A Study on Translation Strategies of Internet Buzzwords from the Perspective of Skopos Theory

Abstract

As an emerging distinctive linguistic product of the Internet era, internet buzzwords constitute a vital component of online communication among contemporary masses, carrying unique youth cultural connotations and characteristics of the times. Due to their inherent playful nature and culture-specific attributes, their Japanese translation for cross-cultural communication tends to generate semantic deviations and cultural misinterpretations, posing considerable translation difficulties. Taking Skopos Theory as the theoretical framework and typical Chinese internet buzzwords as research objects, this paper conducts case analyses to verify that the Japanese translation of internet buzzwords is not confined to a single approach. Instead, guided by communicative purposes, translators strike a dynamic balance between the coherence rule and the fidelity rule. While preserving the cultural connotations and linguistic features of the source text, such translations facilitate cross-cultural communication.