to theoretical insights gained from a variety of sources, including translation studies, contrastive rhetoric and critical discourse analysis. A model of text processing will be outlined, and each aspect of the model proposed will be related separately to a problem of language processing, in domains as varied as translator- and interpreter-training, cultural studies, literary criticism and language teaching.

Chapter 4 Roles of Business English and Its Translation 4.1 Roles of Business English

4.1.1The Importance of Business English

English for business and economics (EBE) focuses on English taught within a company, business school, and other professional or corporate setting. Its primary concerns are effective communication and negotiation, technical and business writing, workplace idioms and vocabulary, and business customs and culture. EBE is also known as BE (business English) and, in the corporate settings, as EPP (English for professional purposes). It is currently the fastest growing form of ESP

In the 21St century, international cooperation and communication exist in hi-tech and trade economy fields. English is a bridge connecting different nations. After China joined in WTO its economy development made an urgent demand for English teaching and

learning to step upward. In the year 2006, China's total import and export figure reached 176 billion US dollars, ranking the 3`d in the world. The international business can't operate without BE. It's a statistic figure that, among 16000 million people who use English as mother tongue or second language in this world, above 90% are using BE in their daily life. These facts demonstrate that BE will play more and more important a role which is worth of much more researches.

Business English is not a neatly-defined category of special English. Some key differences between Business and General English are in its need analysis and learner

expectations. In Business English, the needs analysis is to assess the needs of the company, the job, and the individuals, and to define the language level required by the job. And the learners are likely to be more goal-orientated and to expect success. Business people normally have high expectations of efficiency, quality, and professionalism.

The Business English is likely to be defined primarily in relation to business

performance skills such as meetings, presentations, socializing, or report-writing. Within these skills areas, certain concepts are typically discussed and expressed: for example, describing changes and trends, quality, product, process and procedures, strategy. These concepts can be broken down into the more linguistically powerful functional areas such as comparing and contrasting, expressing cause and effect, recommending, and agreeing. The language defined may include grammatical or lexical items, and elements of spoken or written discourse, including, for instance, cohesive devices and stress and intonation patterns, as well as organizational features such as signaling a new topic or turn-taking in interactive sequences.

One of the main characteristics of Business English is the emphasis on performance- training learners to become operationally effective. For people in business, the priority is to be able to understand and get their message across. The performance criteria need to be seen in the context of specific business situations which the learner will be involved in. So it's necessary to conduct such studied on how to completely transfer one's intention in business activities where Business English is used. 4.1.2The Importance of Business English Translation

In previous language teaching and learning, the English learners~always limited by understanding language structures and translating literature works and paid inadequate attention upon its communicative function. Once ESP (English for special purposes)

translation concerned, even the students majoring in English will find it quite difficult. To fill the gap between language teaching and practical use, we should cast EBE (English for business and economics) a new view that the Business English translation is a cross-culture communicative activity aiming at transferring one's intention.

There are a number of activities involved in business. These include requesting

information or equipment, ordering supplies, praising or thanking someone for a job well done, complaining about a job badly done, and responding to someone else's request, order, praise, or complaints. While some of these activities may be accomplished orally or by filling out a form, many of them require writing a letter. A letter provides a record of the activity for someone's file, it allows the writer to provide more context or explanation than is usually possible on a form, and it helps the audience remember what is to be done. While letters may be written more frequently in some jobs than in others, all technical people should be able to writer a good letter when it is needed.

When using Business English, how one can completely transfer his intention has a bearing on culture differences and the language differences as well as. Every year we can

find more and more literature works being translated into Chinese, while less translation can be seen concerning technology or economy. Business English translation strategy has been seldom mentioned. In the more and more business activities, there is an urgent need to cast attention on BE translation.

