摘 要

1. Introduction 1

1.1 Research Background 1

1.2 Research Purpose 2

1.3 Structure of the Thesis 3

2. Literature Review 4

2.1 Overview of Vague Language 4

2.2 Previous Studies of Vague Language at home and abroad 4

2.3 Previous Studies of Translation Strategies of Vague Language 5

3. Vague Language in Cosmetic Advertisements 7

3.1 The Characteristics of Vague Language in Cosmetic Advertisements 7

3.1.1 Phonetic vagueness 7

3.1.2 Lexical vagueness 8

3.1.3 Syntactic vagueness 10

3.2 The Main Functions of Vague Language in Cosmetic Advertisements 10

3.2.1 Improving the efficiency of language expression 10

3.2.2 Enhancing the flexibility of language expression 11

3.2.3 Improving politeness 11

3.2.4 Advertisers’ self-protection 12

4. Translation Strategies of Vague Language in Cosmetic Advertisements on the basis of Functional Equivalence Theory 13

4.1 Functional Equivalence on Lexical Level 13

4.2 Functional Equivalence on Syntactic Level 14

4.3 Functional Equivalence on Stylistic Level 15

4.4 Summary 16

Conclusion 18

References 19

Abstract

Vague language makes the expression of language more vivid, euphemistic and decent, and promotes the communication and development of language. Cosmetics advertising pursues a clear and vivid language to let the public understand the product attributes. Therefore, the application of vague language has important value in cosmetic advertisements.

This thesis discusses the application of vague language in cosmetics advertisements from the analysis of its features and main functions. At the same time, on the basis of Functional Equivalence Theory, this thesis emphasizes on analyzing translation strategies of vague language in cosmetic advertisements from lexical, syntactic and stylistic levels. The purpose of this thesis is to provide some suggestions for the selection of translation strategies for cosmetic advertising language.

Keywords: Vague language; Cosmetic advertisements; Functional Equivalence Theory; Translation strategies

中文摘要

模糊语言使得语言的表达更加生动、形象、委婉、得体，因此，模糊语言广泛应用于日常生活和工作中的各个领域。化妆品广告追求以简洁生动的语言，让大众了解产品属性，因此，在化妆品广告中，模糊语言的运用有重要价值。

本文从模糊语言的特点和主要功能的分析，来探讨模糊语言在化妆品广告中的运用。同时，本文基于奈达的功能对等理论，从词汇，句法和文体层面分析了化妆品广告中模糊语言的翻译策略。本文的目的是为化妆品广告语言翻译策略的选择提供一些建议。

关键词：模糊语言；化妆品广告；功能对等理论；翻译策略

Introduction

1.1 Research Background

Many words express concepts, but they are not accurately defined, which have much to do with the ambiguity of many things in nature. Taking time and space as an example, Hawkes used to say “Space and time are in fact a continuum, and they divide every language in accordance with its own special structure, because no constant boundary and division is existed.” (Hawkes, 1977: 31) Space and time are objective existences and they are not transferred by human will. Though people's understanding of the world is deepening, due to the vagueness of this concept of the objective world, the vagueness of human language is also unavoidable. Because everything that exists objectively is in motion, it is difficult for people to give precise definitions of things that are unclear or transitional in the objective world. The vagueness comes from people's cognitive and communication processes. Faced with the inconsistency of the objective matters and sensory inconsistency, people have to use abstract generalization or vague language to express language units with maximum amount of language information,which is also in line with the economic limitations of language. Besides, in the actual communication process, the interpretation of the sentence depends largely on the background, and the psychological factors such as the personal character of the communicator also influence the semantic interpretation. In social contact, people sometimes use vague language to increase communication flexibility, and maintain a good social relationship with a special social purpose, which is particularly evident in the vague euphemism.

Functional Equivalence Theory was put forward by Eugene A.Nida based on the nature of translation, because he found it was hard to lessen the variance between the original language and the target language and make them transform easily. According to the definition of translation, Nida believes that it is not only equivalent in lexical sense, but also equivalent in semantics, style and stylistic. There are four aspects including in dynamic equivalence: lexical equivalence, syntactic equivalence, chapter equivalence, and stylistic equivalence. The cultural significance of the source language may be obscured by forms and hinder cultural exchanges. Thus, in literary translation, in accordance with Nida's theory, the translator should take the four aspects of dynamic equivalence as the translation principle, and accurately reproduce the cultural connotation of the source language in the target language.

