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UM E-Theses Collection (澳門大學電子學位論文庫)

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Title

Investigating Macao tourism brochures and their translations : an appraisal perspective

English Abstract

Tourism, on a par with gaming, has long been a significant industry which contributes greatly to the sustainable prosperity of Macao. Among various tourism promotion materials, such as those released on websites, free guides and newsletters, tourism brochures are undoubtedly the most common and important promotional materials to introduce Macao’s culture, promote tourism products and attract tourists from all over the world. This thesis aims to investigate the attitudes construed in Chinese and English tourism brochures and to identify differences in the attitudes accordingly. Furthermore, it also discusses possible factors influencing the attitudes constructed in both the Chinese and English texts. Twenty pairs of tourism brochures in Chinese and English official versions provided by the Macao Government Tourist Office (MGTO) are collected as the research subjects. Among those, ‘Macao World Heritage’ and ‘EVENTS, FESTIVALS & ENTERTAINMENT’ are discussed in detail, as they almost cover all the sightseeing places and events and festivals in Macao. The analytical framework is built upon the Appraisal Theory which was developed by J.R. Martin and P.R.R. White (2005) from Halliday’s (1978, 1994) SFL. The analysis also draws from the theoretical concept of genre analysis by Suzanne Eggins (1994). Following the bottom-up procedure, the analysis is first done on schematic structures and realization patterns of both Chinese and English versions. Then, the attitudinal positioning of the authors of the two versions and the GRADUATION resources are investigated in detail. Besides, various factors which may influence the attitudes construed in tourism brochures are discussed. The findings show that schematic structures of both the two versions in MACAU WORLD HERITAGE are all the same, so are those of most in EVENTS, FESTIVALS & ENTERTAINMENT, while realization patterns in both the two brochures are often different. In terms of attitudinal positioning, the attitudinal positioning tends to be more subjective with more attitudinal VII resources found in the Chinese versions of both the two brochures. It is hoped that the findings of this research will provide a new way for scholars and English learners to have a deeper understanding of this particular genre and to pay attention to the invisible yet decisive factors in making the final products, such as diverse cultures, different target readership and translators’ subjectivity, which may influence the attitudinal positioning in producing this particular kind of promotional materials.

Issue date

2015.

Author

Wang, Yi Nan

Faculty

Faculty of Arts and Humanities

Department

Department of English

Degree

M.A.

Subject

Brochures -- Macau

Advertising -- Tourism

Chinese language -- Translating into English

Supervisor

張美芳

Files In This Item

Full-text (Internet)

Location
1/F Zone C
Library URL
991000796229706306