4.2. The Business English-Chinese Translation Research in China

During the recent two decades, Business English has been widely used in various walks of life. Business English courses are offered by many language schools worldwide (by over 100 schools in the UK alone). Yet despite this fact, ESP teaching and learning has gained little in China because English teaching used to be about literature. Business English is an area of ESP that is relatively poorly researched. Rigorous linguistic analysis is fiagmented and is more frequently based on the written forms of language such as correspondence, annual reports, and articles in business journals. Some kind of analysis has been carried out with respect to the language of meetings and discussions. Business English-Chinese translation is attracting increasingly interests in recent years. Researchers compared the differences between these two languages and related the differences with translation strategy. But more than a half of researches are on the basis of culture differences. }th the translation theory, contrastive linguistics and discourse

analysis growing immensely in the last twenty years or so, translation research has been given a new perspective (discourse analysis). Lots of books concerning discourse analysis and translation can be found in library. Mr. Li Yunxing wrote a book Translation Theory and Practice Series, discussing to what degree and under what rules that English and

Chinese texts are translated into each other by comparing these two different language. In a book written by Ms. Liao Ymg and Mr. Mo Zaishu, a comprehensive study on BE

translation is carried out on the basis of language style, pragmatic and language learning. A descriptive direct is given. But there is still a gap between BE translation studies and the practice use in reality. A tentative study on the relationship between Business English discourse analysis and translation strategy is justified.

Chapter 5 Business English Discourse Analysis and

Translation Strategy

People around the world conduct business meetings in English even though English may be a foreign language to all those present. The language that they use will be neither as rich in vocabulary and expression, nor as culture-bound, as that used by native speakers, but will be based on a core of the most useful and basic structures and vocabulary.

Businesspeople do not always need to knew the full complexities of English grammar and idiom. Fine distinctions in meaning (as are conveyed by some of the compound tenses, for example) may not be important in a business context.

The text can only be understood and analyzed within and in relation to the framework of the communicative act-in-situation (Nord 1991:12). Different with general English, Business English is formal or informal documents in conducting deals or supplying services in such forms: letters, memoriam, reports, advertisements and agreements. 5.1. Business English Tezt Proper

First we can have a look at the following business letter. In order to translate it well. the translator should have knowledge about the features of Business English and Chinese. The following letter can give us an overall impression on Business English and Business Chinese.

关于:精铜砂的问题

五月十日关于精铜砂的信谅悉。

兹决定按照你们四月姗寄来的开价及具体条件，向你们购买精嗣砂10000公吨， 希望在七月姗一日前一次交货。

我们当于货物准备装运前十五天，要求此间中国银行开立以你们为收益人的不 可撤消的食用证，由你们根据规定，在信用证下收款。 请即按照开价及具体条件寄送合同草本，以便审阅。

希望这项业务将是一个良好的开端，交为我们今后的业务合作奠定基础。 候复。

Re: Copper Concentrates

We refer to our letter of May 10 on the above subject. (1)

We have now decided to make a purchase from you of 10000 metric tons of copper concentrates on the basis of your offer and the concrete terms sent by you on April 30. We expect the material to be delivered in one shipment before July 31.

We shall ask the Bank of China here to open in your favor an irrevocable letter of credit, 15 days before the commodity is ready for shipment, for the full value of our order in accordance with your terms. (2)

Kindly prepare and send us for perusal a draft contract embodying your offer as well as the concrete terms.

We hope that this transaction will be a good start and will lay a solid foundation for business cooperation between us in the time to come. Your early reply will be appreciated. (3)

It can be found that business letter has its own features. concerning sentence structure, pattern, and wording, in both English and Chinese texts. There are also some similarities between Business English and Business Chinese. Only when a translator got familiar

with the both texts features, can he or she do the translation. In the above sentences (noted by 1, 2, 3), (1) and (3) tell us two different express modes separately in English and Chinese. There is a professional term in (2) which should also be clear to the translator. In constructing a Business English text, the methods usually undertaken by authors include induction, deduction, comparison, persuasion and explanation. For all the Business English articles, the texts have the following seven features: completeness, conciseness, concreteness, correctness, clarity, courtesy and consideration ( Zhuang Xueyi, Zhou Yaozong, 1993).

5.1.1 Completeness

The most important characteristic of exchange in the context of business meetings, telephone calls, and discussions is a sense of purpose. Language is used to achieve an end, and its successful use is seen in terms of a successful outcome in business transaction or event. Much of the language needed by businesspeople will be transactional: getting what you want and persuading others to agree with the course of action you propose. In BE the contents must be complete to cover all the relative topics in hope for an answer or an action from the reader. When a client makes an order, he will make it clear that what the goods are, All these

when it is anticipated to ship, where to deliver, and how to make the

terns might be written in a fixed format, easy for the translator to follow. A notice is as the same.

Notice

Dec. 31, 1999 All the staff of Accounts Department is requested to be ready to attend the meeting in the conference room on Tuesday, at 3:00 pm, Jan 6, 2000, to discuss the financial statement of last year.

