Các thủ thuật phương pháp và chiến thuật sử dụng trong dịch anh việt các bản tin tài chính ngân hàng

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI
UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES
FACULTY OF ENGLISH LANGUAGE TEACHER EDUCATION

GRADUATION PAPER

TRANSLATION PROCEDURES, METHODS AND
STRATEGIES APPLIED IN ENGLISH – VIETNAMESE
TRANSLATION OF FINANCE AND BANKING NEWS

SUPERVISOR: NGUYEN THI MAI HUU, M.A.
STUDENT: NGUYEN THI MINH THUY
YEAR OF ENROLMENT: QH2009

Ha Noi, May 2013


ĐẠI HỌC QUỐC GIA HÀ NỘI
TRƢỜNG ĐẠI HỌC NGOẠI NGỮ
KHOA SƢ PHẠM TIẾNG ANH

KHOÁ LUẬN TỐT NGHIỆP

CÁC THỦ THUẬT, PHƢƠNG PHÁP VÀ CHIẾN THUẬT SỬ
DỤNG TRONG DỊCH ANH – VIỆT CÁC BẢN TIN TÀI
CHÍNH NGÂN HÀNG

GIÁO VIÊN HƯỚNG DẪN : Th.s NGUYỄN THỊ MAI HỮU
SINH VIÊN: NGUYỄN THỊ MINH THÚY
KHÓA: QH2009

Hà Nội, Năm 2013


ACCEPTANCE

I hereby state that I: Nguyen Thi Minh Thuy, QH2009E15, being a candidate for
the degree of Bachelor of Arts accept the requirements of the College relating to
the retention and use of Bachelor’s Graduation Paper deposited in the library.
In terms of these conditions, I agree that the origin of my paper deposited in the
library should be accessible for the purposes of study and res earch, in accordance
with the normal conditions established by the librarian for the care, loan or
reproduction of the paper.

Signature

Nguyen Thi Minh Thuy
May, 2013


ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

First and foremost, my profound gratitude goes to my supervisor, Ms. Nguyen
Thi Mai Huu who has provided me with great support and instruction. Her enthusiasm
and valuable feedback have greatly facilitated my process of conducting the research.
Besides, my gratitude is extended to the substantial assistance from the faculty
and the university‘s library who gave me useful guidelines and documents for my
research.
Finally, I would like to express my sincere thanks to my parents and friends for
their considerable encouragement to my accomplishment of the thesis.

i


ABSTRACT

In the era of globalization, translation of information especially in such a
volatile market as finance and banking, plays a vital role in the development of each
country. Nevertheless, there has been restricted number of researches focusing on
translation of this field. Hence, the research was carried out for the purpose of
revealing translation procedures, methods and strategies applied in translating finance
and banking news.
Fifteen pieces of news in English and their translated versions in Vietnamese
collected from prestigious sources of news served as samples. They were carefully
analyzed in the light of Newmark (1988)‘s theory of translation procedures and
methods at three levels: word, sentence and text respectively. The findings show that
shift translation and through translation were among the most frequently used
procedures at word level. Translation strategies at sentence level involved passive to
active voice converting, shift translation and sentence splitting. Headlines, special part s
of articles were chiefly translated by communicative method. Likewise, text was
translated communicatively as a whole. It is suggested that translators should master
the translation procedures and methods and flexibly utilize them appropriately to the
readers. Moreover, regularly updating information about finance and banking news and
the global economy is also highly recommended for better translation.

ii


TABLE OF CONTENTS
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS................................................................................................... i
ABSTRACT ............................................................................................................................ ii

