硕士学位论文英汉歧义现象对比与翻译.docx

硕士学位论文英汉歧义现象对比与翻译.docx

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硕士学位论文英汉歧义现象对比与翻译

学校代码：

10254

密级：

论文编号：

上海海事大学

SHANGHAIMARITIMEUNIVERSITY

硕士学位论文

MASTERDISSERTATION

论文题目:

英汉歧义现象对比与翻译

学科专业：

　　　外国语言学及应用语言学　　　　

作者姓名：

　　吴兆丽　　　　　　　　

指导教师：

张海英副教授

完成日期：

　二〇〇八年六月　　　　　　

论文独创性声明

本论文是我个人在导师指导下进行的研究工作及取得的研究成果。

论文中除了特别加以标注和致谢的地方外，不包含其他人或其他机构已经发表或撰写过的研究成果。

其他同志对本研究的启发和所做的贡献均已在论文中作了明确的声明并表示了谢意。

作者签名：

日期：

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本人同意上海海事大学有关保留、使用学位论文的规定，即：

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作者签名：

导师签名：

日期：

ShanghaiMaritimeUniversity

上海海事大学

地址：

中国上海浦东大道1550号1550PudongDadao

邮编：

200135Shanghai,200135

电话：

（021）58855200P.R.China

网址：

AmbiguityinEnglishandChinese——

AContrastiveStudyandSomeSuggestionsonTranslation

ByWuZhaoli

UndertheSupervisionof

ProfessorZhangHaiying

AThesisSubmittedtotheCollegeofForeignLanguageof

ShanghaiMaritimeUniversity

inPartialFulfillmentof

theRequirementsfortheMADegree

ShanghaiMaritimeUniversity

June,2008

Acknowledgements

Thisthesiswouldotherwiseneverhavebeencompletedwithoutthehelpandsupportofmanypeople.

Firstofall,Iowemydeepestgratitudetomysupervisor,ProfessorZhangHaiyingwhoreadandrereadmywritinganddetailedcomments.Herremarkableinsightsandsuggestionshavemadegreatcontributionstothecompletionofthisthesis.

IwouldalsoliketoexpressmysincerethankstoProfessorWangJuquanforteachingushowtoconductacontrastivestudybetweenEnglishandChinese,ProfessorZhengLixinforhislecturesongenerallinguistics,ProfessorWangDaweiandHanZhonghuaforofferingtranslatingtheoriesandpractices.Theiradequatehelphashadaremarkableinfluenceonmycompletionofthethesis.

Finally,Igivemythankstomyfamily,friendsandclassmates,forgivingmeunfailingsupportandpatiencewhileIwaspressingonwithmypaper.

摘要

歧义是语言的普遍特征，是语言共性的表现。

但是，语言不同，语言的结构也就不同。

再加上不同民族的语言习惯、思维方式等的差异，使得语言在具有共性的同时，每一种语言还具有与众不同的特性。

所以，歧义现象在不同的语言中有不同的表现方式。

按照结构类型，语言被分为孤立语，粘着语和屈折语。

就这种分类来说，英语属于一种混合型的语言，其一般的形态结构是粘着语类型。

汉语是一种孤立语，其粘着语素很少（Robins,2000:

