Translation Skills of Business Cards from the Perspective of Skopos Theory

Abstract

Business cards, representing the identity of a company and a person, play a vitally important role in business dealing. With the rapid development of globalization, economic ties between all countries in the world are becoming closer. And the use of business cards between countries is increasingly frequent. As a result, correct and standardized translation of the business cards is vitally important.

Current researches on the translation of business cards are mainly about one aspect of it, like translation of name or address. Also, almost of them do not view the translation from the perspective of skopos theory. Therefore, this paper systematically discusses the translation skills of business cards information from the perspective of skopos theory.

This paper consists of four chapters. The first chapter gives a brief introduction to business cards, including definition, characteristics and functions of business cards. The second chapter introduces the origin of the skopos theory, and three principles of it. The third chapter, from perspective of skopos theory, analyzes the translation skills of personal name, company name, personal titles and company address in the business cards in detail. In the last chapter, the significance of skopos theory in the translation of business cards will be discussed. This thesis discusses translation of business cards from the perspective of skopos theory, in order to provide readers with a relatively systematic analysis of it and to provide useful information for future practical translation of business cards.

Key words: business cards; translation skill; skopos theory