英语毕业论文之消除不良商标翻译的策略

英语毕业论文之消除不良商标翻译的策略 消除不良商标翻译的策略 学生姓名: 学生学号: 院(系): 年级专业: 指导教师: The Strategies to Avoid Bad Brand Translations Contents Abstract„„..„„„„„„„„„„„„„„...„„„„..„„„„„„„„„I Key Words„„„„„„„„„„„„„„„„„„„„„„„„„„„„„...I 摘 要„„...„„„„„„„„„..„„„„„„„„„„„„„„„„„„......II 关 键 词„„............................................................... ....................................................................I I Introduction„„„„„„„„„„„„„„„„„„„„„„„„„„.„„...1 I. Introduction of Brand Name„„„„„„„„...„.„..„„„„.........................2 A. Edification of Brand Naming Question„„„.„„„.„...„„„.„„„„...2 B. Necessity of Professional Correction„„„„„........„„..„„„„„„.......2 C. Values in Brand Name„„„„„„„„„„„„„„„„„„„„„„...3 II. Present Situation of Brand Translation„„...„„„„„„„„„...„„„„.. .5 A. Unsuccessful Cases of Brand Translation„„„„„„„„„„„„„„„.5 1. Lack of Aesthetic Psychology„„„„„„„„„„„„„„„„„„..5 2. Filled with Indelicacy„„„„„„„„„„„„„„„„„„„„„...6 3. Impropriety to British and American Idiom Culture„„„„„„„„„„6 B. The Difference between Bad Translation and Good Translation„„„„„„...7 III. Reasons for Bad Translation and Strategies to Solve the Problems „„„„„„9 A. Reasons for Bad Brand Translation„„„„„„„„„..„„„„„„„9 B. Strategies to Surmount these Difficulties as a Translator„„„„„„„....10 1. Knowing the Characteristics of the Translated Brand and Commodity„...11 2. Understanding the Target Countries’ Culture and Tradition „..„„„......11 3. Attention to the Innovation in the Brand Translation„„„„„„„„...12 4. Attention to the Standardization of the Language„„„„„„„„„„12 C. Strategies to Solve the Problem from the Other Aspects„„„„„„„„..13 Conclusion„„„„„„„„„„„„„„„„„„„„„„„„.„„„„..15 Acknowledgements„„„„„„„„„„„„„„„„„„„„„„„„„..16 Bibliography„„„„„„„„„„„„„„„„„„„„„„„„.„...„„.17 Abstract In recent years, there are barriers and risks caused by international culture difference in export corporations of China. Now and again, there are cases that the sales of the export commodity are blocked because of mistranslation of brand names. In this paper, through unsuccessful cases, the author wants to make the readers know that an unsuccessful translation to the brand may make the sales of products fall quickly. The basic reason that caused the different results is cultural difference, which really makes the translators have difficulty in translating the brand names. Then, how to surmount the barriers caused by cultural difference in brand translation becomes an urgent task for the translators. Firstly, for the translators，the characteristics of the brand and commodity should be taken into consideration; secondly, the target countries’ cultures and the psychology of consumers are involved in translation of the brand names; finally, the translators should pay attention to the innovation and the standardization of the language. In a word, only when the translators improve their skills of translation, should the export of China have a bright future. Key Words Brand translation; export commodity; culture difference 摘 要 当前,中国出口企业正面临国际文化差异造成的传播障碍与风险,因商标翻译失误影响商品出口的案例时有发生。本文将通过案例分析说明不成功的商标译名可使产品的销售一落千丈。 关键词 商标译名;商品出口;文化差异 Introduction With the development of the international labor-division and the tense of globally integrative economy, the commodity circulates from state to state frequently. The country which wants to enter into the global market must achieve it by means of advertisement. As the words and time are limited, now in this thesis the author only discusses a part of it---the improper brand translation in China. Through the unsuccessful cases of the brand translation, the author wants to make the reader especially the enterprise and the person who engage in the brand translation pay more attention to it. And nowadays China has entered into WTO, so the translation will play more and more important role in international communication. So it is certain that the brand translation will be an essential part in the international trade. This article is not an investigation about the skills of the translation but a research of the methods to surmount the cultural difference in brand translation. The brand translation is just like a pair of wings for the enterprise to enter into the global market. While most people think that translation is a difficult work, which lies in the fact that it is difficult for a foreigner to understand the country’s cultural background knowledge. And the brand translation is not just a language transformation problem, and it also has great relationship with the cultural elements, such as: social culture, folk custom, esthetics, psychology, economical market and so on. How to solve the problem effectively? From the point of translators, they should first know the characteristics of the translated brand and commodity; at the same time, they should also understand the target countries’ cultural traditions and the psychology of consumers; what’s more, they should pay attention to the innovation and the standardization of the language. From the point of the export corporations, they should put more investment on the brand name’s translation. ?. Introduction to Brand Name It is well-known that the trademark of the commodity just as human’s name, the word has had been usually referred when the manufacturers would like to build a new brand as the public praise. It