英文标签英语毕业论文.doc

中外服装品牌英文标签语言的跨文化研究摘要：随着中国市场经济的迅猛发展，近年来众多中国服装商品进驻国外市场，标签语言的国际化，标准化和规范化愈显重要，本文从跨文化角度，借鉴文体分析方法，结合10个中国服装标签的英文版本和10个英语国家的原版英文标签，从词汇、句法和语篇三个层面对中外标签的语言进行了分析。中国装标签的英文版本倾向于祈使句的使用，命令语气较强，句式结构临摹国外水准偏低，英语国家原版英文标签语气温和，静态，质感，词汇语篇方面，二者均使用简单词汇及文字图形结合。本文旨在通过上述分析和研究，总结出英文服装标签文本的特征和撰写技巧为中国企业提出可行性建议，进一步有效实现公司简介的商务沟通目标，同时期望能对中外服装标签语言研究提供一个新的视角，抛砖引玉，唤起大家对于这个领域的更多研究。关键词：服装标签；跨文化；语言比较iiia comparison of languages on the chinese and english clothing tags from the cross-cultural perspectiveabstract: with the rapid growth of chinas marketing economy, a lot of china-made clothes sweep into the foreign markets in recent years, so the internationalization, standardization and normalization of the languages of the clothing tags seem more important than they probably are. from the cross-cultural perspective and with the help of stylistic analysis, the author studies the languages of 10 chinese-version clothing tags and 10 original english-version clothing tags respectively in lexis, syntax and discourse. the english version of chinese clothing tags inclines to use the imperative sentences with strong tone of command, and their corresponding sentence structures and those of the original english clothing tags are not alike. comparatively the latter give a more static feeling in a milder tone. in the perspective of lexis and discourse, clothing tags, both home and abroad, use the simple words and add the words with pictures. tentatively, the author gets a general conclusion of the skills and characteristics of english clothing tags language. besides, according to the current problems existing in the chinese clothing tags translation, the author gives the relative advice to the chinese clothing company in order to promote the international commercial communication, besides, the author expects more studies on this field with a new view point.key words: clothing tags; cross-culture; linguistic comparisoncontents1. introduction12. literature review22.1 former studies on the clothing22.2 ideas on the clothings translation22.3 ideas on the clothing tags32.4 limitations of these early studies32.5 research method 32.5.1 research questions32.5.2 data collection and methodology42.5.3 organization of the thesis43. a cross-culture approach to english clothing tags translation53.1 cross-cultural studies63.2 cultural differences between english and chinese clothing tags63.3 nidas theory74. the linguistic characteristics of the clothing tags7 4.1 lexical perspective84.2 syntax perspective84.3 discourse perspective95. findings and discussion 10 5.1 general expression of the language105.2 findings in the english version of chinese clothing tags115.2.1 frequent use of noun, verb and gerund 115.2.2 present tense and imperative sentences125.2.3 combination of letters with pictures125.2.4 capitalization of english clothing tags135.3 problems found in the english version of chinese clothing tags13 5.3.1 use of the chinese english 14 5.3.2 lack or excess of conciseness 145.4 methods of translating clothing tags165.4.1 following established translation basic sentence structures to follow 16 reason to follow international standard17 6. conclusion176.1 summary of the research186.2 implications of the research186.3 limitations 186.4 directions for future research19references20comparison of languages on the chinese and english clothing tags from the cross-cultural perspective1. introduction1.1 significance of the thesisagainst the background of economic globalization and regional integration, english, as the most commonly used language in business activities, plays an increasingly vital role in our international community. translators and the producers, they have paid much attention to the translation of the clothing manuals and trademarks in english version. this paper tries to come up with some principles to be followed in the clothing tags translation by analyzing both the influence of culture over tags and the problems existing in current trademark translation. 1.2 the purpose of writing the article based on ten samples of the english and chinese clothing tags respectively collected from the market and the internet, the author attempts to overcome the shortcomings of the previous studies and illustrates the importance of clothing tags translation in the globalized clothing industry. through the comparison of the languages of the sample english and chinese clothing tags, the readers could get a better overview of the content of the clothes tags. then the author goes further to discuss about the definition and classification of the clothes tags and the principles of the content of the clothes tags, including courtesy, conciseness, clarity, completeness, concreteness, correctness, and consideration. after the detailed analysis，the author of this paper will try to discover that cultural differences implying in the english and chinese clothing tags provide some guidance to the translation of clothing tags at large. 2. literature reviewin this part, the author will survey briefly the previous studies home and abroad on the languages of the clothing tags.2.1 former studies on the clothing some scholars have conducted some research on the clothing trademarks and manuals translation from different aspects. sun yanxia (2007), a postgraduate of dalian maritime university, studies on translation of clothing trademarks from cultural perspective in her thesis. the thesis points out that we are born in a particular culture and taught to conform to it, and our feelings, thoughts and behavior are shaped by our culture, our experience takes place against a vast background of cultural presuppositions. as a result, clothing trademark translation is the language conversation across different culture. cao wei (2007) writes a paper named functionalist approaches to the translation of products instructions. this article emphasizes the functionality of the target text in the target culture. it suggests that 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. 