377-378）。

这两种语言不仅可以从结构方面，而且可以从意义方面进行比较。

再者，随着英语在语法上越来越向分析语发展，它与汉语的共性也越来越多，这使我们可以对这两者语言进行对比分析。

本文的主要目的就是对英汉两种语言中的歧义现象做对比研究，并将研究成果应用于翻译实践。

无论在英语中还是在汉语中，歧义现象都有很多种不同的分类方法。

为了便于对两种语言进行对比分析，我们把它分为四类：

词汇歧义，句法歧义，语义歧义及语用歧义。

有些学者认为词汇歧义与语义歧义是同一回事，因为有时它们难以区分。

然而，我们在这里分开来讲有两个原因：

一是我们从不同的角度强调这两种歧义；二是这种分类便于对英汉两语进行对比分析。

通过对比我们发现，英汉的词汇歧义在类型和引发原因上有很多相似点。

英语中的句法歧义比汉语丰富，而汉语的语义歧义比英语多。

由形态变化引起的语法歧义是英语所特有的。

汉语没有严格意义上的形体变化，但是有语意格。

这些都是由语言本身的特点决定的。

在对四类歧义现象进行分析之后，我们对翻译中遇到的歧义现象进行了探讨。

在将对比结果应用于翻译实践的同时，我们对歧义现象的翻译提出了几点建议。

关键词：

歧义，对比分析，语境，功能对等

ABSTRACT

Asapervasivefeatureoflanguage,ambiguityisareflectionoflanguageuniversals.However,becausedifferentlanguagespossessdifferentstructuresanddifferentnationshavedifferentlanguagehabitsandmodesofthinking,besidessimilarity,eachlanguagehasitsspecificcharacters.Therefore,ambiguityphenomenondisplaysitselfdifferentlyindifferentlanguages.Instructuraltypology,languagesaredividedintoisolating,agglutinative,andinflectivetypes.Englishisamixedtypeoflanguageinrespectofthethreetypes.RegularmorphologicalstructuresinEnglishareusuallyagglutinative.Chineseisclassifiedasisolating,inwhichboundmorphemesarerare.（Robins,2000:

377-378）Thesetwolanguagescanbecontrastednotonlyfromstructurebutalsofrommeaning.Furthermore,sinceEnglishhasbecomemoreandmoreanalyticalingrammar,itnowsharesmoresimilaritieswithChineseinmanyways.AndthismakesiteasierforustocarryoutacontrastivestudyofambiguityinEnglishandChinese.ThisdissertationaimsatacontrastivestudyoftheambiguityphenomenoninEnglishandChinese.

TherearemanydifferentkindsofclassificationsofambiguityinbothEnglishandChinese.Inordertomakeiteasierforustomakeacontrastivestudybetweenthetwolanguages,wedivideitintofourtypes,namely,lexicalambiguity,syntacticambiguity,semanticambiguityandpragmaticambiguity.Somescholarsthinkthatlexicalambiguityandsemanticambiguityarethesamethings,becausesometimestheyaremixedwitheachotheranditishardtosaywhatkindofambiguityitbelongsto.However,therearetworeasonsfordescribingthemseparately:

Oneisthatwewanttogiveemphasisonthesetwokindsofambiguityfromdifferentangles;theotheristhatwefinditconvenientforustoconductacontraststudybetweenthetwolanguages.

Bycontrast,wehavefoundthatlexicalambiguityinthetwolanguagesissimilartoeachother,bothintypeandinsource.SyntacticambiguityinEnglishseemstobericherthaninChinese,whilesemanticallystructuralambiguityinEnglishisnotsorichasitisinChinese.GrammaticalambiguityduetoinflectionendingsisaspecialtyinEnglish.TheChineselanguagehasnoinflection,buthassemanticcases.Thisisdecidedbythenaturesofthesetwolanguages.

Aftercomparingtheambiguityphenomenonofthetwolanguagesfromthefouraspects,wewillanalyzeambiguityphenomenonintranslation,tryingtoapplythecontrastivestudytotranslationandgivesomesuggestionsabouthowtodealwithambiguousexpressionsintranslation.

KEYWORDS:

