本文是一篇英语论文，本报告以翻译目的论作为指导理论，译者通过结合具体的翻译实例，探讨了形式主语句的常用翻译方法，包括分译法、省译法、倒置法和替代法。
1 Task Description
1.1 Background of the Task
Theories of Criminal Law,as an academic article,was first published in theStanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy in 2018.It is divided into six sections,and thetranslation task is based on the first four sections of the article.
It is said that China has formed a relatively complete criminal law since the XiaDynasty in 2000 BC,while it was in the fifth century BC that ancient Greece formeda complete legal system(Zhang&Zhong,2005).In recent years,with theacceleration of globalization and the concept of governing the country by law,legaltranslation is playing an increasing important role in the world.
It is suggested that foreign-related legal work should be paid attention to in theFourth Plenary Session of the 18th CPC Central Committee.At present,the reform ofjudicial system in our country is at a critical stage.As one of the most mature legalsystems in the world,more and more people have been conducting research onAnglo-American law system(Zhang,2016).However,due to the huge differences incultural background and the characteristics of legal language,how to deal with legaltranslation well deserves people’s attention.
1.2 Choice of the Text
The translation material is taken from an academic article named Theories ofCriminal Law.There are many legal terms and specific expressions in this article,which make it difficult for the translator to understand.After the translation wasfinished,the translator indeed got a lot of legal information from it.In addition,byreading Theories of Criminal Law,readers will have an overview of westerncountries’criminal law system,and it will also bring some reference to theconstruction of criminal law in our country.
For another,the trend of globalization promotes the legal communicationbetween different legal systems and different countries.With the changes in theinternational environment,there is a growing demand in China’s legal exchanges withother countries,in which legal translation is essential for legal communication(Du,2005).We are now living in a multilingual age where translation serves as acommunication media for local and national regulations and international law.Thetranslation of legal texts has legal effects,which may even contribute to peace or war.The influence of legal translation is manifold.For example,without legal translation,international trade can not be carried out smoothly.As China moves towards theglobal stage,legal translation is becoming more and more important(Li&Hu,2006).
2 Process Description
2.1 Preparation for Translation
Adequate preparation before translation is fundamental during the translationprocess.Therefore,a lot of preparations were made by the translator so as to improvethe translation efficiency and faithfulness.Overall,the preparation work can bedivided into the following three parts.
First of all,the translator read the whole article to know its structure and get ageneral understanding about what is is mainly talking about.Theories of CriminalLaw belongs to legal text,and has its own writing style.Therefore,the translatorconsulted a large number of materials to understand the unique features of legal text,making sure the translation can delivery the same experience to the readers as thesource text to the source readers.
Secondly,the translator looked up the legal parallel texts,and the comparisonbetween Chinese and English legal terms on the Internet to understand theircorresponding expression.Before translation,the translator also asked for somesuggestions from the supervisor and classmates to explore and mark the translationdifficulties in the original text.
2.2 Translation Process
During the translation,it should be emphasized on conveying the content of theoriginal text faithfully and concisely on account of the characteristics of legal texts.The whole translation can be mainly divided into two periods.
In the first period,the translator made a schedule by translating about 300 wordsevery day.According to the translation plan,the first version was finished in aboutone month.During this period,the translator read through and get the main idea ofeach paragraph,and then translated them into Chinese according to the context,involving with the adjustment of the word order.Although some preparation beforetranslation had been made,the translator was still faced with many problems.Forthese uncertain words or sentences,the translator firstly searched for the relevantdictionaries,and then shared the translation with the supervisor and classmates to seekfor advice from them.If the difficulties still can not be solved properly,the translatormarked them during the first period.
3 Case Analysis .............................. 8
3.1 Theoretical Framework ....................................... 8
3.1.1 Introduction to Skopos Theory ................................... 8
3.1.2 Principles of Skopos Theory .................................... 9
4 Conclusion ........................................ 29
4.1 Major Findings ...................................... 29
4.2 Limitations .................................... 31
4.3 Suggestions ..................................... 33
3 Case Analysis
3.1 Theoretical Framework
The translation was completed under the guidance of skopos theory.In thischapter,skopos theory was introduced,including its content,development andprinciples.
3.1.1 Introduction to Skopos Theory
Skopos theory is a relatively new model of translation theory mainly proposed byHans Vermeer,a German translation theorist,and its establishment can be traced backto the 1960s and 1970s.Skopos theory is an external study of translation,whichfocuses on the selection of various purposes in the process of translation.Therefore,itcan undoubtedly make up for the shortcomings of traditional translation studies,thusadding a new research perspective to the multidisciplinary exploration of translation(Fan&Liu,2002).
Katharina Reiss,Hans Vermeer and Justa Holz Manttari have made greatcontributions to the development of functional translation theory.In 1971,KatharinaReiss listed the function of text as a standard of translation criticism in her book Possibilities and Limitations of Translation Criticism.In other words,we can evaluatethe original text from the relationship between the functions of the original text andthe target text.Later,Hans Vermeer developed and created skopos theory on the basisof behavioral theory.He proposed that the methods were determined by the outcome.That is to say,the translation principle was dependent on the purpose of the wholetranslation activity(Vermeer,1989).The skopos theory was further developed byJusta Holz Manttari,who focused on analyzing the behaviors,conditions andfunctions of participants in the whole translation process.
4 Conclusion
4.1 Major Findings
Based on the excerpts of Theories of Criminal Law,the translator encounteredmany sentences with formal subjects while translating it into Chinese,and thetranslation report focused on the translation methods in the sentences with formalsubjects.These sentences mainly exist as the following three patterns:“It+be+noun/adjective/past participle/verb+clause”,“It+be+adjective(for/ofsb)/noun/verb+to do sth”and“It+be+adjective/noun(phrase)+doing sth”.
During translating sentences with formal subjects into Chinese,four translationmethods were applied by the author,which are division,omission,inversion andsubstitution.It is hoped that the findings could bring some reference to legaltranslation.
Firstly,division is the most widespread used in the translation of sentences withformal subjects.Since the sentences with formal subjects is usually lengthy andcomplicated with many components,it can not be expressed explicitly if translated according to the original form.Besides,because of the difference between Englishand Chinese,the translator analyzed the sentence structure firstly to ensure anaccurate understanding of the meaning of the original text before translating,and thencut them into several short phrases or sentences during the translation.By this way,the translation will become more comprehensible,and the readers can easily get theinformation of the text.
reference(omitted)