List of figures ........................................................................................................................... v
List of abbreviations ............................................................................................................. vi
CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION ....................................................................................... 1
1.1. Rationale ......................................................................................................................... 1
1.2. Significance of the study .............................................................................................. 2
1.3. Aims of the study .......................................................................................................... 2
CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW .......................................................................... 4
2.1 Translation....................................................................................................................... 4
2.1.1 Definition of translation.......................................................................................... 4
2.1.2 Translation Methods ................................................................................................ 4
2.1.3 Translation procedures ............................................................................................ 7
2.2. News ............................................................................................................................... 8
2.2.1. Definition of news .................................................................................................. 8
2.2.2. Types of news ......................................................................................................... 9
2.2.3. Characteristics of news ..................................................................................... 10
2.3 Business news, finance and banking news ................................................................ 11
2.3.1 Business news ........................................................................................................ 11
2.3.2 Finance and banking news.................................................................................... 11
CHAPTER 3: METHODOLOG Y .................................................................................... 13
iii


3.1 Sampling ........................................................................................................................ 13
3.2 Data analysis instruments ............................................................................................ 13
3.3 Data analysis procedure ............................................................................................... 14
CHAPTER 4: FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION ............................................................ 15
4.1. Translation procedures at word-level ....................................................................... 15
4.1.1. Translation procedures for translating Finance and banking terminology .... 15
4.1.2. Translation procedures for translating proper names....................................... 19
4.1.3. Translation procedures for translating acronyms ............................................. 22

4.2. Translation strategies at sentence-level .................................................................... 23
4.3. Translation methods for translating news headlines ............................................... 25
4.4. Translation methods at text-level .............................................................................. 29
CHAPTER 5: CONCLUSION .......................................................................................... 37
5.1. Summary of the study ................................................................................................. 37
5.2. Implications of the study ............................................................................................ 38
5.3. Strengths and weaknesses of the study..................................................................... 40
5.4. Suggestion for further studies .................................................................................... 41
REFERENCES ..................................................................................................................... 42
APPENDIX A - DATA ........................................................................................................ 44
APPENDIXES B – NEWS SAMPLES ................................................................................... 57

iv


List of figures
Figure 1: Translation procedures for translating Finance and banking terminology 15
Figure 2: Translation procedures for translating proper names

19

Figure 3: Translation procedures for translating acronyms

22

Figure 4: Translation methods for translating news headlines

26

v

List of abbreviations

SL

Source language

TL

Target language

SLT

Source language text

TLT

Target language text

vi


CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION

1.1. Rationale
The world that we are living has entered an era of globalization where almost all
countries and economies are connected together in a particular way. Every change in a
country exerts an effect on others. In such a condition, timely information or news
plays increasingly momentous role in the development of an economy.

In finance and banking area, where monetary policies of a nation change every
year, exchange rates fluctuate every day and stock prices tend to be volatile every
second, news is crucial. Accordingly, translation of financial and banking news from
English (major source language of information) into Vietnamese requiring not only
timeliness but also accuracy has become essential for Vietnam‘s economy to keep pace
with the development of the global economy.
Recently, in the context of economic crisis, finance and banking has not only
been an area seriously suffered from the depression, but also an effective key for
economic recovery. These days, some of the most burning issues on media have been
public debt, monetary reform and restructuring banking system. It is especially critical
for those who work in finance and banking field to constantly update information of
national and international changes. Once again, the importance of translating finance
and banking news is emphasized.
As a senior student of double major English – Finance and banking, the
researcher has been equipped with background knowledge of economics in general as
well as finance and banking in particular. Thus, it is interesting and useful for her to
conduct a study called translation procedures, methods and strategies applied in
English – Vietnamese translation of finance and banking news in the hope to identify
appropriate strategies for translating financial and banking news. Moreover, on

1


carrying out this paper, the author also aspires to broaden background knowledge of
her major and have a chance to practice translation skills.

1.2. Significance of the study
For other students, the research was aimed at providing them with theoretical
background in translation and translating finance and banking news. Moreover, there
were some suggestions for further studies, which may be useful for them afterwards.

With regard to other readers, especially those who were interested in finance
and banking field, the researcher hoped to help them have an in-depth look into
methods and procedures of translating finance and banking news and strategies to c ope
with difficult situations.

1.3. Aims of the study
The main aim of the study is to conduct an investigation into the English –
Vietnamese translation of financial and banking news on some of online newspapers in
Vietnam majoring in finance and banking in order to:


Identify translation methods and procedures applied in translating

financial and banking news.