ambiguity,contrastivestudy,context,functionalequivalence

Contents

Chaper1Introduction1

1.1literaturereview1

1.1.1Thestudyofambiguityinwesterncountries1

1.1.2ThestudyofambiguityinChina2

1.1.3ContrastivestudyofambiguityinEnglishandChinese3

1.2TerminologicalReview4

1.2.1Ambiguity4

1.2.2Vagueness6

1.2.3Polysemy7

1.3Theoreticalfoundation7

1.3.1N.Chomsky’stheoryofTransformational-generativegrammar&Ambiguity7

1.3.2Speechacttheory&Ambiguity10

1.3.3CooperativePrinciple&Ambiguity12

Chapter2AcontrastivestudyofambiguityinEnglishandChinese14

2.1LexicalAmbiguity14

2.1.1Homonyms14

2.1.2Polysemy16

2.1.3Categoricallexicalambiguity17

2.2Syntacticambiguity18

2.2.1Multiplemodificationambiguityinsubordinatestructure19

2.2.2Multiplemodificationambiguityincoordinatestructure20

2.2.3Grammaticalrelationships22

2.3Semanticambiguity24

2.3.1Differentsemanticrelationships24

2.3.2Differentscopesofnegation26

2.3.3Ellipsis29

2.3.4Semanticorientation30

2.4Pragmaticambiguities31

2.4.1AmbiguityofDeixis32

2.4.2Ambiguityofconversationalimplicature35

2.4.3Ambiguityofindirectspeechact37

2.4.4Ambiguityofcontextualrestriction38

Chapter3Ambiguityandtranslation42

3.1Factorscausingambiguity42

3.1.1Linguisticfactor42

3.1.2Culturalfactor42

3.1.3Factorofmodeofthinking43

3.2Ambiguityintranslation44

3.2.1Aprincipleoftranslation46

3.2.2ThreesuggestionstodealwithambiguityinE-C&C-Etranslation48

Chapter4Conclusion56

Bibliography58

Chaper1Introduction

Ambiguityisconsideredasakindofspecialrelationshipbetweentheformandthemeaningofalanguage;thatis,onelanguageformcontainsmorethanonemeaning.Howdoesambiguityarise?

Inasimpleword,itisdueto“theinfiniteuseoffinitelanguage”（QiuShude，1998:

599）.Theformsofalanguagearesimpleandtherulesofitscombinationsarelimited;however,themeaningsofalanguagearecomplicatedandunlimited.Accordingtouniversalgrammar,mostofourlanguagesareconstructedinalinearorderbycombinationoflinguisticsemioticsfollowingdifferentgrammaticalrules.Duringthisprocess,twoandmorehierarchicalrelationshipsoftenfallintooneformofasentencestructure,andthenambiguityarises.

Thisthesisconsistsoffourchapters.Chapter1isanintroduction,includingliteraturereview,terminologicalreviewandtheoreticalfoundation.Chapter2triestoconductacontrastivestudyofambiguitybetweenEnglishandChinese,onthebasisoftheclassificationoflexicalambiguity,syntacticambiguity,semanticambiguityandpragmaticambiguity.Chapter3proposesdifferentapproachestothetranslationofambiguity.Andthefinalpart,Chapter4istheconclusion.

ThepresentdissertationaimstofindoutthesimilaritiesanddifferencesbetweenEnglishandChineseintermsofambiguityphenomenonbyacontrastivestudy,andapplythecomparisontotranslation.

1.1literaturereview

1.1.1Thestudyofambiguityinwesterncountries

Thestudyofambiguityinwesterncountrieshasalonghistory,whichcanbetracedfarbacktoancientGreece,whenitwasstudiedwithinthescopeofphilosophy.Aristotle,awell-knownphilosopher,discussedambiguityinhiswritingDeSophisticsElenchis,inwhichhelistssixsourcesofmisunderstanding,namely,ambiguity,amphiboly,combination,divisionofwords,accent,andformofexpression.Amongthem,amphibolyreferstotheambiguitycausedbygrammaticalstructures,andcombinationindicatestheambiguitycausedbycombination.Later,theStoics,oneofthefamousphilosophyschools,hadasystematicstudyaboutambiguity（Catherine,1993）.TheGreeklinguisticphilosopherGalenproposesamorecomprehensivetheoryonambiguity.Hebelievesthatlanguageisthevehicleforcommunicatinginformationandlanguageexpressionhasthreekindsofeffect,namely,good,badandirrelevanteffect.Ambiguityistheembodimentofthebadeffect,andeverymisunderstandingiscausedbyambiguities.

Wecanseethattheearlyphilosophersandgrammariansbelievethatambiguityperformsanegativeroleincommunicationanditisgenerallyadeviationfromtheideallanguage.However,agreatturningpointappearsinSaussure’speriod,whendescriptivelinguisticscameintobeing.Themaintaskofdescriptivelinguisticsistoexplainlanguagephenomenon,andmanylinguistsbecameinterestedinexplainingambiguity.

Chomskyhasemphasizedthat