Transformation Rules between Different Parts of Speech

1、transformation rules between different parts of speechintroductionnow that translation is a language activity, its essence is to transfer the information or content of the source language by target language. so it may be defined as follows: the replacement of textual material in one language by equi

2、valent material in another language. it is also agreed that everything in one language is translatable by seeking its equivalence in another language，no matter how great the differences，of space，time and social relations between these two languages are. the also famous american translation theorist

3、eugene a.nida holds that “translation consists in the reproduction in the receptor language of the message of the source language in such a way that the receptors in the receptor language may be able to understand adequately how the original receptor of the source language understood the original me

4、ssage”. he insists that anything expressed in one language can nevertheless be expressed in another language; people with different languages from different cultures can surely communicate with each other，by seeking equivalence，reorganizing the form and the semantic structure of the original message

5、，in proper ways，of course. all this shows us that the cognitive ability of any nation will never get restricted owing to its “backward” language structure. then how to seek equivalence becomes the core of the translation studies，both in theory and practice. many excellent translation critics and wor

6、kers have devoted themselves to this core problem，and have undoubtedly made great contributions to the study of it. while source language and target language are nevertheless two different languages in the world. they all have their unique ability of forming a word，their unique word order，their uniq

7、ue signs of discourse. they have，at the same time，different special language forms such as proverbs and poems. differences between two widely different languages，especially irrelevant languages，such as english and chinese，in their structures，forms of expressions and usage are more conspicuous. what

8、we call “equivalence” is but an abstract concept and an ideal target to strive for，so it is far from being an easy job to practice it. it is not easy，but quite worth trying for.transformation between parts of speech has been studied by many scholar and experts and made great contributions, which are

9、 very useful in translation. even though those famous translators and experts had make great contribution and achievement in this field, but it does not mean everything has already been done, which is still far from enough yet. there is no doubt about the fact that these translators and experts have

10、 been working on it from different angles and has already been done to gather all those reasons concerning concrete transformation. compared with them，the author is trying his best in the thesis from different grammar models of translation，by analyzing a great many very good examples from some excel

11、lent translation materials，to find some rules of transformation from english into chinese，and also the reasons for transformation of various kinds. the purpose of this thesis is to contribute a little to the cause of translation and improve my translation level. above all, adoption of the technique

12、of transformation is directly aimed at achieving the maximal expressiveness.1 .1 definition of transformationtransformation can be defined in a way as follows: “by transformation，we mean that in translation a word in one language belonging to a certain part of speech is not necessarily to be turned

13、into one of the same part of speech in another language，i .e. no correspondence of part of speech between two languages necessary in translation，we cannot translate english mechanically word for word into another european language to achieve adequacy，still less can we translate english into chinese

14、in this way. this is determined by the fact that chinese and english are two entirely different languages. but we should know a translator is not supposed to change the parts of speech of the original work at will.” (eugene a.nida,language, culture and translating)eugene a. nida also pointed out tha

15、t，means of transformation between parts of speech，like the use of noun denoting the meaning of an action，is widely used in some languages such as english and greek. when we translate english into chinese，however，we can more often than not meet with this kind of transformation. then what we call tran

16、sformation between parts of speech in english-chinese translation may be defined in the following specific way as transformation of some certain parts of speech in english into some other parts of speech in chinese.1 .2 necessity of transformation in translationas we all known, transformation is one

17、 of the most important translation techniques in english-chinese translation. before we go on with the principles of transformation，it would be advisable for us to go back to morphological classification of chinese words. it is quite obvious that chinese characters are not inflective in form and the

18、refore not definite in part of speech when taken separately. in chinese，some words can only be used in certain applications，while others without any outward change may function now as nouns，now as verbs，now as adjectives，etc，the value in each case being shown by syntactic rules and the content. in m

19、odem english，the function of double part of speech is also very common，though not so common as in chinese. words identical in form may be used as different parts of speech. take the word round for example：this is the first round.(n.)这是第一周(或第一回合)。 round the comer slowly.(v.) 慢慢绕过这个角。the word “while”

20、similarly may be a conjunction in “while he was away”，a verb in “to while away time”，a noun in “he stayed here for a while” and. but a great many words in english belong to one word-class only.it has already been stated that we can not always get an appropriate corresponding chinese word for an engl

21、ish word of the same part of speech，and vice versa，and that if you replace each word in a sentence in one language with one or two words of the same part of speech in another，it would be substitution，and not translational all，and the sentence this substituted would sound very awkward，or even unintel