would be an invisible property to the enterprises. A. Edification of Brand Naming Question “A rose by any other names would smell as sweet” was said by Shakespeare. It is a pity that he is wrong from the point of marketing. What we see is only what we want to see, what we smell is also what we want to smell. Actually, the core that inculcated to the customer is not all kinds of characteristics of the product but mainly brand names. Brand names whether perfect or poor have great effect in spreading and selling the commodity. What has been hidden in the brand name? Brand name works just like a key, which open the spiritual door that lurked in the customers. The great master of marketing and father of localization theory A. Rees points out: “In the times of localization, the most important marketing decision you need to make is to give a name to the commodity.” Brand name is the most distinctive sign relied by the customer when they are selecting and buying something. To a large number of products, brand name plays the role as the main instrument of making the brand different from the others. B. Necessity of Professional Correction With the progression of the globally integrative economy, the international trade has become the vital impetus to promote the economical development of the countries in the world. The brand translation then plays an important role on external sales situation. Just like the American scholar A. Rees said: “Brand name translated well or badly, maybe directly leads millions of dollars difference to the sales achievement.” At present, associate professor Dang Fangli from Shanghai Finance and Economics University points out, the export corporations in our country now are confronting with the barriers and risks caused by international culture difference. Now and again, there are cases that the sales of the export commodity are blocked because of mistranslation of the brand names. Nowadays, the translated brand has been turned into the important “face” to the products of the enterprises and brand globalization. A good translation to the brand may make the brand well-known; on the other hand, an unsuccessful translation to the brand may make the sales of the product fall quickly. In recent years, although many enterprises of our country have made congratulatory achievement in brand translation when they are ready to enter into the international market, there are still some problems need to be solved. In the following, there are unsuccessful cases about the brand translation of the internal and external enterprises, hoping to arise the attention of the readers especially the translators and the export enterprises. “Win at the starting line with a good name” which describes the importance of a good brand translation to the marketing of the corporation said by the experts in Brand Institute of China. As the brand name is considered to be the “golden business card” in export, and we can see the difficult situation that the export enterprises and the translators must face up, so it is significant to find a professional correction to them and do well in translating. C. Values in Brand Name How much would a good brand name values in the market? The answer to this question is that we can see from many companies’ high investments to the name or trademark. The symbol of the American Airlines was collected at a high levy of 5.8 billion U.S. dollars. And Mobil Oil has granted 1.4 million U.S. dollars for the selection of trademarks. The organizational psychology, linguistics, sociology and statisticians have taken six years to investigate about 55 national languages and folk, then advise more than 10,000 drafts, and finally select "Exxon" as its brand which become the world famous brand. Nowadays, more and more companies spend millions of even hundreds million funds to the activities of advertisement and promotion. In many of the areas, the noises of the competition are increasing gradually. And how to make the customers hear our voice clearly? As the force of the brand name is rising gradually, most of the investments are put in the brand names whatever the commodity brands or the company brands. The brand name is one of the aspects that never change, and it is the requirement to enter into the global market. So, it is worth of trying our best to the brand translation work, and makes it become one of the invisible properties with great values. ?. Present Situation of Brand Translation Many trademarks of the domestic brands have wonderful connotation in Chinese, however, “When in Rome, do as the Romans” is always obeyed not so well when they are translated into another language, resulting in decreasing of the brand competitive ability. Unsuccessful Cases of Brand Translation As brand translation is a cross-cultural movement, when our commodities export aboard, we should choose words that are according with language culture and custom in target country. Otherwise, the translated name would become the obstruction in export commodity. There are several reverse examples: 1. Lack of Aesthetic Psychology The very representative failure appeared in brand translation in the export commodity: our country has been exported one kind of lipstick, which was called “Fangfang”. This name was truly very good in Chinese, and as soon as the Chinese saw “Fangfang”, they