I always believe that it would be the best that translators only translate other languages to their mother language, as most people can only use their second language to a communicating lever, if not worse. While translation requires not only to convey the meaning of the source language but also to rewrite it in an artistic way, which means the translator should be able to use the target language in a masterly skill. However, if we have to, I think the principle to translate your mother language to second language is more or less the same as the other way around. Here I want to share some of my opinions on Chinese to English translation.

Firstly, read the sentence, and then rephrase it in a way that you would say in English instead of translate in word on word. This is the first principle of translation, but many translators who are fresh in Chinese to English translation tend to neglect this simple rule, even they already have some experience on English to Chinese translation. They would try their best to write sentence correct grammatically, while the translation is still awkward to English native speaker as they translate it to literally and stick to every word in the source language.

For example:

依靠南坪县卫生主管部门领导，充分发动群众，宣传群众，让大范围药浴家犬阻断内脏利什曼病的意义做到家喻户晓，促使群众参与并配合进行家犬药浴实验。

Original Translation:
Relying on the leadership of health authorities in Nanping County to fullly mobilize the masses and propaganda among the masses, so that the significance of a wide range of medicated bath of domestics dogs for inhibiting visceral leishmaniasis is well known to every family and encourage the masses to participate in and meet the experiment of medicated bath of dogs.

Revision:
Rely on the leadership of health authorities in Nanping County to comprehensively publicize the treatment to the masses, so that the significance of a wide range of medicated bath of domestics dogs for inhibiting visceral leishmaniasis is well known to every family and encourage people to participate and help carry on the experiment of medicated bath of dogs.

After proofreaded by an English native speakers:
With the leadership of health authorities in Nanping County, the deltamethrin treatment was widely publicized to residents of the study areas, in order to communicate the significance of extensive medicated bathing of domestic dogs for inhibiting visceral leishmaniasis and encourage people to participate in the study.

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Comment: The usage of “mobilize the masses and propaganda among the masses” in the original translation to translate the “充分发动群众，宣传群众” was awkward. The revision try to remove these kinds of awkwardness on phrases, but actually the whole translation was translated too literally. It is not necessary to translate every word in the original sentence as long as the translation is faithful to the meaning. It would lead to awkward sentences and difficuty in understanding. The final version is much better than the original one and more readable.

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