Find out the most frequently used method and procedures.



Give some suggestions for financial and banking news translation

strategies.
The above objectives were satisfied on seeking for the answers of following
questions:


What are translation methods and translation procedures applied for

finance and banking news translation?

2




Which methods and procedures are the most frequently used in finance

and banking news translation?


What are translation strategies to deal with difficult situations in finance

and banking news translation?

3


CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW

2.1 Translation
2.1.1 Definition of translation
Documentary evidence of translation can be traced back for at least two
millennia and the present day international communication depends heavily on it.
However, there are still various definitions of translation.
According to Dubois (1973) ―translation is the expression in another language
(TL) of what has been expressed in another (SL), preserving semantic and stylistic
equivalences‖.
Similarly, Peter Newmark (1988) defined translation as ―rendering the meaning
of a text into another language in the way that the author intended the text‖.
Concerning with equivalent in translation, Hartman and Stork (1972) explained

that ―translation is the replacement of a representation of a text in one language by a
representation of an equivalent text in a second language‖. The aim of translation is to
accurately retain grammatical and lexical features as well as the factual information of
the original by seeking equivalent in the TL.
In short, it seems that the above researchers shared the same point of view when
focusing on the requirement that the content and style of the original text (SLT) should
be preserved as far as possible in the translated text (TLT)

2.1.2 Translation Methods
As mentioned, controversy has arisen among researchers about the definition of
translation and also, methods of translation have been of no exception. Newmark
(1988) provided eight main methods of translation.

4


SL

TL
Adaptation

Word for word translation
Literal translation

Free translation
Idiomatic translation

Faithful translation

Communicative translation

Semantic translation

Word-for-word translation
In this translation method, the SL word order is preserved and the words
translated singly by their most common meanings, out of context. Cultural words are
translated literally. The main use of word-for-word translation is either to understand
the mechanics of the source language or to construe a difficult text as a pre -translation
process.
Literal translation
The characteristic of literal translation is that the SL grammatical constructions
are conveyed to their nearest TL equivalents but the lexical words are again translated
singly, out of context. As pre-translation process, this indicates the problem to be
solved.
Faithful translation
Faithful translation attempts to reproduce the precise contextual meaning of the
original within the constraints of the TL grammatical structure. It transfers the cultural
words and preserves the degree of grammatical and lexical ―abnormality‖ (derivation
from the SL norms) in the translation. It attempts to be completely faithful to the
intentions and the text realization of the SL writer.
Semantic translation
5


This method differs from faithful translation only in as far as it must take more
account of the aesthetic value (that is, the beautiful and the natural sound) of the SL
text. While faithful translation is uncompromising and dogmatic, semantic translation
appears to be more flexible. It translates less important cultural words by culturally
neutral third or functional terms but not by cultural equivalents and it makes other
small concession to the readership.

Adaptation
This is the freest form of translation. It is used mainly for plays (comedies) and
poetry; the themes, characters, plots are usually preserved, the SL culture converted to
TL culture and the text rewritten.
Free translation
Free translation produces the matter without the manner, the form of the
original. Usually, it is paraphrased much longer than the original, a so-called ‗intralingual translation‘, often prolix and pretentious, and not translation at all.
Idiomatic translation
This method produces the message of the original but tends to distort nuances of
meaning by preferring colloquialism and idioms where there do not exist in the
original. As a result, the translated version is lively and natural.
Communicative translation
The effectiveness of a text is given priority in this method as it attempts to
render exact contextual meaning of the original in such a way that both content and
language are readily acceptable and comprehensible to the readership.
Among eight translation methods presented, semantic and communicative are
two basic approaches in translation because they fulfill two main aims of translations:
accuracy and economy. Semantic is more economical, written at writer‘s linguistic
level while communicative at readership‘s. However, two methods treat the following
items similarly: stock and dead metaphor, normal collocations, technical terms, slang,
colloquialism, standard notices, ordinary languages.
6