were unable to restrain in the heart to raise the beauties’ association: Not only as if the consumer saw a beautiful young girl, moreover has probably smelled the fragrance from her body. But its pronunciation was the Chinese pinyin “Fangfang”, as soon as English reader took a look, they couldn’t help have the feeling of terror in the heart. Because Fang is exactly an English word, one of the meanings is the dog’s long tooth, and the other is the snake’s poison-tooth. Therefore, what the English readers imagined was not the young girl with the lipstick on, but actually the vicious dog or the poisonous snake that makes threatening gestures, just like the Chinese image of the “ghost”. Because of this failure in translation, the lipstick’s sale is probably not difficult to imagine. The scented soap “Mifeng” by the literal translation was “Bees”, which was supposed to be correspond completely translation. But the English readers didn’t like this translation actually. Because on the body of the bees there is fabric thorns which can’t be seen clearly, so they believed that to scratch the commodity in the body would make them feel uncomfortable. It is certain that this is another unsuccessful case of the corporation which wants to make their commodity enter into the global market. The “i” playing card which was transliterated into “i puke” was also supposed to be totally fixed the translation skill and the principle. But the translator had not thought absolutely that this Chinese brand name happened to be two English words “i” very large or particularly and “puke” vomit 贺川生:1997 . The people who played the playing cards many are for entertainment without doubt, and the Chinese “i” was also a very ideal name, but the English would be shrunk back at the sight of the translated name. Not only as it was not joyful for the human, instead had it made one feel disgusting. With such bad translation, how could you desire excessively that the translated name would bring you millions of benefits back? 2. Filled with Indelicacy The sign “Wuyang” for a kind of bicycle was translated into “Five goats”. Goats may be regarded as not the proper man in English, or the sex maniac, therefore all the men or the women were not willing to ride on it. The gentleman shirt “Ziluolan” was translated into pansy. Pansy does not have the masculinity meaning, sometimes refers to the man who does the homosexuality. So, parts of the gentleman were very possible not to purchase such kind of shirt. 3. Impropriety to British and American Idiom Culture One kind of export commodity ---the dry battery was so-called “Baixiang”. In theory, the translation “white elephant” should be 100% correct, but they have never realized that “a white elephant” is a fixed English phrase, which means “a burden possession” or “useless”. “Bailing” was a kind of pen made in Shanghai. Someone translated it into “White Feather”. However, in the English speaking countries nobody asked about the commodity, as the idiom “to show the white feather”, which means to escape from the battle and the white feather symbolizes the coward. From the above，all of them are about the Chinese enterprises who want tentered into the global market. And the similarity is that all of them are lack of translating the brand name properly into the target countries’ language. And they are all doing the same thing that is achieving half the result with twice the effort. In other word, brand translation has become the obstruction of the export in China. B. The Difference between Bad Translation and Good Translation Many well-known international brands from ordinary names were translated into Chinese with ingenuity. If we compare the marketing to be a campaign, then a good brand name becomes a flag that never comes down. Marketing international brands on a global scale must surmount all sorts of cultural barriers inevitably, like language difference, expense custom difference, and religious difference and so on. So, the overseas brands which have infiltrated the Chinese market always have careful consideration to the naming question. It is suggested that we should surmount the linguistics concept and risen to the stratification plane of the cultural psychology and the market relocation. So, suitable cultural transformation is necessary when we convey the original text information faithfully to the target readers. For example, as to the brand “Yutu”, why does the translator translate it into “Moon Rabbit” but not “Jade Rabbit”? That’s because “Yutu” was the under tree’s rabbit which accompanied ChangE to live on the moon in the myth of our country. Therefore, it stands for moon. So it is proper to translate it into “Moon Rabbit” which according to Chinese culture. And on the other way, this translation also makes the English readers not misunderstand or mistake it for the rabbit which is made of jade. As to the photo-print machine “Rank Xerox” from US, the translator in Hong Kong transliterates it into “Lankeshile” which makes the readers so puzzled that they can’t catch up with the meaning. Latter, it becomes very popular by the translation “Quanlu”. “Xerox” means “duplicate with printing of static electricity” in Chinese, although it doesn’t have the same meaning with “entire record”, there is still relationship between them. It is said that