Lecture 7 Affirmation and negation 汉英翻译 教学课件.ppt

Affirmation and Negation 肯定与否定 （正、反表达法） Affirmation and Negation 1.A: Can we go swimming? B: I don’t see why not. 2. Excuse me. 3. Don’t stop working. 4. He went into the insecure building. 5. He knew he was mortally ill. 6. Teacher: You don’t like homework, do you? Students: No. The differences in negation between English and Chinese result from differences in the way of thinking and in the mode of speaking. Generally speaking, English negative words and expressions fall into the 4 categories: 1) “full negatives”— 全部否定/完全否定 no, not, none, never, nothing, nobody, nowhere, neither, nor, etc. 2) “semi negatives”– 半否定 hardly, scarcely, seldom, barely, few, little, etc. 3) “partial negatives”—　部分否定 not every, not all, not both, not much, not many, not always, etc. 4) “words with negative implication”—具否定涵义的词汇 fail , without, beyond, until, unless, refrain, refuse, neglect, absence, instead of, other than, except, rather than, etc. Negative words and structures sometimes should be readjusted in translation according to contexts. That is to say, depending on the context, we can use either negation or affirmation to translate negatives. The same is true of affirmative words and structures. Contents 1. Negation 2. Affirmation 3. English words with both affirmative and negative equivalents in Chinese 4. Double negative 5. Roundabout affirmative 6. Some traps in negative structures 1. Negation 反面表达法/否定表达法/正话反说/正反表达法 Some affirmative words, phrases or sentences in English can be translated into negative ones in Chinese. 1) Verbs 1.-- “When will we have the picnic?” -- “If the weather holds a couple of days.” 如果这两天天气不变的话我们就去野餐。　 如果这两天天气持续的话我们就去野餐。 （negation 反面表达法 vs. affirmation 正面表达法） Question: Which version is better? 3. Such a chance was denied (to) me. 我没有得到这样一个机会。(negation) 4. I have read your article and expected to meet an older man. 拜读了你的大作，没想到你这样年轻。 2) Adverbs (1) we may safely say so. 我们可以万无一失