22、ligible to the reader. a good translator will therefore try by all means to reproduce the thought of the author faithfully in another language，quite disregarding the parts of speech of individual words so used in his version. lets take a few sentences for example. first we will see lenins famous say

23、ing “it is impossible to live in society and be independent of society.” you first draft of translation might be literal translation like the following:这是不可能的，生活于社会而独立于社会。how unnatural in chinese the sentence sounds! it may be improved like this:生活于社会而独立于社会是不可能的。this is probably the way in which mos

24、t of the people will translate the sentence. but the translation may still be modified to make it more expressive and impressive in chinese:生于社会，不能脱离社会。(或生于社会，不能超乎社会)it is evident that the above sentence sounds beautiful to the ear due to effective use of the technique of transformation of adjective

25、 into verb. in practical translation work，words in the original，if necessary，may be translated into words identical in meaning but different in part of speech. all in all，transformation of parts of speech of all kinds in translation is eventually aimed at expressiveness，which is of vital importance

26、in the course of translating activity. ii reasons for transformation between parts of speech in english-chinese translation there are more differences than similarities in sentence construction between the two languages, english is an alphabetic language composed of latin letters which represent the

27、 sound of words; whereas the chinese language is an ideographic language composed of logographic characters which represent ideas or things rather than the sound of words.2.1 differences in classification of parts of speech as devices for exchanging ideas，english and chinese share much sameness or m

28、any similarities in terms of vocabulary. for instance，both have various nouns to represent names of things or concepts; both have different verbs to refer to actions and states of various kinds; in order to describe characteristics of things or actions，english and chinese have such modifiers as adje

29、ctives or adverbs; besides notional words， they both have such forewords as prepositions and connective words. the differences in part of speech of the two languages exist likewise. for example，articles，relative pronouns，relative adverbs，participles，gerunds and infinitives are unique to english，all

30、of which dont exist in chinese. even words of the same part of speech function quite differently in the two languages. in english，nouns are more frequently used than that of chinese，whats more，nouns of english have richer connotations. therefore，many concepts representing actions are expressed with

31、nouns. in this case，when translated into chinese，they are often transformed into verbs and the adjectives which modify english nouns are accordingly transformed into adverbs.2.2 corresponding in meaning but different in part of speechnida holds that every language is capable of expressing the entire

32、 universe of experience with its own symbols，but in various ways. it is undoubtedly true that as long as we make a comparative study of the english language and the chinese language，it is not difficult to find that words of the same meaning in both english and chinese are not always the same part of

33、 speech. in other words，ideas expressed in one part of speech in english may or must be expressed in some other part of speech in chinese due to great differences between english and chinese.2 .3 differences in word-formationenglish and chinese both have their own unique word-formation，which to some

34、 extent accounts for transformation between parts of speech in english-chinese translation. word-formation in english，in its restricted sense，refers to the process of word variations signaling lexical relationships. it can be further sub-classified into the compositional type(compound)and the deriva

35、tional type(derivation).for the sake of our discussion，we confine our attention to the derivational type only. different from compound，derivation in english shows the relationship between stems and affixes. stem is the core of derivational words，we could get many corresponding words by adding affixe

36、s. although these words have different parts of speech, the core meaning is the same.2 .4 differences in the distance between deep structure and surface structure in chinese and english.besides the reasons mentioned above，there seems to be another important reason for the transformation of parts of

37、speech of various kinds, differences in the distance between deep structure and surface structure in both english and chinese.noam chomsky，a remarkable american linguist，holds that any language has both deep structure and surface structure; languages are more identical in deep structure than in surf

38、ace structure; in deep structure lie all the semantic and syntactic explanations; in changing deep structure into surface structure，some parts are omitted.then，we are forced to know what deep structure and surface structure really are. according to noam chomsky, deep structure is abstract syntactic

39、representations of sentences generated by phrase structure rules，but they are not the kind of sentences we ordinarily says need to change them into sentences we actually say，which are called surface structure. to realize this change，we need transformational rules，which are those rules to transform t

40、he deep structure of a salience to the surface structure. a transformational rule consists of a sequence of symbols which is rewritten as another sequence according to certain convention.it must be admitted that instead of going directly from one set of surface structure to another，the competent tra

41、nslator actually goes though a seemingly roundabout process of analysis，transfer，all restructuring. 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 in th

42、e receptor language which is most appropriate for the audience which he intends to reach. it has been confirmed by more and more translation practice that the process of transfer takes place on a near-kernel level。the reasons are as follows: first，the relations between the linguistic units of messag

