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Cross-cultural differences in business interpreting

Source: China Paper Download Center [08-08-06 16:11:00] Author: Lai Hengjing Editor: studa0714

< p> Content summary: In cross-cultural business communication, Eastern and Western nations often encounter cultural conflicts due to differences in cultural accumulation, cognitive styles, and ways of thinking. Interpreters should consciously cultivate their own cross-cultural awareness, reduce or even eliminate pragmatic errors in business negotiations, and promote the success of cross-cultural communication.

Keywords: Interpretation, cross-cultural differences, cross-cultural awareness

Interpretation is a language communication behavior that converts information from one language form into another language form through oral expression. It is a basic communication method that human beings rely on in communication activities between different cultures and nationalities. Interpretation is extremely challenging. Compared with written translation, the outstanding feature of interpretation is a highly impromptu transcoding activity of language symbols. When interpreting, the translator does not have time to think over and over again, let alone consult a dictionary or reference book. Sometimes, the interpreter can predict the relevant content of the interpretation based on the situation at the scene, but cannot predict the specific details. Especially when interpreting for business negotiations, the unpredictability is even more prominent. This requires the interpreter to not only be proficient in the source language and the target language and related business knowledge and industry knowledge during business negotiations, but also understand the two cultures and understand that the differences between the two cultures are reflected in the language. Differences in expression. At present, cross-cultural communication has become a prominent feature of the era of globalization. Only by understanding more about the cultural differences of various ethnic groups, as well as the different habits, behavioral patterns, thinking patterns and conceptual awareness of people living in different ethnic environments, can we gradually improve the professional quality of business interpreters.

Classification of Cross-Cultural Differences in Interpretation

Take the translation of Chinese and English as an example. Since the peoples who use two different languages ??belong to Eastern and Western cultures, The difference is self-evident. The cultural orientation of one ethnic group may be unfamiliar, distinct, or even unacceptable to members of another ethnic group. The cultural differences that cause cultural barriers in the process of Chinese and English interpretation can be divided into two categories: verbal language and non-verbal language according to the way they are carried. This article mainly discusses the cross-cultural conflicts caused by differences in cultural accumulation, cognitive systems, and thinking patterns, which are the main contents of cultural differences faced in interpretation.

Differences in cultural accumulation

Both Chinese and English languages ??have accumulated a large number of idiomatic words (including idioms, proverbs, maxims, slang, colloquialisms, idioms, etc.) during their long-term use. , they contain rich cultural connotations and have strong national colors. The different geographical environments, living habits, ideas, religious beliefs, and traditional customs of the two language groups are all vividly reflected in these idioms. For example, in a business event, the Chinese side said something like "set up the 'one-dragon' service center to provide a coordinated process service for foreign investors in obtaining approval”. "One dragon" translated as "one dragon" will make foreigners confused. Furthermore, "dragon" means evil things in the West, but in China it means "auspicious". If you don't understand this situation, it is easy to cause misunderstanding.

Cognitive Differences

People have different ways and perspectives of perceiving and understanding the world around them. Within a nation or a huge social group, such differences usually cause less barriers to understanding, whereas between different ethnic groups and communities with different language systems, cognitive differences often cause barriers to understanding. Facing the same or different objects of perception, people of different ethnic groups choose and form words with specific meanings in their own way, and non-members of the ethnic group cannot understand their meaning. For example, there is an example in business negotiation interpretation: the Chinese side said, "We will not give you free notes, and we will pay on time." The translator translated it as "we shall not issue blank paper to you, we will pay you on time". Here, "making an idle note" is a Chinese term. Common people understand its meaning deeply, but foreigners do not understand it. In fact, "白" here means "empty". Of course, it does not mean that there is not a word written on the note, but that it does not count. It is similar to "writing a bad check". It can only be compared with the popular English saying IOU (I owe you (homonym) has a slightly similar meaning. If it is translated as "we shall not issue IOUS to you", only then can foreign parties understand China's true intentions.

Differences in thinking modes

Thinking is people’s generalization and indirect reflection of objective reality with the help of language and existing knowledge and experience as a medium. Thinking mode refers to the standard form of thinking activities.

The thinking modes of the Chinese and English speaking nations vary from culture to culture. The differences in thinking modes determine the diversity of language expression forms. There are significant differences in syntax between the Chinese and English languages. Therefore, when doing language conversion, it is necessary to adjust, arrange and combine according to the habits of the target language, so that the target language can be natural, communication can be smooth, and it can be accepted by the cultural psychology of members of various ethnic groups. If no adjustments are made, it will be difficult for the listener and may even affect correct understanding. For example, many special sentence patterns in English that are different from Chinese have caused obstacles to understanding in English-Chinese interpretation. These special sentence patterns are directly related to certain characteristics of the British national thinking mode. For example, "It" is used as the subject to express time, place, distance, words indicating the names of inanimate things are used as the subject, and the passive voice is widely used. This is all due to the thinking characteristics of the British people that strictly separate subject and object; many "it" is used as the subject The formal subject replaces the real subject in different forms and the complex and multi-level subject-slave compound sentences in English are probably related to the British people's emphasis on analytical thinking (while the Chinese focus more on comprehensive thinking); people in British and American countries are expressing their thoughts When speaking, it is customary to talk about the subjective situation first, then talk about the objective situation directly related to the subjective situation, and finally talk about other related situations. This situation is probably related to its linear thinking characteristics (the thinking of the Han nation is curvilinear); and some or all Inversion may be inseparable from its reverse thinking characteristics.

Understanding these thinking characteristics of the British people will help interpreters to "broadly" decompose special sentence patterns in English, break through the shackles of the surface structure of English sentences, break the shackles of the Chinese thinking model, and explore the true intention and meaning under the surface structure of the language. information and translate it according to Chinese thinking patterns and language habits