4。1 Literal Translation 9 

4。2 Free Translation 9 

4。3 Creative Translation 10

    4。4 Tips of Cultural Equivalence in English Film Title Translation 12

V。 Conclusion 13

Bibliography 15

Acknowledgements 16

An Analysis of Cultural Equivalence in the Translation of English Film Title 

I。 Introduction 

    Film title translation from English to Chinese has not experienced quite a long history。 When Chinese began to conduct the reform and opening-up, there were a few communications between China and the English speaking countries, and there were only sporadic film importation from abroad。 Moreover, the study of the film title translation was a bit superficial。 After the reform and opening-up, a flourished development in film industry has been witnessed。 English films started to plunge into Chinese market and English film title translation became a part of this industry。

    Up to now, film title translation has a history of many years, and fast development in film title translation have been witnessed in this period。 However, film title translation is given less attention as it should deserve。 Because of the flourishing title translation market, recent study of English film title is now attracting comparatively more attention, and providing a lot of methods rendering English film titles into Chinese, based on different translation theories。 However, most of the former study is focused merely on English film title, with less in-depth comparisons and study on cultures in cultural equivalence translation between English and Chinese。 So cultural equivalence reflected in English film title translation should be paid great attention, in order to convey the cultural connotation of the English film and achieve cultural communication between China and English-speaking countries。 Thus, this thesis consists of five parts, the first part will give a brief introduction of background and problems of English film title translation in China。 And the second part is going to analyze functional equivalence and cultural equivalence theory。 Tn the third part, the reflection of cultural equivalence in film title translation and the forth part is to talk about strategies of English film title translation。 The fifth part is to sum up the whole paper in order to reveal the significance of cultural equivalence。

II。 Functional Equivalence and Cultural Equivalence Theory

   Functional equivalence theory was proposed by Eugene Nida, who was a world-known translation theorist。 This theory plays an increasingly important role in translation as well as in cross-cultural exchanges。 Therefore, it deserves great attention of scholars and translators。

2。1 Functional Equivalence 

    Nida’s functional theory can also be called dynamic equivalence theory, which doesn’t mean literal translation。 This theory includes four aspects, which are lexical equivalence, sentence equivalence, passage equivalence and style equivalence。  Nida’s functional theory is oriented towards readership to some extent。 It emphasizes a dynamic way of equivalence between targeted language and original language in designative and associative meanings。 In his book Language and Culture-Contexts in Translating, functional equivalence also deals with culture, which exerts a profound influence on adjustment of translation procedures。(Nida 178-179)

    In terms of this theory, functional equivalence embodies a comparison between the way in which readers appreciate and understand the original text and the way in which readers appreciate and understand the translated text。 Nida’s functional theory contends that translators reproduce the functions of the original text and deliver them to the receptors who read targeted-language text。 The concept of functional equivalence theory is based on an assumption that the readers of translated text could conceive how the original readers appreciate and understand source-language text。