A foreign language translation paper prepared for you: from the perspective of dialectical thinking, talk about the translation skills of scientific English and solve your writing problems.

Translation is the transformation from the original text to the translated text, which involves various contradictions. Scholars at home and abroad have written many books on translation standards, characteristics, principles, principles and methods. The theory of which disciplines should be introduced into translation studies has not been exhausted. Introducing dialectics into the field of translation, and understanding some skills in EST translation and their dialectical relationship from a philosophical point of view are helpful to solve some problems in translation activities, so it is necessary to discuss them.

I. Literature review

With the deepening of reform and opening-up, the translation of EST is becoming more and more important, and the research on its translation skills and translation theory is also endless. Hou, a domestic scholar, made a comparison between English for Science and Technology and English for Literature, pointing out that English for Science and Technology is more accurate than English for Literature. Based on the information equivalence standard of scientific translation, Liu proposed that the main function of scientific style is to transmit information. [2] Zheng Shengtao first put forward the bracket translation method for translating long sentences of EST into Chinese, and analyzed six usage occasions of bracket translation method with examples. [3] Qi Wei proposed that translators must understand the knowledge of related scientific and technological fields; Follow the principle of conciseness and accuracy to avoid mistranslation; Pay attention to literal translation, free translation, transliteration and formal translation methods; Pay attention to the conversion of parts of speech. [4] Yang Rong used the method of empirical research to explore the characteristics of subjective translation units and objective translation units selected by subjects in the process of English-Chinese translation of scientific and literary texts. [5] The "comparative translation of sentence patterns" and "English-Chinese scientific translation of key words" are strictly introduced. [6] It can be seen that there have been many achievements in stylistic analysis and translation of EST, and it is of certain value to discuss the Chinese translation of EST from the perspective of dialectical thinking.

Second, the theoretical basis

Dialectical materialism holds that dialectical thinking is based on the objective relationship between all things in the world, further understanding and perception of the world, and feeling the relationship between man and nature in the process of thinking, and then drawing some conclusions. [7] Its methods include: (1) contact method: it is a way to examine the horizontal contact of thinking objects from the perspective of universal contact. (2) Development method: it is a method to examine the past, present and future of the thinking object from the perspective of time by using the development concept of dialectical thinking. (3) comprehensive method: it is to examine the thinking object from a comprehensive point of view, that is, to comprehensively examine the horizontal connection and vertical development process of the thinking object from time and space as a whole. Scientific English translators need to deepen their understanding of translation skills in order to use them flexibly.

Third, the syntactic features of EST

EST (English for Science and Technology) is used to state what happens or appears in nature and science and technology, and it is used when people engage in scientific and technological activities, that is, to describe the works, papers and experimental reports of natural science majors, as well as the structure and operation instructions of practical scientific and technological means (including instruments, meters, machinery, tools, etc.). ), including describing its rules, characteristics and process, has the characteristics of objective and accurate expression, strong logic and rigorous structure, and its sentence patterns are often long and complicated, which brings some troubles to readers and translators. The main syntactic features can be summarized as the following "Wuduo", the specific contents are as follows.

1. There are many passive sentences and unqualified verbs.

English for science and technology itself aims to provide readers with objective scientific and technological information, and rarely uses personal pronouns as the subject, so it is often expressed in passive structures, non-predicate forms, prepositional phrases and other sentence patterns. Due to the limitation of subject matter and usage, that is, the explanation of the logical relationship between the components in a sentence, the language of science and technology reflects the internal relationship between the components of things more correctly and closely, thus forming a distinctive feature different from other styles.

2. There are many nominalization structures.

Scientific and technological style requires objective expression, accurate content and large amount of information, emphasizing existing facts rather than a certain behavior. In order to make writing concise, abstract nouns represent actions or states, and gerund forms are often used as noun and noun phrase structures. The article is more concise, the content is more objective, and the unit sentence conveys more discourse information.

There are many long sentences with complicated structures

The transmission of scientific and technological information needs to be accurate and standardized, and a complex concept or thing is often expressed in long sentences. Long sentences are usually composed of more passive sentences, more non-finite verbs, more nominalized structures, more clauses and coordinate elements. It is characterized by a large number of words and complex sentence structure, often with one or several clauses in a sentence, and may also be accompanied by several phrases in the form of non-predicate verbs, making it more logical and compact.

There are many common sentence patterns.