通知

财务部所有职员请于2000年1月6日星期二下午3: 00整在会议室开会讨论去

年的财务报表，请作好准备，务必出席。

财务部

1999年12月31日

5.1.2Conciseness

Businesspeople are always pressed for time. In business activity, a clerk can hardly afford time to read completely a BE article if it's too long. On the one hand, BE article should be complete, as we have mentioned. On the other hand, the word and sentence should be concise and clear. It's a fact that Chinese and English have much difference in their wording. Commonly speaking, Chinese wording is more complex and sometimes repeat itself with other words. In translating Chinese to English, we should avoid the redundancy in wording. Completeness and conciseness are two key factors controlling and complementing each other in Business English.

For example, we use `decide' to replace `come to a decision', use `for' to replace `for the pwpose of and use `as you request' to replace `in accordance with yow request'.

The old business jargon should be abandoned. We can express `ult'，`prox' and `inst.' by modern English `this month', `next month' and `last month'. `at yow earliest convenience' is also replaced by `as soon as you can' in common BE letters.

根据贵方7月1日来函要求，现随函附寄300美元支票一张。

1)Re. Your letter of 1 st inst., in connection with our account, we are remitting our check herewith, as per your request, in the amount of $ 300.

2 ) As requested in your letter of 1 st July, we are enclosing our check for $300. The first translation is better than the second for it's being concise and modern. Unnecessary meaning repetition should also be avoided. 我们已开始向外国出口机器

We have begun to export our machines to the foreign countries.

`Export' means sell to foreign countries, so there is a word redundancy in this translation. It should be changed into `We have begun to export our machines.'

5.13Concreteness

Like conciseness, Business English documents are concrete and point direct at the aim without any abstractness and vagueness. In writing or replying a letter, concreteness is a top factor in explanation. Concrete facts and figures are necessary in making offers and when compensation is required. It's especially important in choosing numerals and verbs in order to express one's intention clearly.

We have received with thanks your check, which has been placed to your credit. We have received with thanks your check No. 248 for US$2000000, in payment of our commission. The amount has been placed to your credit.

收到你方第248号支票一纸，金额计20万美元，用以支付我方佣金，谢谢。该 笔款项已记入你方账户贷方。

The second sentence makes clear what the check No. and amount, even the usage as well. It gives a concrete and clear impression to the readers_

5.1.4Correctness

Business concerns benefits of two or more parties. Mistakes mean risks. Information has to be conveyed with minimum risk of而sunderstanding, and the time for processing needs to be short. Therefore there is a preference to be clear, logical and thoughtful, emphasized by the kinds of words that indicate the logical process. There is often a need to be concise- particularly when communicating by fax or telephone一and certain familiar concepts may be expressed in word clusters to avoid circumlocution (for example, `cash with order', `just in time delivery'). Certain terms have evolved to save time in referring

to concepts which people in business are familiar with (for example, `primary industry', `Parent Company'). Many of these are acronyms (for example, CIF and FOB). It's also important that in translation we should avoid any possible mistakes. Correct wording is as 加卯rtant as correct terms use.

“贵方要求短期内交贵方所订货物”is translated into English like this, `You ask very short delivery for you order'. There is a mistake. `Short delivery' refers to `short of weight'(短重)，not `quick delivery of goods'(迅速交货).So it should be changed into `You require quick delivery of your order'.

5.1.5Clarity

There is always a main idea in every article. A Business English document should not only express its content clearly, but also be clear in sentence structure and text

organization. In order for clarity, some foot, examples or diagrams axe added if needed. All the appendix should be simple, direct and clear. The more familiar the words are used, the better will they work.

中国制造的棉质与丝质女衬衫在欧洲市场销路很好。

a. Cotton and silk blouses made in China enjoy a good market in the Europe market. b. Cotton and silk blouses made in China sell well in the European market. The `market' has two meanings; one means `sell well' and the other means `the market share'. Ifpossible, we should avoid use such ambiguous word in translation. Compare the following two sentences: We can supply 50 tons of the item only. 我们只供这种商品50吨

We can supply only 50 tons of the item. 我们能供这种商品仅限50吨

In the first sentence, \"only\" is a distinguisher of `item\" } while in the second, \"only\" is a distinguisher of \"50吨，，，two dii}erent meaning are thus expressed.