43、e are most clearly marked at the keel or near-kernel level; second，languages exhibits far greater similarity of structure at the near-kernel level than they do on the level of the surface structures. by transferring on this near-kernel level，one is least likely to distort the meaning.in order to det

44、ermine the underlying relationships between elements in a phrase，we had better beneath the surface structure of back transformation，and determine what is the keel from which the surface structure is derived. this provides the clearest and most unambiguous expression of the relationship. back-transfo

45、rmation here of a surface structure to the underlying kernels may be regarded as a form of paraphrases ought to know， however，that this kind of paraphrase is intralingua instead of interlingua，i.e.，it is “another way of saying the same thing” in the same language. furthermore，there are no changes in

46、 semantic components: no additions，no deletions，only a different marking of the same relations between the same elements.it must be emphasized that such back一transformations are not be used as a model for translation，nor are they to be carried over wholesale into any translation into a receptor lang

47、uage. they are only the basis for transfer into the receptor language，since they provide not only the clearest and least ambiguous expressions of the relationships, but constitute forms which correspond most closely with those expressions likely to occur in receptor language.iii transformation betwe

48、en parts of speech3.1 transformation of nouns3.1.1 english nouns transformed into chinese verbsit has been universally acknowledged that english and chinese，which do not belong to the same language family， differ greatly from each other， but have almost the same capability to express themselves and

49、share the sameness more or less in vocabularies，because they are both the carrier of the ideology and culture of their own. they both have，for instance，various nouns to name a person，thing，quality， so on and so forth; various adjectives and adverbs to refer to the quality or characteristics of a thi

50、ng or an action; and of course，many other parts of speech that have the same or similar function to describe thing or an action. either english or chinese has its own unique characteristics of means of expression，that is，to be more specific，chinese is a language in which verbs are more widely used t

51、han those in english; while in english nouns are more frequently used and occupy a dominant position，then we have to，more often than not， transform some english nouns into chinese verbs in our practical translation from english into chinese.3.1 .1.1 an english noun, derived from a verb, is often tra

52、nsformed into a verb when translated into chinese. this phenomenon is frequently appeared in political works or newspaper. for example:there were also those, including some within the state department, who agreed with everything about the white paper except its publication.还有一些人,其中包括国务院内部的一些人,也都同意白皮

53、书上所说的每一句话,只是不同意公开出版而已。he urged upon citizens of the country the necessity of persisting in participation in political controversies 他告诫全国套民，必须坚持不懈地参加政治论战。3 .1 .1 .2 the noun that forms a comparatively steady collocation or a set phrase with its preceding verb making the fulfillment of an action impl

54、ied in the noun. the noun，as a matter of fact，plays a key role in this structure，that is，the meaning of the structure is，to a great extent，determined by the noun. thus we should transform directly the noun into a verb，paying little attention to the preceding verb. for example:they took a final look

55、at iron mike, still intact in the darkness.他们最后看了铁麦克一眼它依然安然无恙地耸立在黑暗中.dont make the mistake of using the title “mr” with the first name.不要把“mr”这个称呼和名字错用在一起。3 .1 .1 .3 when some nouns derived from verbs by adding such suffixes as “er” or “or” do not really indicate identity or some certain profession,

56、 but imply much more than the meaning of a verb，we are supposed to transform such nouns into verbs to make our translation be in better keeping with the expression habits of the chinese language。for example; i am afraid i cant teach you swimming. i think my little brother is a better teacher than i.

57、我未必会教你游泳。我想我的小弟弟比我教得好。talking with his son, the old man was the forgiver of the young mans past wrong doings.在和儿子谈话时,老人宽恕了年青人过去所干的坏事。3 .1 .1.4 when we have no way to find in our translation a suitable noun conforming to the expression habits of the chinese language for a common english noun that has

58、 no implied meaning of a verb，we might as well transform this noun into a chinese verb。as a result of this，our translated text is bound to read more fluently and naturally by means of the above-mentioned transformation. for example:a fire in the neighbors house can easily bring disaster to everyone.

59、 一家失火，四邻遭殃he was an asset at any party. he was lavish with flowers and expensive boxes of chocolate.每个宴会都有他的大驾光临，买起鲜花和高价盒装巧克力来，更是大手大脚。 some english nouns, which possess the property of verbs, we often transform the nouns to verbs when translated into chinese. for example;the sight and sound of our jet planes filled me with special longing.看到我们的喷气式飞机,听见隆隆的机