Translation competence from Chinese into English : differences in tense-aspect choices between native and non-native English speaking translators

Abstract

This study examines verb tense and aspect choices in Chinese-into-English translation and compares the choices made by native Chinese-speaking translators with those made by native English-speaking translators. The study used a data-driven approach based on a parallel Chinese into English translation corpus to evaluate the relative importance of the factors affecting tense-aspect choices by three groups of translators: native Chinese-speaking novice translators, native Chinese-speaking professional translators, and native English-speaking professional translators. The factors that were examined to evaluate their effect on tense-aspect choices included: the tense and aspect used in the Chinese source text; the lexical aspect of the English verb; the rhetorical structure of the Chinese source text; and the translator's language background and competence level. The study has found that the factors having the greatest influence on tense-aspect choices in Chinese-to-English translation are the tense and aspect of the verb in the source text, the lexical aspect of the verb, and temporal expressions in the source text. The two groups of Chinese-speaking translators (novice versus professional) differ in a statistically-significant way in their English tense and aspect choices, but both groups exhibit gaps in their understanding of some of the most important English tense and aspect forms, such as the present perfect and past simple tenses. Significant differences have also been found between professional native Chinese-speaking and native English-speaking translators in their choice of tense and aspect forms, most importantly at the discourse level. In addition, native English-speaking professional translators are found to have difficulty understanding Chinese tense forms expressed through context. This study suggests that native Chinese-speaking translators should become more native-like in their English tense and aspect choices at the grammatical level and at the discourse level particularly in complex sentences. It is hoped that the findings will help native Chinese-speaking translators improve the quality of their Chinese-into-English translations and provide insights that can be used to improve translator training programs.

Date of Award	2014
Original language	English