Abstract

The information age expose people more information from foreign media. Because the existence of language gap between the writers and the readers, English newspapers and magazines should be translated into Chinese by translators before delivering to end readers. In an article, the title is of crucial importance, therefore, making the translation of titles a challenging task. What is the best way to express the thoughts in the original articles? Should we adopt the translation strategy of Domestication or Foreignization? The task is left to translators’ concern.

This thesis uses Nida’s and Venuti’s translation theories as theoretical basis, and titles in The Economist magazine as the object of the research. In this thesis, the titles are classified into five categories: Slang and idioms, Metaphor and simile, Allusion, Transferred epithet, Other language. And four translation strategies are proposed and discussed based on the domestication and foreignization theory, they are: closest equivalence, translation compensation, fit translation and cultural preservation.

This thesis is not only a novel practice on the classical domestication and foreignization theories, but also provides direct guidance in news translation to translators.

Key words: domestication, foreignization, The Economist, title translation, culture