In recent years, as a tool for propagandizing and disseminating information, advertising has become the preferred marketing method for modern cosmetic brands. Cosmetics advertising pursues a clear and vivid language to let the public understand the product attributes. Vague language makes the expression of cosmetic advertising language more vivid, euphemistic and decent, and promotes the communication and development of language. Functional Equivalence Theory is an effective and instructive translation strategy used in many studies. Therefore, on the basis of Functional Equivalence Theory, this thesis emphasizes on analyzing translation strategies of vague language in cosmetic advertisements from lexical, syntactic and stylistic levels.

1.2 Research Purpose

This thesis analyzes translation strategies of vague language in cosmetic advertising in combination of Functional Equivalence Theory. The purposes of this research include three levels. First, the most direct purpose is to reveal the advantages of vague language in cosmetic advertisements through concrete examples. Second, the purpose is to illustrate that Functional Equivalence Theory plays a guiding role in translation strategies of vague language in cosmetic advertisements. The last is to show that translators should adopt different translation strategies and consider various factors to achieve the functional equivalence between the original advertisement and the target advertisement as effectively as possible.

1.3 Structure of the Thesis

This thesis is made up of five chapters. The first chapter is composed of research background, research purpose and structure of the thesis. Literature review is in the second chapter, including overview of vague language, previous studies of vague language at home and abroad and translation strategies of vague language. The third chapter is an analysis of the features and the main functions of vague language in cosmetic advertisements. According to Functional Equivalence Theory, the fourth chapter focuses on translation strategies of vague language in cosmetic advertisements through specific examples, and then makes a summary of translation strategies above. The last chapter is the conclusion part, which summarizes the research carried out in this thesis, evaluates the research results objectively, and points out the inadequacies and improvements of this thesis.

Literature Review

2.1 Overview of Vague Language

Vague language, as a kind of flexible language, is the characteristic language with indeterminacy of denotative meanings and no specific connotation. Vague language has greater generalization and flexibility than precision language. Language extension is embodied in generality and flexibility. Vague language has two characteristics. That is, it is clear in essence, but vague in appearance; it is affirmative in showing qualitative , and it is changeable in representing quantitative; it is definite in content, and it is flexible in form.

2.2 Previous Studies of Vague Language at home and abroad

Vague language didn’t receive much attention at the beginning. Until 1965, the thesis Vague Sets was published by L. A. Zadeh in the journal Information and Control. L. A. Zadeh was a motor engineering cybernetic expert at the University of California, Berkeley. The concept of “Vague Set” was first proposed, which marked the birth of vague theory. The innovation of a new scientific thinking method has aroused general concern of language circles about vague language, and vague linguistics has emerged. Max Black believed that “the ambiguity of a word is expressed in that it has a limited area of application, but the boundaries of this area are not clear.” Hedges are explained by Lakoff as “words that make things blurred”. These explanations of the definition of linguistic ambiguity, we say that the benevolent sees benevolence, the wise sees wisdom. But no matter what circumstance it is, people have had a general understanding and understanding of the formation of vague language through these definitions. A thesis on vague language written by Chinese Professor Wu Tieping from Beijing Normal University was published in the fourth issue of Foreign Languages in 1979. This thesis symbolized the birth of vague language in China, because it was the the first time for China to study language ambiguity bu using vague theory. Now, the definition of ambiguity is “the ambiguity of people's understanding of the boundary or nature of things, and also the nature of each other, that is, the inter-transitional nature.” (Li Qiang 2006: 37) Nowadays, the definition of ambiguity is “the ambiguity of people's understanding of the boundary or nature of things, and also the nature of each other, that is, the inter-transitional nature.”(Li Qiang 2006: 37) That is to say, a word has both the characteristics of this attribute and the characteristics of another attribute, which are between the two attributes.

There are various studies on vague language in advertisements. The thesis “Analysis of the Adaptation of vague Language in Advertising Language” published in 2010, based on adaptation theory, pointed out that advertising vague language must adapt to the audience's language, psychology, culture and value orientation in order to achieve the commercial and social effects of advertising. In the thesis “Study of Pragmatic Vagueness in Cosmetic Advertisement” published in 2012, it pointed out that in the process of producing advertisements, the right use of vagueness could arouse the consumers’ interests towards the products and services and the proper use of pragmatic vagueness could also make advertisers produce more aesthetical advertisements. The theses above all provide this thesis with a lot of references and value.