5.1.6Considerateness

In making a business deal, the benefit of every party will be taken into consideration. This is reflected in words and sentences. A positive and definite aptitude considering mutual needs and emotions is expected from all parties. The receptor's feeling should be taken into consideration about what his needs, hopes and emotion are. This is called `you-attitude'.

“我们五点关门”should be translated into `We are open till 5 p.m.', but not `We

close at 5 p.m.' if clients' feelings are under consideration.

5.1.7Courtesy

Both Chinese and English can express itself in courtesy and sincerity. Especially in

international communication, a translator has the task as important as the writer to impress the reader in polite manners.

请将贵方需求的详细信息告诉我方，行吗

1) Will you tell us more detailed information on your requirements?

2) Will you please (kindly) tell us more detailed information on your requirements? 3) Would you please tell us more detailed information on your requirements? The second sentence is better than the first and the third is better than the second.

5.2 Business English Translation Strategy 5.2.1Coherence&Cohesion

In addition to the contents, the text's structure and style are also the key factors in deciding a translator's strategy. These 3 factors ensure that the language work well in a concrete situation to fulfill one's communicative intention.

5.2.1.1 Coherence

The starting point for the analysis of content has to be the information carried by the text elements linked on the surface of the text by the text-linguistic linking devices, such as logical connections, topic-comment relationships, functional sentence perspective, etc. Analyzing the content of syntactically or semantically complicated texts can be made easier by a simplifying paraphrase of the information units, which can be formulated

independently of the sentence structure. The logical relationship between these units should be noted. This procedure permits the translator to identify (and possibly

compensate for) presuppositions, and even defects in coherence, which frequently occurs in texts. But the same logic sequence seems different in English text and Chinese text. Coherence refers to all the grammatical or methods by which the sentences are united. Coherence is the notional and logical unity of a text, a necessity in constructing a text and a major feature of the very text. Sentences cohere through the use of referential synonyms, which may be lexical, pronominal or general.

Only when we grasp what and how a ST is, can we take an appropriate coherence method to construct then’.A transfer process is needed. Other factors such as register and text type also have the bearings on the coherence methods. Despite of its close connection with grammar, coherence is not merely a grammatical factor. It's above sentences and easily neglected in ST analysis and TT construction. Coherence is clearly not a mere feature of texts, but rather the outcome of cognitive processes among text users

< Beaugrande1981:6 ). A translator should avoid translating sentences without considering its textuality.

The example is as the following.

It has become increasingly clear that the United States must find methods to control inflation, probably the single problem that most worries the average American. President

Jimmy Carter noted that inflation is the cruelest tax that anyone can pay. Many people agree with that statement, arguing that the persistent decline in the dollar's purchasing power hurts people directly because products cost more, and also causes a kind of psychological damage. Recent polls have shown that the average American, far from being optimistic, expects prices to rise to ever higher rates.

越来越明显的是，美国必须找到控制通货膨胀的方法也许通货膨胀是一般美国人 最担忧的问题.卡特总统曾指出，通货膨胀是每个人付出的最苛刻的捐税。许多人具有 同感，认为美元购买力的持续下降，直接损害了人民，因为产品价格提高了，并且 给人们造成了一种心理上的创伤。最近进行的民意测验表明，一般美国人远非乐观， 预料价格还将上涨更高。

In the above Chinese text, the lined parts are translated sentence by sentence. But the logic is destructed when it's translated into Chinese. The information here consists of a logic relationship like this: the decline in the dollar's purchasing power-一products cost more-- hurts people directly-- causes a kind of psychological damage, i.e. Cause 1-Result 1(at the same time Cause 2 }-Result 2-Result 3. So it's reasonable to rearrange the

sentence sequence when transferred to Chinese and the translation should be like this:他 们认为美元购买力的持续下降使产品价格提高，不但直接损害了人民的利益，而且 给人们造成了一种心理上的创伤。

The reconstruction of logical relationship and rearrangement of the linear sentences are two factors of coherence. The ST logic is thus transferred to TT logic.

5.2.1.2 Cohesion

One of the pervasive illusions which persist in the analysis of language is that we understand the meaning of a linguistic message solely on the basis of the words and

structure of the sentence used to convey that message. We certainly rely on the syntactic structure and lexical items used in a linguistic message to arrive at an interpretation, but it is a mistake to think that we operate only with this literal input to our understanding. We can recognize, for example, when a writer has produced a perfectly grammatical sentence from which we can derive a literal interpretation, but which we would not claim to have understood, simply because we need more information.