2.1.3 Translation procedures
According to Peter Newmark (1998), while translation method involves the
whole text, translation procedure is used for sentence and smaller units of language. In
the book ―A Text Book of Translation‖, he mentioned a number of translation
procedures. However, the main ones were transference, naturalization, through
translation, shift

or

transposition, modulation, cultural

equivalent, functional

equivalent, and descriptive equivalent.
Transference
Transference or loan word or transcription is a procedure in which a SL word or
expression is directly taken into TL with no translation. This procedure is usually
applied for proper names or new technical terms that do not have equivalent in TL.
Naturalization
In this procedure, a transferred word is adapted to the TL in terms of both
pronunciation and morphology.
Through translation
Through translation (or calque, loan translation) is the literal translation of
common collocations, names of organizations, components of compounds and phrases.
This translation procedure should only be used with already recognized terms.
Shift or transposition
This procedure involves a change in the grammar or part of speech of a word or
expression from SL to TL.
Modulation
Modulation means a variation in the message when it is translated into TL due
to a change in point of view. Three main types of modulation are one part-another,
passive-active and positive-double negative.
Cultural equivalent
In cultural equivalent, a SL cultural word or expression is translated by a
cultural word considered equivalent to it
7

Functional equivalent
Functional equivalent is the using of cultural-free word or expression in a
translation for a cultural word or expression in the SL
Descriptive equivalent
In this procedure, the meaning of a SL word is explained by several words
In addition to above 8 procedures, there is another should be mentioned which is
couplets
Couplet is the combination of two or more translation procedures for dealing
with a single problem, particularly with cultural words. The most frequently used is
transference mingled with a functional or cultural equivalent.

2.2. News
2.2.1. Definition of news
It can be said that the concept of news is as old as human beings. However, it is
difficult to find a conventional definition for this term satisfying every journalist,
sociologist, political scientist and recipient all over the world.
In the article, ―The term news – its concept and definition in Anglo – Saxon
tradition‖, Marek listed a number of different definitions of the term news provided by
many researchers in different fields of study in various periods of time. Among them,
the following of Melvin de Fleur and Everette Dennis in their book ―Understanding
mass communication‖ should be the most commonplace one: ―news is current or fresh
knowledge about an event that is gathered, processed and disseminated via medium to
a significant number of interested people‖.
Phillip H. Ault and Edwin Emery also shared the same opinion when defining
news as follows:

8

News is a report of an event, containing timely (or at least hitherto
unknown) information which has been accurately gathered and written by
trained reports for the purpose of serving the reader, listener of viewer.

Similarly, but putting more emphasis on the significance of news, Charnley
(1993) asserted in his book ―Reporting‖ that:

News is the current information made available to the public about
what is going on – information often of vital importance to men and women
trying to make up their minds about what to think and how to act. News is
timely concise, accurate report of an event: it is not the event itself.

In a word, to be considered news, a piece of information must not be previously
known, be delivered by mass media and have some effect on readers. Hence, in the
world of on-going changes, news as defined above has been playing increasingly
important part in people‘s life.

2.2.2. Types of news
Bell (1991) devided press news into four categories namely hard news, feature
articles (a small case of soft news), special topics e.g sport, business or financial, etc.,
and headlines (crossheads subheadings, bylines, photo captions). However, according
to Handbook of Independent Journalism, published by U.S Department of State in
2006, news can be grouped into two main types which are hard news and soft news
with slight difference.
Hard news or spot news, breaking news refers to factual, timely stories of
important events of almost every aspect of life ranging from politics, economics to
society. For the purpose of helping readers to get the information as quickly as
possible, hard news is usually written in a distinctive style.
9

In contrast, soft news is not time-bound to immediacy and appears in longer
articles to provide readers with background information of human-interest topics e.g
arts, entertainment and lifestyle. In terms of writing style, soft news writers usually
beat around the bush before getting to the central point and include their personal
opinions in the news.