2.3 Previous Studies of Translation Strategies of Vague Language

Obviously, translation strategies must be analyzed in diverse studies of vague language translation. Yu Fubin (2000) concentrated on discussing vagueness and translation, namely, from virtuality to reality, from reality to virtuality and from virtuality to virtuality, aiming to explore the possibility of translation strategies that do help to discuss literal translation and free translation. The study of Zhang Jinlan (2004) shows that in order to effectively achieve the translation purpose, appropriate translation strategies should be chosen according to functions expected in different texts and decide the strategies based on the requirements of the readers, such as literal or free translation, even delete and rewrite. Wang Xinjie (2005) put forward two translation methods of vague language. One is to heed if there is some divergence between Chinese and Western modes of thinking. The other one is to follow your heart but don’t break the rules, which means that attention should be paid to the cultural connotation contained in a language by the translator. Based on the characteristics of vague language and the analysis of English advertisements, Sun Ran (2010) proposed some translation strategies, including from vagueness to vagueness and from accuracy to vagueness.

3. Vague Language in Cosmetic Advertisements

3.1 The Characteristics of Vague Language in Cosmetic Advertisements

The range of cosmetics mentioned in this thesis is based on the definition of Webster's third edition of the New International Dictionary (1993 514): Cosmetics are products that provide beautification, protection, adjustment, cleaning, coloring, and regulation to human skin, hair, nails, lips, and eyes.

In the thesis “The Art of Cosmetics Advertising Language” published in 2010, Zhang Lu gave the definition of cosmetic slogan, that is, in order to promote audience's understanding of cosmetic brands, products and services, cosmetic companies and advertisers publish artistic and highly generalized language through certain media. The term “cosmetics” as used herein refers to the form of speech that appears in the form of speech or text in cosmetic advertisements.

The concept extension of vague word expression is always unclear and has strong ambiguity. “words with vague semantic definitions and rather vague conceptual connotations.” (Liu Xiaqing, 2003) Advertisers use this feature of vague words to enhance the promotion of products effectively. This thesis emphasizes on the analysis of the characteristics in phonetic, lexical and syntactic vagueness.

3.1.1 Phonetic vagueness

The ambiguity of language is on the basis of its natural essence. The homophonic pun is commonly seen in cosmetic advertisements. The homophonic pun consisting of identical or similar words is always of great humor and interest. And the expression has two meanings in specific environment, which not only enhances the persuasiveness and attraction of the advertisement, but also leaves the public with deep impression. For example, in the familiar cosmetic advertisement “趁早下‘斑’，请勿‘痘’留”, the terms “下‘斑’” and “‘痘’留” have the same homophones as the terms “下班” and “逗留”. In truth, the advertisement has two meanings. The first means that the store is doing a good business, and if the employees sell their cosmetics early, they can get off work early. The second is aimed at consumers, alluding to the good quality of the cosmetics in this store, and as long as you use it, skin problems such as freckles and pimples on the face will disappear quickly. Such an advertisement is humorous and attractive.

3.1.2 Lexical vagueness

Generally, nouns are used as modifiers to provide information on the quality, characteristics and specifications of the products in English cosmetic advertisements. Noun modifiers can be quite ambiguous, and this feature can be used to achieve unexpected results in cosmetic advertisements. For instance: as long as you smell it, you will feel a sense of mystery. The mystery in this perfume advertisement depicts the strange feeling and pleasure of smelling perfume, describing the characteristics of the perfume in terms of subjective feelings. And the term mystery is uncertain, and the “mystery” of the fragrance of perfume is always in the heart. This allows the public to give a rich imagination of noun modifiers, prompting them to be more interested in exploring and understanding such products.

Adjectives, because of their own modification, are often used as vague words. Advertisers try to inspire the imagination of consumers and stimulate consumers’ desire of purchase by applying highly ambiguous adjectives. For example, “Avon - a new feeling!” Advertisers use the vague adjectives of “new”, cleverly grasping the potential consumer psychology. Consumers can't know the whole new process after using the cosmetic, as it varies from person to person, but there is no doubt that it will bring a new look. It can be seen that the ambiguous adjective "new" has deepened the impression of the product in the hearts of consumers. Advertisers use these vague adjectives to create a good association with consumers.

In cosmetic advertisements, advertisers improve the vagueness of semantics with some sensory verbs. Many English cosmetic advertisements commonly use the words, such as make, get, give, have, see, buy, look, feel and taste. The purpose is to gradually understand the effect of the product and naturally see the change and increase the credibility of the product. Advertisers always try to avoid the use of verbs such as “purchase” as low as possible. Instead, they use verbs with semantic vagueness, so as to influence the consumers’ decisions. For example, “Perfect your makeup, improve your skin” (the concept of “perfect” and “improve” in the advertisement of “Mayvallon” is vague, because everyone has their own criteria. Therefore, the extension of the two vague verb concepts is not absolute. This advertisement uses the vague nature of the verbs "perfect" and "improve", which not only makes the advertisement concise, but also enhances advertising and freedom.