The Application of Communicative Dynamism and Thematic Progression Models in the Analysis of Biology-related Text

• Main Authors: Yu-lien Lee, 李有連
• Other Authors: Hsiao-chen Chiang
• Format: Others
• Language: en_US
• Published: 2009
• Online Access: http://ndltd.ncl.edu.tw/handle/44543829418815981000

碩士 === 國立彰化師範大學 === 翻譯研究所 === 97 === When producing target text, translators have to make the information flow easy for target readers to process; they have to deal with subject, verb and object-related word order issues; they have to choose a starting point to systematically develop target text; they also have to organize surface text in a coherent way. These issues can be classified into four categories: information structure, Communicative Dynamism constraints, Thematic Progression models and cohesive devices. Previous studies in these four subjects quote everyday English language as sentence examples. The present study is designed to expand from monolingual examples to English Chinese bilingual ones and quote examples from Human Physiology the Mechanisms of Body Function seventh edition. The purpose of this study is to find out whether the proposed theoretical frameworks, constraints, models and devices are applicable to both English and Chinese biology-related text. Brown and Yule’s patterns of English and Chu’s patterns of Mandarin are utilized to identify the given information in both languages. Chen’s Communicative Dynamism constraints are applied to account for Mandarin’s subject, verb and object ordering issues. Bloor and Bloor’s Thematic Progression models are adopted to explain both source and target text development. Cohesive devices proposed by Halliday and Hasan are employed to create surface text coherence. Translators can follow the framework of information structure to produce the target text which observes the rule of placing given information before new so that readers spend less time processing target text information. Translators can adopt the concept of Communicative Dynamism to follow more closely on the dynamism of Mandarin’s subject, verb and object word order. Translators can observe the Thematic Progression models of the source text and effectively reproduce the target text accordingly. Translators can utilize cohesive devices to create the coherence of the surface text. Most of the frameworks and models proposed in this study are equally effective in both English and Chinese biology-related textbook translation. However, the concept of Communicative Dynamism is more applicable to Chinese since Chinese language arranges its word order according to the amount of dynamism each sentence element carries.