the translation “Quanlu” with cultural transformation comes from the pen for the god. The Lotus Root powder from Xihu Hangzhou is one of the famous nourishments. In history, it had been taken as “articles of tribute” which was offered to the emperors every year. Although most of the Chinese people knew this point, as to the British and American, they rarely knew. So, when the translator translated “Oufen” into “Lotus Root Starch” according to the Chinese-English Dictionary and advertised it to the foreign consumers, they were not willing to purchase the commodity. That’s because it was easy for people to put on weight when they ate the “starch”. And most of the westerners feared to put on weight. After altering it to “powder” or “pudding”, the sales was obviously increased. It is a failure to translate “Baixiang” into “White Elephant”, but the brand “Baixiong” to “White Bear” is truly a success. According to Chinese-English Dictionary written by Beijing Foreign Language Institute, one of the meanings is polar bear and the other is white bear. It seems proper to translate it into “Polar Bear”, but in recent years, the international politic situation has changed. And “Polar bear” refers to one of the political influence in the world additionally. Therefore, the translation “White Bear” is good. The brand “Jinji” clock which has a high reputation in China, but there is a minor defect that the translation “Golden Cock” is not proper. In Britain and American, “cock” not only represents “the rooster” but also “the male organ” which causes this translation to be vulgar. In order to make the translation elegant, it is proper to change “cock” into “rooster”. This change can surly make the original text readers and the target readers have the same aesthetic feeling. ?. Reasons for Obstructions and Ways to Solve the Problem Why a commodity with the same brand becomes popular in the native country but often meets with refusal in another country. There is an invisible reason comes from the cultural difference in different nations. And, how to surmount the barriers caused by cultural difference in brand translation becomes an urgent task. Reasons for Obstructions in Brand Translation In the following, there are three reasons from the points of culture values, psychological structure, and region and humanities environments. 1. Different Culture Values The culture values of China have the deep humanism spirit, human’s value display through “the introspection”, “deny oneself”. The Confucianist initiates “to practice moral culture, the governing, make the world peaceful” which emphasis aware ability on moral standard. Professor Yang Chaoyang with American nationality thinks that: “the Chinese pay great attention to the product contents of the advertisement, relating to the real diagnosis. It bases on the religious behavior which has the fatalism color and the overall orientation, the relationship of which establishes on the real diagnosis.” But the westerner pays great attention to the external forms of the product advertisement, reflecting the feeling and view effect. 2. Different Psychological Structure The stable psychology structure in China, which takes “humanity”, “pragmatic”, “endurance” as the basic contents, forms the Chinese uniquely cultural psychology. It manifests it in details first for greatly unified idea: attach importance to authority, but indifferent to the fact; psychology of following the crowd: recognize the community, ignore the individual; consciousness of small farmer: hold high regard for material benefit, have low regard for thought; the human sentiment is supreme: think much of morals, think little of the effect; egalitarianism: value matching, undervalue competition. But the westerner’s psychological structure is complex and loose. They consider “individual”, “the cognition”, “the behavior” as its basic contents, which forms the westerner’s unique culture psychology. 3. Different Region and Humanities Environments China is one of the four big ancient nations with the fertile place, which takes the inhabited area as the center and spreads out “the family standard”, attaching importance to family. But the western country is inferior to Chinese history to be so glorious. They are lack of homeland idea not only because the region to be narrow and small but also as they are moving frequently. So they emphasize the free life and individual risk surmounting.(刘士军，继红:1994) The brand translation belongs to the advertisement culture which is the subculture attaching to the main culture. Along with world economics’ development, the international exchanges of the economy, science, and technology are gradually increased. So, the world is developing forward to the direction of “global village”. If we can understand deeply the similarities and differences between the Chinese and western culture when translates the international brand, without doubt can cause this brand spreading east, west, south and north with a clear goal and effectively. B. Strategies to Surmount These Difficulties as a Translator The cultural and language difference in brand translation really adds a lot of difficulties to the translators. So, most translation experts think that the translation work should be done by the translators in target countries. As only the translators in target