Some specific sentence patterns are often used in scientific English articles, thus forming a sign that the style of scientific English is different from other styles. For example, the antecedent "it" has a variety of structures, and the longer subject clause is placed at the back, guided by the formal subject "it", which avoids the top-heavy sentence structure and makes the writing more dignified and steady, in line with the style of EST.

5. Generally there are more present tense and present perfect tense.

The reason why these two tenses are frequently used in EST is that the former can better express the eternity of the content of the article, which shows that scientific definitions, theorems and formulas in the article are not limited by time and can be established at any time. The latter is mostly used to express the research results that have been discovered or obtained.

The above features rarely appear alone, and they are often used in a sentence, especially long sentences, which should be paid attention to when reading and translating. From the perspective of dialectical thinking, it is of great significance to explain the interdependence between pairs of techniques in EST translation, such as addition and subtraction, sequential translation and reverse translation, split translation and combined translation, positive translation and reverse translation.

Fourthly, dialectical thinking in EST translation skills.

English for science and technology is centered on objective things, that is, the so-called object center or concept center. Only by paying attention to dialectical thinking and using translation skills flexibly can we have proper translation.

Addition and subtraction of 1. translation

In order to faithfully reflect the syntactic features of EST, some words are added to conform to Chinese expression habits. Sub-translation refers to removing some irrelevant words from the original text without destroying the syntactic features of the original text, so as to make the translation more fluent. However, the addition and subtraction of words are limited and cannot be arbitrary. Appropriate treatment should be taken according to the needs of the target language.

Example (1) Original: These findings show that dark matter particles interact with each other, so that they "annihilate" each other, resulting in subatomic particles called quarks and their antimatter counterpart antiquarks. The heat generated by this annihilation prevents the cooling and contraction of the protostar cloud of hydrogen and helium, thus preventing the fusion reaction from taking place.

The results show that dark matter particles interact and annihilate, and at the same time release subatomic particles called quarks and their corresponding antimatter antiquarks. This mutual annihilation of dark matter particles will generate enough heat to prevent the protostar cloud composed of hydrogen and helium from cooling and shrinking, thus preventing the nuclear fusion reaction from happening.

Both "annihilation" and "heat" in the original text are nominalized phenomena with very abstract meanings. Without addition and translation, it is difficult to express the meaning of the original text clearly, because the main sentence "This annihilation produced heat" formed by connecting the words "produce" appears at the beginning of a long sentence containing 26 words. The translator adds "the sum of dark matter particles" to modify "annihilation" and "enough" to modify "heat" to ensure the clarity of the translation and make the meaning of the main sentence clear in the context. To examine this translation skill with horizontal connection, since words need to be added, words need to be subtracted. Subtracting words makes the translation more concise and concise on the basis of being faithful to the original. The words that can be reduced are pronouns, conjunctions, articles, prepositions and so on.

Example (2) Original: "In order to affect the flow, you must change the conditions under the ice sheet, because what happens on the ice determines the speed of the ice flow." Das said.

In order to influence the movement of the ice, we have to change the bottom of the ice, because what happens under the ice determines the speed of the ice, Das said. (translated)

The subject "you" was deleted from the translation. There are many sentences without subjects in Chinese, while English sentences generally have subjects, so translators must delete them according to the situation in English-Chinese translation.

2. Forward translation and reverse translation

Shun translation refers to dividing the original text into several parts according to the meaning group, and then translating each part from front to back according to the word order of the original English sentence, and vice versa.

Ex. (3) Original: Is it possible to get a scene to evolve positive feelings in Who Will?

Is it possible to find a taste that people like at first sight? (translated by Jin Xin)

Is it possible to find a smell that people like when they smell it? (The author tries to translate)

Example (4) Original text: People are just beginning to understand how the scene shows its effect.

People are just beginning to realize how perfume works. (translated by Jin Xin)

The working principle of fragrance is just beginning to be known. (The author tries to translate)

In example (3), the author tries to translate the translation with stronger tone in some specific occasions, while in example (4), the author tries to translate the translation with reverse translation rules according to whether the language environment can play a connecting role. Of course, it must conform to the purpose and intention of the original author. Shun translation and reverse translation, like everything in the world, are interrelated and influence each other. When translating scientific and technological texts, both forward translation and reverse translation will appear. According to the need and possibility, sometimes there are more translations in parallel and less in reverse. On the contrary, sometimes there are more backward translations and less forward translations. Using all the translations in sequence or using all the translations in reverse is too monotonous and inflexible, which affects the reading aesthetic feeling of the translations.

