Onthe LinguisticFeatures and Translating Principles of Trade English

龙玲珑

Since China introduced the reform and opening policy thirty years ago， the course of foreign economic trade has made wonderful achievements. It is obvious that，as a common-used language， Englishplays an important role in it. After 13 years of arduous negotiation， China finally returned to the big family of the World Trade Organization as expected. So， as a communicationtool， Englishwill inevitably become more and more important. However， trade Englishas a variety of ESP （Englishfor Special Purpose） has its own particular linguistic traits and characteristics. As a result， trade translation is a complicated course， which involves not only translation theoriesand practice but also business background knowledge and there must be some effective ways to follow for translation.

trade English linguistic features translating principles

ⅠLinguistic Features of Trade English

Itis universally acknowledgedthat trade English， as well as other forms of general Englishshares a few common traits， but it still embodies its own particular linguistic features in such aspects as language， style and meaning and so on. In his book of General Linguistic Course， Ferdinandde Saussure， a modern linguisticmaster made great efforts to have a comparison between economicsand linguistics and drew a conclusion that the illumination of the science of economy was mainly relied on the form of language （Cat ford， J.C， 1965）.

1.Conciseness

In trade field， when it comes to trade negotiation talks and correspondence transmission， people often use as few words as possible to provide the greatest amount of information in order to save time and increase efficiency. Economists also try to be concise when expound problems. The trait is mainly shown in the following two aspects.

2.Logic

Trade Englishis one type of the practical style. It contains a variety of extremely complicated economicand trade activities. Logic has a great effect on trade language， especially the business contract， which belongs to a kind of legal document. It is generally believed that a certain amount of documentary works， to be exact， common adverbs are usedin business contract to make the whole text logic and concise.

ⅡTranslation Principles of Trade English

After years of translation practices in trade translation and observation of its linguistic features， contemporary Chinesetranslators point out the translation principles， namely， faithfulness， exactness and consistency. This is an inheritance and expansion based on China's traditional theories， and it also basically fits for the peculiarity of trade language and its information connotation （冯庆华， 1998）.

1.Faithfulness

In recent translation area， most of the translation theorists insisted thatfaithfulness should be the basic standard of translation experience. The definition emphasizesthe fact that people should express out the information contained in source languageappropriately. Here， faithfulness does not necessarily demand the consistency of grammar and sentence structure， but the equivalence of connotation of information. In other words， it is not the source languagebut its content that we must be loyalto.

2.Exactness

Since Englishtranslation involves different specialized subjects and branches， translatorsshould not only possess profound knowledge in all areas， but also reach high levels in both Englishand Chinese. If we have a translation practice in a special domain of trade English， we must master the concerning knowledge skillfully， such as important Englishexpressions， conceptions， sentence patterns， special vocabularies， different questions， etc so as to select the exact words correctly and achieve a good translation result （秦莉莉， 2004）.

（1）Obscure Words

Every language has its own style， so it is very important to identify the semantic meaning during the translation experience. The translation of trade Englishshould abstainfrom the presumable use of obscure words. So translators must be cautious to choose such words， which is one of the key factors in increasing the quality of translation.

（2）Main Idea

There are plenty of complicated lengthy sentences in corporation financial documents， so we must treat them carefully to avoidmaking seriousmistakes. To tell thetruth， all kinds of translation exercises， one should not distort thereal intention of the source-language， but especially in trade translation， one must get a general idea and key point of the source-language without making even a litter error， or else we cannot imaginethe terrible consequence.

3.Consistency

In the practice of translation， we should not only translate all types of style according to their respective standards and patterns， but also observe the principle of consistency. Without consistency， we are unable to talk about faithfulness and exactness at will （刘法公，2006）.

Ⅲ Conclusion

From above discussion and analysiswe can see that trade Englishis one of the most prominent fruits of the global economic development， so there is no doubt that trade English shares several common features with other forms of general Englishin some aspects， especially in the close correlation with natural Englishand mathematic language. At the same time， however， as specializedpractical English， it possesses such distinctive traits as conciseness and a sense of logic.It is universally acknowledgedthat all these characteristics of trade Englishform the foundation of translation practice.All in all， a rational attitude towards the linguisticfeatures and translation principles of trade Englishfor people is to practicetranslation principles on the basis of the unique linguistic features and protrude the linguistic features in the course of translation practice.

References：

[1]Cat ford， J.C. A Linguistic Theory of Translation[M].London：Oxford University Press，1965.65-67.

[2]Gideon Toury.A Rational for Descriptive Translation Studies[C].The Art and Science of Translation [C].Disposition 7，1980，special issue：45-48.

[3]刘法公.论商贸译名翻译的统一问题[J].中国翻译，2006，（3）：64-68.

[4]秦莉莉.经贸翻译的多视角[J].外语研究，2004，（4）：62-65.