In addition to our knowledge of sentential structure, we also have knowledge of other standard formats in which information is conveyed. We also rely on some principle that, although there may be no formal linguistic links connecting contiguous lin如stic strings, the fact of their contiguity leads us to interpret them as connected. We readily fill in any connections which are required.

The main concepts of cohesion are the features that bind sentences to each other grammatically and lexically. The concept of cohesion accounts for the essential semantic relations whereby any passage of speech or writing is enabled to function as a text.

Halliday&Hasan take the view that the primary determinant of whether a set of sentences do or do not constitute a text depends on cohesive relationships within and between the sentences, which create texture: `A text has texture and this is what distinguishes it from something that is not a text. The texture is provided by the cohesive relation' (1976:4).

Cohesive relationships within a text are set up `where the interpretation of some element in the discourse is dependent on that of another. The one presupposes the other in the

sense that it cannot be effectively decoded except by recourse to it'. (1976:4)

There are five ways of coherence: reference, ellipsis, substitution, conjunction and lexical cohesion.

Lexical cohesion refers to cohering test by lexical methods which can be classified 恤。synonymy and collocation. Synonymy coherence means that the lexis linked with synonymy, near synonym, super ordinate, hyponym and general word. It's practical to distinguish synonymy coherence and make use of it in deciding TT wording in translation. In Sri Lava, caretaker General Motors has swapped locomotives for tea, selling the leaves in turn to English dealers for cash.

在斯里兰卡，通用汽车公司用机车拒换取麟，然后把条蟒卖给英国人以获得现 金。

Once a text came into being, the words are not separate any more, which depend on its co-context and differs with its ex川anation in dictionary.

In English- Chinese translation, personal reference should be paid special attention because it appears as lexical coherence in Chinese. There are also occasions when English is translated into Chinese; the pronouns must be turned into nouns for correct expresses. Koreans are going just a bit crazy over mad cow disease. Asia's most prodigious beef eaters are giving up on all things bovine.

亚洲人中最爱牛肉的当推韩国人，可是近来他们因疯牛病而陷入恐慌，所有的牛 产品一概拒之门外。

In English, `the', `this', `that', `these', and `those' appear frequently, while Chinese has no particles. Except for‘这，or‘那’，there are few corresponding expressions and the surface reference changes its form.

Across the eurozone, people rushed to cash machines amid the fireworks that marked the start of 2002 to get their first historic taste of the new banknotes.

在欧元大地上，空中燃起的烟火标志着2002年的来临人民奔向取款机，去初 次尝试这具有历史意义的欧元新钞。

Ellipsis is by means of lexis absence to reach the co-contexts coherence. It

`illustrates the trade-off between compactness and clarity'. ( Beaugrande 1981:69 ?.There are three kinds of ellipsis: nominal ellipsis, verbal ellipsis, and clausal ellipsis. Once turned into Chinese, the omitted verb will usually be added into the sentence.

Full of energy and creative ideas, they explore new markets through right market strategies and innovative technology.

他们充满活力，富有创意，运用正确的市场策略，拥有创新的技术，开辟新的 商业市场。

Zero-subject in Chinese makes it a point when being transferred into English. In Chinese sentence structure, the subject is not prominent. The readers can catch what the subject is by the sentence theme. But if such sentence is to be translated into English, the subject must be added.

请从速结帐.

We would appreciate your paying the bill of the shipment without delay

The linking devices which appear in a text, such as anaphora, cataphora, substitutions, recurrence (i.e. repetition of elements or patterns), paraphrase (i.e. expressing the same content in a different form), proforms, etc. (cf. Halliday&Hasan 1977:14ff, and similarly

de Beaugrande&Dressier 1981:48i} ), can also be used to analyze the content. The most common forms these take are connectives denoting addition, contradiction, contrast, result, ect. These connectives are tricky when they are polysemous, since they may have meanings contradicting each other.

Co-referential forms are forms which `instead of being interpreted semantically in their own right make reference to something else for their interpretation' (1976:I8). Where their interpretation lies within a text, they are called endophoric relations and do form cohesive ties within the text. Endophoric relations are of two kinds: those which look back in the text for their interpretation, which Halliday&Hasan call anaphoric relations, and those which look forward in the text for their interpretation. which are called cataphoric relations.