3. Individual translation and combined translation

The translation of long sentences in EST needs to be handled flexibly. On the premise of not destroying the original intention, the original sentence structure should be changed greatly, and then translated into two or more sentences, that is, long sentences should be shortened and split to avoid blunt Chinese sentences. Sometimes, it is necessary to translate two or more clauses of the original text together, that is, to make the translation coherent and have a sense of integrity. Both methods can make the translation more fluent.

Scientists believe that dark matter constitutes most of the universe, but this invisible substance is thought to have played a role in the evolution of the early universe, not in the formation of the first star.

Dark matter is invisible to the naked eye, and scientists believe that most of the universe is made of it. It is believed that dark matter played a role in the evolution of the early universe, but it had no effect on the formation of the earliest stars. (translated by Cao)

Example (5) has almost all the syntactic features of EST. First of all, it belongs to a typical long sentence, and its main sentence predicate is the passive form of the present perfect tense, with the "evolution" and "formation" of the nominalized structure. There are two ways to translate this sentence: split translation and combined translation. The translator translates "dark matter" and appositive "invisible things" into a complete sentence "dark matter is a substance that cannot be observed by human eyes" The "invisible thing" is separated from the "dark matter" in the main sentence by the preceding comma, and it is itself modified by a long attributive clause guided by which. The translator translates the attributive clause "Scientists think it constitutes most of the universe" and the bracket "Scientists think it constitutes most of the universe" into a complete sentence "Scientists think it constitutes most of the universe". Then the predicate part of the main sentence is translated into the clause "people think that dark matter played a role in the evolution of the early universe", and the subject "people" is added through addition and translation. Finally, the prepositional phrase "in the formation of the earliest stars" is translated into another independent and complete clause with inflectional "but" not "before it, but it has no influence on the formation of the earliest stars. As can be seen from Example (5), split translation and combined translation are interdependent and influence each other. This paper analyzes and translates the original text by the method of unity of opposites, objectively and comprehensively reveals the relationship between split translation and combined translation, and alternately uses split translation and combined translation, so that all translated sentences are naturally combined into a sentence with complete meaning and in line with Chinese expression, which greatly enhances the vividness and readability of the original boring scientific and technological articles.

4. Forward translation and reverse translation

Due to the differences in thinking, there are some differences between English and Chinese in expressing affirmation or negation. There are various negative expressions in English. According to Chinese expression habits, affirmative sentences in EST may be translated into negative sentences or affirmative sentences. Generally speaking, English scientific vocabulary includes never, no, not, non-, un-, im-, in-, ir- and -less, while Chinese vocabulary includes no, no, no, no and no.

Nearly 70% of available fresh water is used for agriculture. Global irrigation water consumption has increased by more than 60%. According to United Nations statistics, nce 1960. At the same time, poor irrigation and drainage measures lead to salt accumulation in about one-eighth of irrigated land.

Nearly 70% of available fresh water is used for agriculture. According to the statistics of the United Nations, since 1960, the water used for irrigation in the world has increased by more than 60%. At the same time, due to improper irrigation and drainage methods, about one-eighth of irrigation areas have salt water accumulation. (translated by Hu Deliang)

Example (6) There are no negative words such as "never", "no" and "no" in the original text, and there are no negative prefixes and suffixes. It is a positive sentence, but there is "improper drainage and irrigation" in the translation, which is a typical irony and negative sentence. The reason is that "the irrationalization and drainage of the poor" is a derogatory term, and "the poor" is combined with the nominalization structure composed of three abstract nouns. In the original text, "poor" means "inappropriate", which is caused by the different expression habits between English and Chinese. In mutual translation, the translator translates the affirmative statement in English into irony in Chinese, which accurately expresses the original intention and conforms to the standardization of language. This reciprocal translation method of positive and negative substitution has now become an important skill in EST translation.

Verb (abbreviation of verb) conclusion

Undoubtedly, people's dialectical thinking ability plays an important role in the understanding and translation of EST. English for science and technology is diverse in content, formal and solemn in style, objective in expression, strong in logic, complex and rigorous in structure and accurate in concept. Applying dialectical thinking to the practice of EST translation is conducive to better understanding and translation of EST texts, and has certain guiding significance for the translation of long sentences in EST. Because it can make the translator fully master and use the best translation skills according to his own writing characteristics and rules, and successfully complete the perfect communication between the author, the translator and the reader.

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