countries can know well of their cultural trend, stylish language and cultural root, it is more possible for them to translate the brand name which is favored by target people. It is a pity that Chinese are not generalized in most countries, and very few foreigners can understand the profound culture of China. So, the Chinese translators are taking on the arduous task of introduce the Chinese commodity and culture abroad. The Chinese commodities which want to enter into the global market must go along with good translated name. The following are some points for attention: 1. Knowing the Characteristics of the Translated Brand and Commodity First, grasp commodity characteristics: one is quality, including the commodity quality, producing area, function as well as performance. The other is personal status, including commodity’s technological level, culture affective tone, price as well as creditworthiness. Second, understand the original advertisement plan. As to the market, the choice of the advertising market and assurance of the characteristics, including advertising audience’s age, sex, occupation, education level and so on. As to the message, the selling points and the demand spots of the advertisement, defining the correct information of the advertisement. As to the media, the advertisement chooses what kind of media for transforming the information to the goal audiences. As to the motion, the related marketing and promotion which caused the advertisement to effect. As to the measurement, all kinds of appraisal anticipate before and afterward the matter. As to the money, the investments that put on the advertisement. 白智勇:1991 Only the translators know very well about these situations, can they grasp the key points in translation. 2. Understanding the Target Countries’ Culture and Tradition First, Regardless of any countries and nationalities, all have taboos. Regarding the national custom forms a lot of years ago, we should give the essential respect, which can also affect the sales of the export commodity at the same time. For example, the English do not like the elephant, quite like the panda; the Italian and the Spanish like the rose, envy with the chrysanthemum; the Japanese abstain from the lotus, the fox and the badger, but like the oriental cherry, the turtle, and the duck; the Russian thought the yellow rose meant to break ties with friends or be inauspicious; the French and the Belgian thought the walnut, the peacock and the chrysanthemum are the unlucky things; some countries in North Africa consider the dog’s design as the taboo; the Islamism countries envy with the pig, the trademark with the dog and so on. Second, when we translate the brand, the related color messages are also noticeable. The Belgian most envy the blue color, they think the blue color is inauspicious; the Turk forbid with the variety goods to arrange the house and the living room, absolutely, they believe the variety is an ill omen; the Japanese envy the green, but the Indian like the green actually. It is not strange that each kind of taboos is possible, by no means can we talk clearly in a few words, as it is one kind of special knowledge in the ethnology. As the translators of the international brand, they should study vigorously and do well the promotion for the product in international market. 3. Attention to the Innovation in the Brand Translation Just like the Italian proverb “Tradutori, traditori” translation is traitor . Advertisement language itself is filled with rich imagination and the enormous creativity, the promotion is its only goal. When the translator translates the brand into another language as aspects of social culture, language, national psychology reasons and so on. Such kind of translation is not just “one to one” corresponding symbols transformation, and the translator must reorganize the surface layer form of the primitive structure in the precise of the maintenance of the semantic in-depth structure basically coordinate with each other and the function’s similarity. And we must also pay special attention to unify the native culture, because of the new trend of the international advertisement: changes from “global” to “glocal” global localization . In the request that the translator should maintain the spirit of the national culture in brand translation, as “the culture only belongs to a nationality, then belongs to the world”. 4. Attention to the Standardization of the Language First, use the standard language in the target countries, including standard pronunciation and typeface. It has vital significance regarding the establishment of the domestic market, expansion of the commodity circulation and the economy relationship, development of the overseas service and so on. If the translator does not use the standard language and writing, which can affect the brand’s value, thus influence the enterprise’s economic efficiency. Second, the translator must be cautious in using the dialect. There is very big limitation in brand translation with the dialect, which can only have an effect in some dialect region. Therefore, it is not suitable for the translator to abuse the dialect in brand translation. Third, when the translators are translating the international brand, they should respect certain existing translations that are already thoroughly