2.2 ideas on the clothings translationwhen the clothing industry plans for a new foreign market, the successful rendering of trademarks and manuals into the target language (usually english), can stimulate the consumption of clothes and be conducive in opening up the overseas market for clothes produced by domestic manufacturers. manual, being an applied language, has become a widely used medium of communication in modern commercial society. its chinese-english translation strategy involves not only the transformation of languages, but also the cultural differences between chinese and english. clothing manuals translation has to take national culture, regional culture, foreign consumer psychology and other factors into consideration. it is a kind of cross-culture translation. translators should have cross-cultural consciousness and with a good understanding of the cultural differences so as to surmount the cultural obstacles.2.3 ideas on the clothing tagsthe essence of chinese and english brand clothes tags is a certain product of culture and some carrier of culture in intercultural communication as well. the translation of the clothing tag, which is a part of the manual, plays a vital role in establishing the international brand image of a company. it will give out a lot of information about the clothes and the company, if a good translation can express chinese cultural information and arouse the potential customers interest. besides the proper translation also helps people to have a better understanding of the effect of culture and helps to sell the product or inspires consumers purchasing desire. 2.4 limitations of these early studiesthe above papers mainly focus on the clothing trademarks or the manuals translation strategies from the perspective of culture disparity and successfully find out what cultural factors influence the translation of clothing trademarks and how to adjust these factors to suit for the translation. however, tag, as an important part of the manual, hasnt been talked about from the cultural perspective in the past time. this thesis is to examine the differences between the languages of the international clothing tags and studies some problems of the english version of the chinese clothing tags. 2.5 research method2.5.1 research questionsthe present study will answer the following questions:(1) what is the current situation of the clothing tags translation in english version in china, america and uk?(2) why is it urgent to improve the clothing tags translation in english version?(3) what are the problems of the chinese clothing tags language? (4) how do the cross-culture communication theory, nidas theory influence the translation of the clothing tags?(5) to improve the quality of the translation, what should the translator and the clothing industry do? 2.5.2 data collection and methodologythe data collected are mainly from the website or from the supermarket named tianjin yuandongbaihuo and the market on binjiang road, besides, the author asks a friend in america to help collecting some original clothing tags. all the examples can be found in these websites. the research method is mainly a qualitative one. comparative and descriptive methods will be adopted to analyze the problems.2.5.3 organization of the thesisthe thesis is composed of six chapters.chapter 1 introduces the background of the current research and the problem that is to be discussed in this thesis, and the significance of the current research. chapter 2 reviews the formers achievements, and analyzes the data and methodology. chapter 3 introduces the relative theories during the translation of the chinese clothing tags. chapter 4 introduces the current situation of the clothing tags language and compares chinese-english version and original english version of clothing tags from the linguistic aspect. chapter 5 analyzes the common problems existing in the translation and in this chapter the author makes the solution based on theories, analyses the common mistakes, and analyses the special expressions in the clothing tags translation field. chapter 6 summarizes the major findings and limitations of the present research.3. cross-culture approach to english clothing tags translationthis chapter is the theoretical explanation for clothing tags translation from the cross-cultural perspective. in this chapter, theories concerned with cross-cultural communication are employed as the solid basis to guide clothing tags translation practice. the following two termscultural approach and cross-cultural communication, are the key terms which need to be defined clearly in the thesis in order to make further statements on translation theories. cultural approach is a term used informally to refer to types of translation as a tool for cross-cultural or anthropological research, or indeed to any translation which is sensitive to cultural as well as linguistic features. such sensitivity might take the form either of presenting tl recipients with a transparent text which informs them about elements of the source culture, or of finding target items which may in some way be considered to be culturally “equivalent” to the st items they are translating. thus a translator who uses a cultural approach is simply recognizing that each language contains elements which are derived from its culture (such as greetings, fixed expressions and realia), that every text is anchored in a specific culture, and that conventions of text production and reception vary from culture to culture. an awareness of such issues can at times make it more appropriate to think of translation as a process which occurs between cultures rather than simply between languages. skopos theory, thick translation and translational action are all examples of this type of approach (mark shuttleworth and moira cowie 2004:35).cross-cultural communication or intercultural communication refers to any communication between people from different cultural groups. precisely speaking, cross-cultural communication is “communication between people whose cultural perceptions and symbol systems are distinct enough to alter the communication event” (samovar, porter and stefani 2008:48). 