2.2.3. Characteristics of news
Although researchers have not come to an agreement on the definition of the
term news, the features of news they have given seem to be in common. According to
The University of Vermont Journalism Blog, news has six main characteristics:
Timeliness, Impact, Proximity, Controversy (or Conflict), Prominence and Oddity.
Timeliness
This is one of the most important characteristics of news clearly reflected in its
definition. As a matter of fact, journalists always stress current information and try to
report it ahead their competitors. Nevertheless, timeliness of news depends on its types
of publication such as a weekly newspaper or daily newspaper.
Impact
It can be said that ―if it affects reader - physically or emotionally - it might be
news‖. To be more specific, the news that has deeper impacts on larger number of
people all over the world is worthier breaking the news than others.
Proximity
Another deciding factor of news is proximity which means that news should
report events happening in the place where readers feel connect to rather than some
faraway places. The distance examined can be physical or psychological.
Controversy (or Conflict)
A topic that is being argued is more newsworthy that the one that is already
agreed. Psychologically, controversies are favor of most people and the more tensions
a conflict between subjects, the more interesting and dramatic the news would become.

10


Prominence
The event that involves someone whose name or job is well known (such as the
President of the U.S) and easily recognized by the public is more likely to be interest of
readers.
Oddity
As people tend to be struck by extraordinary things, unexpected or unusual
event, conflicts or controversies, drama or change are more newsworthy than the
commonplace. The news of this characteristic belongs to the ―soft news‖ type since it
is produced with the aim of satisfying people‘s interest and curiosity.

2.3 Business news, finance and banking news
2.3.1 Business news
Business news reports events of business activity – an important aspect that
directly affects human‘s life and attracts their interest. For a long time, this type of
news has become an indispensible part of newspapers or even the main content of
many well-known journals and newspapers such as the Journal Business News
(nebusiness.co.uk) and the Wall Street Journal (online.wsj.com). It has been also much
easier to get access to business news via the mass media, especially by using the
Internet thanks to the development of technology.

2.3.2 Finance and banking news
Finance and banking is a special activity of the economy which has an
enormous influence on other activities and aspects of human life. As a result, finance
and banking news accounts for a considerable proportion of newspapers.
Translation of financial news, as translation of other field, relates to conveying
information and the author‘s intention from the SLT to readers of the TL. Micheal

11


Donald, in ―Financial news and press‖ (1999) regarded translation of financial news as
―rendering news or events in finance from a foreign language into another, keeping full
intention of author and informative capacity‖. This kind of news-translation can be
classified into two major groups which are general economic translation and financial
translation. The formal often deals with the economy at macro and micro level while
the latter concerns daily news relating to the financial market (including commodities,
money, banking, stock, etc.)

12


CHAPTER 3: METHODOLOG Y

3.1 Sampling
The sample selecting process took place in two main stages which were
randomly picking up translated news from Vietnamese online newspapers and looking
for its source in English.
At the first stage, thirty articles of Vietnamese news on finance and banking
were collected from some of popular online newspapers majoring in economics in
general, finance and banking in particular. For example, some of the pieces of news
were from famous business newspapers such as vneconomy.com, tinkinhte.com,
tapchikinhtedubao.mpi.gov.vn, thesaigontimes.vn ( Thời báo Kinh Tế Sài Gòn Online),
stockbiz.vn, infotv.vn etc. With those websites, the writer had to find news in the
finance and banking or global category. On the other hand, with websites specializing
in finance and banking area such as taichinhdientu.vn, ebank.vnexpress.net, it was
easier to obtain suitable news. The reason why the writer chose those online
newspapers was that they were prestige news sources leading in providing information

about economy nation-wide and followed by a large number of readers. Moreover, they
were contributed by the work of skilled and knowledgeable journalists as well as
translators.
After that, the English versions or the sources of those articles were carefully
searched

in

well-known

English

online

newspapers:

cnbc.com,

ft.com,

businessinsider.com, financialexpress.com, online.wsj.com, etc.