The more cohesive, the more fomalised a text, the more information it, as a unit, affords the translator.

5.2. 2Business English Translation Equivalence

Translation must be evaluated according to their success in achieving predefined

goals against the operative

for each occasion: that is, their success as a communication act (Zabalbeascoa, 1994). For many centuries, translation theoreticians

and practitioners at home and abroad have been looking for ways to convey the intended meaning of the SL to TL properly and effectively, i.e. they want to get perfect translation. What is a perfect translation? Many translators try hard to attain `equivalence' between the two languages and equivalence serves as an ideal aim. Especially in the communicative translation of vocative texts, equivalence effect is not only desirable, it is essential; it is the criterion by which the effectiveness, and therefore the value, of the translation of notices, instructions, publicity, propaganda, persuasive or eristic writing, and perhaps popular fiction, is to be assessed. The reader's response could even be quantified as a percentage rate of the success of the translation.

Nida put forward a concept of dynamic equivalence. Dynamic equivalence is to be defined 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. This response can never be identical, for the cultural and historical settings are too different, but there should be a high degree of equivalence of response, or the

translation will have failed to accomplish its purpose困ida 1982:24). For this concept we should know one point: equivalence is not an absolute notion but a relative one and equivalence in translation should not be approached as a search for sameness. Eugene Nida` s division between functional equivalence and dynamic equivalence resolved the arguments between literal translation and free translation, which加tied the translators to try best in seeking the natural equivalence closest to ST.

Text or the set of mutually relevant intentions that serve an overall rhetorical purpose is the ultimate linguistic unit in any activity to do with communicating in language. In all such activities, and particularly in translation, there is hardly a decision taken regarding any element of language in use at whatever level of linguistic organization, without

constant reference being made to the text in which that element is embedded. Translation

equivalence, therefore, can be adequately established only in terms of criteria related to text type membership, and in the light of how these criteria inform the kind of cohesive (texture). The three units (texts, discourse and genre) relay vital signals which, through some form of intertextuality, link a given utterance with what it basically reminds us of, be this some social occasion conventionally enshrined in language, some attitudinal statement or some rhetorical purpose (a textual matter).

The theory on equivalence lays stresses on the relationship between TT and readers. The reader's reflection is the most important factor in considering whether a translation is good or not.

Business English is used in the commercial activity, belonging to the special-use English category. Accuracy in using words, strong specialization, canonical semanteme and straight sentences are all the characteristics of the style of its written form. What characterizes the language are as the following.

Sense of purpose

The most important characteristic of exchanges in the context of business meetings, telephone calls, and discussions is a sense of purpose. Language is used to achieve an end, and its successful use is seen in terms of a successful outcome to the business transaction or event. Users of Business English need to speak English primarily so that they can achieve more in their jobs. It follows that performance objectives take priority over

educational objectives or language learning for its own sake. Much of the language needed by businesspeople (apart from social language) will be transactional: getting what you want and persuading others to agree with the course of action you propose. The language will frequently be objective rather than subjective and personal.

Social aspects

International businesspeople have a need to make contact with others whom they have never met before, or know only slightly. Meetings are often short because

businesspeople are always pressed for time. There is a need for an internationally accepted way of doing things so that people from different cultures, and with different mother tongues, can quickly feel more comfortable with one another.

Social contacts are often highly ritualized. Formulaic language is used (in greetings and introductions, for example) in the context of a routine pattern of exchanges. A certain style is generally adopted which is polite but also short and direct (taking into

consideration the need to be economical with time). Although some situations may require more than this (for example, keeping a conversation going over lunch), the style and content of social interactions will be typified by a desire to build a good relationship while avoiding over-familiarity.

Clear communication

Information has to be conveyed with minimum risk of misunderstanding, and the time for processing (both by the speaker and by the listener) needs to be short. Therefore there is a preference for clear, logical, thought emphasized by the kinds of words that indicate the logical process (for example, `as a result', `for this reason', `in order to').