3.1 cross-cultural studieshofstede (2007) says that culture is the collective programming of the mind which distinguishes the members of one category of people from another. as for the definition of intercultural communication, the author means that is language interactions between individuals and groups perceiving themselves as belonging to different cultures. formerly, the cultural factor was hardly recognized as capable of affecting communication and social relations. now, there is a strong tendency to systematically identifying culture or cultural identity as the main cause of all relational or communication difficulties. in a world of international interdependence, the ability to understand and communicate effectively with people from other cultures takes on urgency. so if we are aware of the significant role culture plays in communication, we may not place the blame for communication failure on other people. many papers have explained us what are the potential barriers in intercultural communication; what we can do to overcome the barriers in the intercultural communication. 3.2 cultural differences between english and chinese clothing tagscultural differences refer to the differences between the contents of the cultures under comparison. more specially, cultures differentiate from each other in their contents such as language, knowledge, faith, view of life, view of value, way of thinking, ethics and conventions etc., resulting from different ecological and geographical environments.to describe the same notion or referent, each language may have its own language form. although the language forms are referred to the same notion or referent, they may be attached with distinct connotations in their cultures, no intrinsic relations could be found between their referential or conceptual means or connotations. it is the language users who have certain special feelings about the language forms on the basis of their cultural knowledge. it is said, words do not have meanings, and people have meanings for words. the emotions, viewpoints and positions of a certain people, which are formed in a certain culture, decide the meanings. words only have meanings in terms of the culture in which they function, as nida says (2000).3.3 nidas theorynida, as a translator of the bible, put forward many translation theories. in his book language, culture and translating (2003), nida stated that, in essence, there was not much difference between the two concepts: dynamic equivalence and functional equivalence. in fact, nidas definition of translation: “translation consists in reproducing in the receptor language the closest natural equivalent of the source-language message, first in terms of meaning and secondly in terms of style”(2003：18) is also another way of defining his dynamic equivalence translation. the cultural factors in translating are more significant than the purely linguistic differences. in nidas view, the most serious mistakes in translating are usually made not because of verbal inadequacy, but of wrong cultural assumptions (2008:29). biculturalism is more important than bilingualism in a successful translation. since words or idioms only have meanings in terms of the cultures in which they function, the translator cannot understand them adequately without careful consideration of their cultural backgrounds. this explains why most programs for the training of translators and interpreters send students to the countries where the acquired languages are spoken for at least half a year or more. only in this way can the students obtain the necessary sensitivity to the many special meanings of words and phrases (2000).4. the linguistic characteristics of the clothing tagsby the internet surfing and personal visits to the clothing markets and taking pictures of the different clothing tags and based on linguistic description, the author compares the languages used in the content of the english and chinese version tags. here the present study mainly focuses on three levels of stylistic analysis: lexis, syntax and discourse.4.1 lexical perspectivethe english version of the clothing tags, no matter made by the american or by the chinese, from the lexical perspective, resembles each other a lot and takes on some common features. they both frequently employ easily-understood vocabularies. as communication channels to the mass public, the clothing companies, especially the one that has international markets abroad, purposely designs the clothing tags carefully and delicately in order to satisfy customers of varied education background. the vocabulary of the clothing tags is limited and simple to be easily understood out of the maximum communication purposes.4.2 syntax perspectiveas for the pictures in the appendix, it seems clear that the first obvious character of the sentences used in the clothing tags is simple rather than complex. simple sentences are short, and easy for the reader to grasp with little efforts. rhetorically, simple sentences give the reader a sense of concise and brisk pace. a glance is enough for the reader to have an idea of what it is about. from the perspective of logics, simple sentences are linear in expression with dir