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As for translation, there are already a great number of available and mature guiding theories. First introduced here, the pragmatic translation, also called the practical translation or applied translation, is the kind of translation of practical texts, for the utmost purpose of transmitting information with the principles of pragmatics. It is distinguished especially from literary translation that conveys strong emotions and aesthetic feelings.
In pragmatic translation, different from the "Functional Equivalence" theory promoted by Nida, it is rather of considerable importance to employ heterofunctional translation, a translation method put forward by Christina Nord in instrumental translation theory, adopted in the process of functional domestication when the functions of source texts are not so suitable for target texts because of cultural or temporal distance, since the functional equivalence is not so absolute in translating practice owing to the incommensurability between two languages and cultural backgrounds. Chinese and English have different dominant functions, namely the appellative function in Chinese while the informative, in English; translators are, therefore, expected to make proper transformation of functions between source texts and target ones, according to Reiss (贾, 2004:9).
Although there have already been some mature and complete theories governing translating practice, the insufficiency of methodology guiding the interpreting practice has raised the author's attention and aroused her interest. For the same characteristics, i.e. to transmit information between two languages precisely and accurately that translation and interpretation share, the author harbors the idea that interpreters can use the instrumental translation theory for reference to better serve the interpreting practice, especially the "heterofunctional translation".
In this paper, it concentrates on the importance and effectiveness of heterofunctional translation theory in on-site interpreting work, particularly with the conference interpretations of ancient verses in the speeches of Chinese leaders as examples. Also, to fulfill this in-depth research of the guiding theory, the author penetrates into this field by virtue of analyzing the outcomes of the questionnaire. It turns out that transferring the original text functions, be they expressive or vocative, into informative function, is necessary and favorable in transmitting messages, for the purpose of achieving preciseness and accuracy, as well as validity. Therefore, this paper will not only resort to Peter Newmark's classification of text functions and Christina Nord's heterofunctional translation but also will make comparisons with the Skopos theory and the "functional equivalence" theory, by elaborating on and analyzing specific examples of conference interpretations of ancient Chinese verses in speeches of leaders.
The author hopes that through her further research into this area, the "heterofunctional translation" can be regarded as an indispensable and beneficial technique in interpreting practice.
2 Literature Review
As for translation, there have already been loads of guiding theories that were put forward by celebrated linguists, such as Karl Bühler, Jacobson, Reiss and Christina Nord, to name just a few. On the achievements of the former linguists, as well as their translation practice, each of them had developed their own distinguished and practical theoretical system, which has made the whole English language progress and change with each passing day. This chapter will mainly concentrate on the theories on pragmatic translation in chronological order to see the advancement in this area.
2.1 Introduction to Heterofunctional Translation
In 1988, in her book Text Analysis in Translation: Theory, Methodology, and Didactic Application of a Model for Translation-Oriented Text Analysis, Second Edition, Christina Nord, a famous German female functionalist, pointed out that “Translation is the production of a functional target text maintaining a relationship with a given source text that is specified according to the intended or demanded function of the target text (translation skopos)” (2005:32). She came up with new research findings in analyzing the functions of texts that in translation practice, there are two types—the documentary translation and the instrumental translation. Documentary translations (such as word-for-word translation, literary translation, philological translation and exoticizing translation) serve as a document of a source culture communication between the author and the source text receiver, whereas the instrumental translation is a communicative instrument in its own right, conveying a message directly from the source text author to the target text receiver. An instrumental translation can have the same or a similar or analogous function as the source text (2005:80). As for instrumental translation, she claimed that it comprises three forms, namely the “equi-functional” translation that the target text can serve the same functions as the source text, and the “heterofunctional translation” that when the source text functions cannot be fully realized by the target text receiver, they may be adapted by the translator to make sure that the target text functions are compatible with the source text functions and do not offend against the sender’s intention, and the “homologous translation” that intends to achieve a similar effect by reproducing in the target culture literary context the function the source text has in its own source culture literary context, which is often found in the translation of poetry.