1 Introduction With the acceleration of the pace of China's economic development and opening to the international exchanges and increasing economic cooperation, external links and international exchanges are also increased. Public signs are essential component of the global cities, language environment and the human environment of tourist destinations. Thus, translating Chinese public signs becomes more important. But now there exists some pragmatic failures in the translation of public signs in the major cities in China. Therefore, the need of the study of pragmatic failures in public signs is increasingly urgent. Because of no grasping of the pragmatic equivalence principle, there has been information bias, error information and communication that are pragmatic failures. The pragmatic failures include pragmatic language error and social pragmatic failure in some public signs in China.68148

1.1 The Previous Study of Translation of Public Signs

With the increasing number of the failure in the translation of public signs, many experts studied from different aspects. Some experts study on the principles of translation of translation of public signs. (Lv Hefa, 2005:23; Luo Xuanmin, 2006(4):66-69) Others study the theory of the translation of public signs. (Zhang Hong, 2007(6)69-71; Zhao Weifei, 2010(05):116-119)  Some also do many researches on the skills of the translation of public signs. (Zhong Xiaohong, 2010:112-114)论文网

There is no denying that previous research has a relatively complete treatment of the related issues of translation theories and principles for public signs, but the practices of translation of public signs remain to be further studied. This article is intended to describe and analyze common phenomenon of pragmatic failure in translating public signs, describes some of the principles and methods of the translation, and gives the corresponding recommendations on translation.文献综述

1.2 Research Design and Methodology

This article discusses the translation of public signs from the pragmatic perspective, analyses the classification and characteristics of the signs, and refers to a large number of examples to raise some problems we now have in translation of public signs. Combining deductive analysis and documentation, case arguments and theoretical arguments, this article also put forward some suggestion in translation, we should base on relevant theories, fully consider the context, and use the principle of pragmatic equivalence.

2. The Main Theories of Translation

2.1 Peter Newmark’s Semantic Translation and Communicative Translation

Some people (Peter Newmark,2001) proposed measures to guarantee the quality of translation, for example, Peter Newmark's “communicative translation” method. And in the meantime municipal departments work together with the local colleges and universities to undertake translation. The specific practices are as follows: the relevant government departments invite the local university teachers of English translation to join guiding translation. And they can give appropriate subsidies to teachers to improve the teachers ' enthusiasm. Among them, Peter Newmark is well known theorists of translation and translation of educator in the United Kingdom, and his most outstanding contribution is "semantic translation" and "communicative translation" in General translation theory. Communicative translation addresses itself solely to the second reader, who does not anticipate difficulties or obscurities, and would expect a generous transfer of foreign elements into his own culture as well as his language where necessary.

2.2 Skopos Functional Translation Theory

Skopos functional translation theory is the core theory of functional translation theory in the 1980 of the 20th century founded by Germany famous translation theorist Han j. Vermeer and Katherina Reiss. The word “skopos” usually uses for the purpose of translation. In addition to the Skopos, Vermeer also used related words, such as "aim", "purpose ", "intention" and "function ".