in the target psychology of advertisement. And it is not necessary for them to innovate the word again, which may cause the general consumers be puzzled to the commodity, thus decrease the sales volume greatly. Obviously, it is not an easy matter for the Chinese translators to dance with the dual shackles of the accidental language, moreover can they dance with the exquisite dancer’s posture is certainly even difficult. As it is related to the aspects of the language, social culture, folk custom, esthetics, psychology, economical marketing study, advertisement principle knowledge and so on, which may cause the translator’s responsibility great and also has significance. From the above, we can see that as a translator, not only need be acquainted with the language but also be familiar with the culture, whatever the native or the target country. Otherwise, they can’t be a qualified translator. The theoretician of translation Nida E.A has pointed out: “Speaking of the true success translation, familiarity to two cultures are more important than grasping two languages, because the words and expressions only then have significance in its function cultural context.” It suggested that the English learners who want to become a translator should have cultural realization when learning a foreign language, not only because of its qualification question but the obligation on their shoulders. C. Strategies to Solve the Problem from the Other Aspects To the country, it should complete the policy of the related departments. The department which is in charge of the commercial management should formulate some corresponding principles and systems, and hold the pass for the brands and advertisements of the export commodity. To the language learners, as we can see from the thesis that the relationship between the language and culture are so close that the language learners must have cultural realization when learning the target language. “Learn a foreign language but not the related culture is the best way to create a fool who is good at talking”. To the enterprise, they should think more about the naming question. It is true that a good translated name plays a determining part in spreading and consolidating the commodity sales. To the education department, the international trade department and the advertisement department in the university should pay more attention to train the related talent, providing human resource guarantee for the brand translation. Conclusion A good commodity with an excellent name is just like to make beautiful things more beautiful. It is a pity that most of the brand translations are so bad that it has a bad effect on commodity sales in China. In fact, there are great values hidden in the brand names. As the brand translation is not just a language transformation problem, it also has great relationship with the cultural elements. So the cultural difference really makes the translators have difficulty in translating the brand names. As to the ways to solve the problem in the thesis, the author has given suggestions that the translators should first know the characteristics of the translated brand and commodity; at the same time, they should also understand the target countries’ cultural traditions and the psychology of consumers; what’s more, they should pay attention to the innovation and the standardization of the language. That is to say, as long as the translators surmount the barriers caused by cultural difference in brand translation, it would surely bring millions of benefits back. In other word, as long as the academy and the enterprises circles pay more attention to the brand translation and improve our level of translation, there will be a bright future of the export in China. Acknowledgements I would like to take this opportunity to express my deeply thanks to my tutor----Tang Guoping, who offers me academic and constructive advices on composing this paper. His patient help and timely encouragement are worthy of high acknowledgement. On the process of composing the paper, he also played an important role in indicating a bright road in my future writing. Then, I also greatly appreciate the help coming from my respectable teachers, Professor Deng XingYi, Liao Hong, Huang TianHong, and Li Liqin. Thirdly, I am very grateful of my lovely friends, Kong Jiaxi, Li Xiuli, Liu Siming, Wei Qiuju, who offered me quiet situation to compose my paper and discuss with me about my paper. Last but not the least，I would like to express my thanks to them who spend their time in reading my paper, and I will be grateful if you could give me your advice. Bibliography [1] Nida，E.A."Language, Culture and Translating" .zhonghuafanyi.net/translation-techniques/110029120.6>ht ml [3] 商标译名成中国企业走出国门的“拦路虎” // . enorth.. 2006-09-16 [4] 国际品牌命名启示 /html/pinpai/123410.html 2007-2-25 [5] 白智勇(广告艺术中的策略[M](北京. 北京工艺美术出版社, 1991 [6] 邓炎昌.语言与文化:英汉语言文化对比[M]. 北京. 外语教学与研究出版社, 1989 [7] 贺川生.商标英语[M](长沙.湖南大学出版社, 1997 [8] 刘立军，继红(市场中的“魔鬼”---现代广告[M](北京(中国经济出版社, 1994 [9] 卢红梅(华夏文化与汉英翻译[M](武汉. 武汉大学出版社，2006 [10] 戎林海. 翻译与文化背景知识[J].《外语教学》1990, 1 [11] 汪春. 国际著名品牌趣译[J](《英语周报》2006-3-12 [12] 王燕希. 广告英语一本通[M].北京.对外经济贸易大学出版社,2004 [13] 王应云(商务英语[M](成都(西南财经大学出版社，2001 [14] 徐伊宇、李广荣(跨文化交际与商标翻译 [J](《华南理工大学学报》2002, 6 [15] 詹蓓译名与文化――从“可口可乐”谈起中国翻译2001, 1 ? [16] 褚东伟.Translation as a Business [M]. 武汉. 湖北教育出版社, 2003