摘 要

随着经济全球化的发展，特别是中国加入世界贸易组织，开展“一带一路”建设之后，中国对外开放的需求迅速增长。然而，在对外开放的过程中，正确准确的英文法律文件翻译在对外交往中发挥着至关重要的作用。翻译是两种语言之间的转换，涉及原作者和翻译者，因此自然涉及原作者和译者的风格问题，即文体学问题。同时，词汇学、语法学、音系学、笔体学、语义学等不同方面的文体特征也可以为法律文本的分析提供明确的方向。本文从文体学角度出发，研究英语法律语篇特征与翻译策略。本文共分为六章：第一章对本文的研究背景和研究目标进行简要介绍；第二章是关于文体学、法律文件、法律英语翻译的文献综述；第三章从词汇学，语法学，笔体学方面阐述法律英语的文本特征；第四章提出法律文本翻译的基本原则为准确、规范和通顺；第五章中，按照法律文本的不同类型，即规范性法律文件，国际贸易合同，租赁合同，探索翻译策略；第六章是本文的结论。

关键词：法律英语；文体学；翻译；语篇特征

Abstract

With the development of economic globalization, especially after China joined the World Trade Organization and launched the “Belt and Road”, the demand for China’s opening up has grown rapidly. However, in the process of opening up to the outside world, the correct and accurate translation of English legal documents plays a vital role in international exchanges. Translation is a conversion between two languages, involving the original author and the translator, so it naturally involves the style of both, that is, the stylistic issue. The relevant research on stylistic features in different aspects of language like lexicology, grammar, phonology and graphology and semantics also provide a clear direction in the analysis of legal discourse. This paper mainly explores the characteristics of English legal discourse and translation strategies from the perspective of stylistics. It is divided into six chapters: the first chapter gives a brief introduction to the research background and research objectives; the second chapter gives literature review of stylistics, legal documents and legal English translation; the third chapter expounds the characteristics of English legal discourse from the aspects of lexicology, grammar and graphology; the fourth chapter presents three basic principles of translation: accuracy, standardization, smoothness,; in the fifth chapter，legal English translation strategies are explored in the process of analyzing the different types of legal texts: prescriptive legal documents, international trade contracts, and rental agreements; the sixth chapter is the conclusion of this paper.

Key Words: legal English; stylistics; translation; features of discourse

Contents

1 Introduction 1

2 Literature Review 3

3 Stylistic Features of English legal discourse 5

3.1 Lexical features 5

3.2 Grammatical features 7

3.3 Graphological Features 8

4 Principles of Legal English Translation 9

4.1 Accuracy 9

4.2 Standardization 10

4.3 Smoothness 11

5 Translation of various legal discourse 13

5.1 Prescriptive Legal Documents 13

5.2 International Trade Contract 13

5.3 Rental Agreement 15

6 Conclusion 16

References 17

Acknowledgements 19

A Study on Features and Translation of English Legal Discourse from the Perspective of Stylistics

1 Introduction

In recent years, the demand for China’s opening up has increased rapidly, especially after China’s accession to WTO and the development of the Belt and Road. Yet, in the process of opening up, it can be seen that correct and accurate translation of English legal documents play a vital role in foreign trade. Translation and trade policy uncertainty does affect export decisions (Feng amp; Li amp; Swenson 2017). Such demand for interpreting foreign-related legal documents brings opportunity to study features and translation of English legal discourse from the perspective of stylistics.

Stylistics is a branch of linguistics which studies style in a scientific and systematic way concerning the manners of different varieties of language at different levels, which includes conversation, news report, science and technology as well as legal discourse. Actually, translation is the conversion between two languages, involving the original author and the translator, thus naturally involving the style of the original author and the translator (田起梅，2014). At the same time, stylistic features in different aspects like lexicology, grammar, phonology and graphology and semantics can also provide a clear direction of the analysis of legal discourse (张德禄，张国，张淑杰，胡永近，2016). So, it is important to study translation from the perspective of stylistics.