There is often a need to be concise}articularly when communicating by fax or

telephone-and certain familiar concepts may be expressed in word clusters to avoid circumlocution (for example, `cash with order', `just in time delivery'). Certain terms have evolved to save time in referring to, concepts which people in business are familiar with (for example, `primary industry', `parent company'). Many of these are acronyms (for example, CIF and FOB)

Needless to say, in principle, the names of ST objects, inventions, devices, processes to be imported into the TT community should be creatively, preferably `authoritatively', translated, if they are neologisms, although brand names have to be transferred. It is not the translator's job to assist any SL advertiser's financial, national or personal prestige interests. At the same time, one cannot be rigid or dogmatic. The media, the experts, will be transferring words whether the translators like it or not. Perhaps when the translator's professional status is raised, they will not be transferring so many. Cultural words are often transferred to give local colour, to attract the reader, to give a sense of intimacy between the text and the reader- sometimes the sound or the evoked image appears attractive.

Conclusions

The orientation of linguistic studies toward language as communication in social contexts has largely promoted the dignity of ESP studies in the theory that English in different fields bears particular features and calls for special techniques.

Business English is an effective tool in fulfilling international cooperation and

communication exit in hi-tech and trade economy fields. It is currently the fastest growing form of ESP But Business English differs from other varieties of ESP in that it is often a mix of specific content (relating to a particular job area or industry), and general content (relating to general ability to communicate more effectively, albeit in business situation).While when students gain their knowledge of business from books in colleges or universities, they can hardly be aware of the real needs of Business English in communicative situation. Business English translation is in the same condition.

This essay mainly discusses the difficulties involved inevitably in Business English translation from the perspective of discourse analysis. It also provides some useful methods and techniques which can an aid in Business English translation.

First, the concepts of `discourse' and `discourse analysis' are given. Discourse analysis is currently a main branch of linguistics because the relationship between language and its communicative situation has attracted enough interest. It has superiority over traditional grammar studies.

Second, the translation factors and process are explained on the basis of text. This is a preparation for explaining why discourse analysis should be used in translation studies. Meanwhile, representative advocators/scholars, their works combined with the

characteristics are taken into account and correspondingly illustrated in a possibly detailed way.

Third, by giving a lot of data and examples, Business English discourse is analyzed and the respective translation strategies are applied. This is the most essential part of this thesis. In actual use, the previous concerns on Business English are effective communication

and negotiation, technical and business writing, workplace idioms and vocabulary, and business customs and culture. When its translation concerned, much research has been

done discussing how different culture make effects on translation. While in its discourse, Business English has specific characteristics, which attract us to pay attentions to seek the links between discourse analysis and translation strategy.

Doing discourse analysis without a contrastive base is as incomplete as doing

contrastive analysis without a discourse base and that translation is an optimally

appropriate framework within which the entire enterprise of languages in contrast may be usefully dealt with. A careful consideration of what actually happens to a given text when someone attempts to mediate in communicating its `import' across both linguistic and cultural boundaries is one way of making sure that we do not settle for a partial view of what goes on inside that text. To bring entire systems of mother-tongue linguistic as well as rhetorical conventions to bear on the act of textual transfer and to match them with those of another language, which is precisely what happens in a process such as that of translating, can only be illuminating and rewarding. Translation can thus add depth and breadth both to contrastive linguistics and to discourse analysis.

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Articles Published During the Academic Years for the Postgraduate Degree

卢晶鑫，我国ESP教育中的教师角色，《中共山西省委党校学报》，2007年专辑， 257-258.

Acknowledgements

The author feels grateful to many people for various kinds of help that they have offered to her in this thesis, and to express her thanks to those who have ever read this paper and corrected a number of miss-statements.

There are many people to thank, and Professor Zheng, her supervisor, comes first. She wants to thank him, who has ever been stimulating and guiding the author's thinking throughout the writing of this thesis. She especially wants to thank him for his loving

support, valuable suggestions, critical comment and kind encouragement that have led the author to produce the present thesis to its completion.

The author is grateful to other teachers, Professor Ji Mofang, who has provided the author with excellent teaching and many instances of generous help over the three academic years, and has been such a vital part of her thesis.

In the meanwhile she wants to thank all the classmates and other friends, who have

ever helped her in one way or another, and special thanks go to her families for their hugs and prayers.

Last but not the least, the author has to extend her appreciation and gratitude to all the contributions whose work has played an important part in this thesis, and she is also indebted to those who are, due to the author's carelessness, not acknowledged in the normal manner in the text.

Thank you all, without whose inspiration, unfailing advocacy and faith, this thesis would not have been made.