3.2 Data analysis instruments
The primary instrument applied in this research was content analysis method.
Basing on Newmark‘s theories of translation methods and translation procedures, the
data were analyzed to find out the answer to the research questions.

13

3.3 Data analysis procedure
Firstly, as the main aim of the research was to point out which translation
procedures and translation methods utilized in translating finance and banking news
from English to Vietnamese and which one is the most frequently used, the qualitative
method was applied. The data collected were analyzed in three ascending levels: word
level, sentence level and text level.
At the lowest level, the researcher worked with small units such as
terminologies, acronyms and proper names in each text in the light of Newmark‘s
theory on translation procedures. Before analyzing, those units in English and its
equivalents in Vietnamese were put into separate column so that the analysis could be
made easier.
At the next level – sentence, some typical structures were examined to find out
the translation procedures applied when translating them. Moreover, changes when
translating sentences such as sentence splitting or information order were also taken
into account.
At the highest level, the text was reviewed as a whole in terms of translation
method. The writer only focused on two main methods which were semantic and
communicative method (two major approaches in translation)
With regard to headline, because it often served the most important function in a
piece of news and had unusual structure, headline was considered a special unit in this
research and studies separately.
Secondly, after finding out procedures and methods employed in translating
different units of the text, quantitative method was used to make conclusion on the
frequency of those procedures and methods.
Thirdly, an overall conclusion was made as an answer for all research questions.
Besides, some application of the result was drawn out in translating finance and
banking news as well as in translating business news.

14

CHAPTER 4: FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION

This chapter includes findings after all the news collected was carefully
examined at three levels: word level, sentence level and text level respectively. In
terms of word level, three following kind of words and phrases were picked up:
terminology, proper names and acronyms to study their translation procedures.
Headlines were exceptional case and separately studied due to its special features.

4.1. Translation procedures at word-level
4.1.1. Translation procedures for translating Finance and banking terminology

In Oxford Advanced Learner Dictionary, terminology has two fold meaning. On
the one hand, it is a set of technical words or expressions used in a particular subject.
On the other hand, it contains words used with particular meanings.
According to Sager (1990) (in Vu Van Duy, 2012), terminology ―refers
deliberately to specific concepts within particular subject fields and therefore constitute
a sub-system of knowledge‖ such as medical terminology, scientific terminology etc.
Unlike general language word, terminology usually has one specific meaning in a
particular field and thus requires reader background knowledge to understand and
translate it correctly.
It can be said that a variety of translation procedures were employed to translate
terminology in collected finance and banking news samples. Among them, literal
translation was frequently used the most, followed by shift translation. Functional
equivalent procedure ranked third in frequency. Other procedures such as descriptive
equivalent and naturalization were accounted for the same small proportion.
Especially, modulation was used only once. Detail about usage proportion of each
translation procedure were presented in the below pie chart.

15

2%
2%

1%
2%
Literal translation

13%

Shift translation
Functional equivalent
Transference

56%

24%

Naturalization
Descriptive equivalent
Modulation translation

Figure 1: Translation procedures for translating Finance and banking
terminology

Literal translation
The procedure mainly used in translating finance and banking terminology was
literal translation. The author considered literal translation was a translation procedure
in the thesis because it dealt with each smallest unit – single word. In this procedure, a

word in source language was literally translated into the target language with one of the
meaning(s) appropriate with the particular context without any changes in grammar or
point of views.
Take the term ―appreciate’ for an example. Oxford Advanced Learner‘s
Dictionary presents four different meaning of this word such as recognize the good
qualities of somebody of something, to increase in value over a period of time, etc.
However, in the context of ―…high growth rates and appreciating currencies‖, the
second meaning suited the best and the term was correctly translated as ―tăng giá trị‖.
Some other example of literal translation were ―credit‖ rendered as ―tín dụng‖,
―deposit‖ as ―tiền gửi‖, ―index‖ as ―chỉ số‖ etc.
Phrases with at least two words were also handled by this procedure in which
the meaning of the phrase was the combination of literal meaning of its word
components. After being literally translated, the meanings of each word were adapted
16