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ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
This graduation paper is my final important task on the way of obtaining
my bachelor degree. It would not have been completed without the guidance and
the support of many people. At this moment of accomplishment, it is my pleasant
task to express my sincere thanks to all of them.
First and foremost, I would like to express my endless thanks and
gratefulness to my supervisor Ngo Thi Thanh Huyen M.A for her precious
advice, detailed comments, valuable suggestions and enthusiastic guidance
corrections from the planning stage to the completion of my thesis. Without her
continual encouragement and useful documents, her careful reading and critical
comments, my paper would be far from finished.
I am obliging to all my teachers in the Faculty of Foreign Languages,
Hung Vuong University, who inspired me and gave me good knowledge of
English for writing this graduation paper.
It would be a shortcoming if I do not mention here all my friends,
especially all members of K12 English Pedagogy for their unceasing
encouragement, care and help during this hard time.
Last but not least, I would like to dedicate my concluding words to my
dear family for supporting me devotedly both material and spiritual throughout
my thesis-writing period.


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ABSTRACT
The study aims to find out some common errors in terms of linguistics
committed by the fourth-year English students at Hung Vuong University when
translating business letters from Vietnamese into English. It is also used to
discover the possible causes of these errors as well as some suggested solutions

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Table 3.1. The errors in terms of linguistics in student’s
translation test

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Table 3.2. Some cases of terminology error committed by the
students in translation test

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Table 3.3. The students’ opinion towards learning style as a
cause of the errors in business letters translation
Table 3.4. The students’ opinion towards teaching and learning
conditions as the causes of the errors in business letters
translation

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NO
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Chart 3.7. The students’ attitude towards some common errors in
terms of linguistics in Vietnamese – English business letters
translation (%)
Chart 3.8. The students’ attitude towards the possible causes for
the errors in terms of linguistics in Vietnamese – English
business letters translation (%)

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LISTS OF ABBREVIATIONS

51
52
53
54

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e1: error of the use of articles
e2: error of capitalization
e3: error of preposition
e4: error of punctuation
e5: error of spelling
e6: error of using correct grammar
e7: error of tense
e8: error of terminology
SC: source culture


An overview on translation..........................................................................8

1.1.1. The concept of translation........................................................................9
1.1.2. Translation methods..................................................................................12
1.1.3. Translation errors......................................................................................18
1.2. An overview on business letters...................................................................22
1.2.1. The definition of business letters...............................................................22
1.2.2. Kinds of business letters............................................................................23
1.2.3. Features of a good business letters...........................................................28
1.3. Summary......................................................................................................35
CHAPTER 2: METHODOLOGY......................................................................36
2.1. Participants...................................................................................................36
2.2. Methodology................................................................................................36


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2.3. Data collection instruments..........................................................................36
2.3.1. Test.............................................................................................................37
2.3.2. Questionnaires...........................................................................................37
2.3. The research procedure................................................................................38
CHAPTER 3: MAJOR FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION..................................39
3.1. The result from translation test.....................................................................39
3.2. The result from questionnaires.....................................................................49
3.2.1. The students’ attitude and interest toward Vietnamese – English business
letters translation.................................................................................................49
3.2.2. Some common errors in terms of linguistics that the students committed
when translating business letters from Vietnamese into English........................53
3.2.3. The causes of student’s errors in terms of linguistics in Vietnamese –

companies not only trade in their countries but also expand their commerce to
other countries. In order to keep in touch with their partners, the best way is to
write business letters. English is their first choice because it has become more
and more popular in global business.
In the process of studying translation at Faculty of Foreign Languages,
Hung Vuong University, the author found that business translation based the
existing rules among languages is very essential. Here, the role of linguistics is
very important in explaining cases without any equivalents. And also, it is
impossible to explain all issues of translation in linguistic aspects but to base
on professional foundations in the field of business. Thus, it is necessary to
take into account linguistic viewpoints as well as those of business categories
in the translations of business letters and business related materials.


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Translation in general and translation business letters in particular are
common job of student’s majority in English linguistics after their graduation.
They work in companies which professionally run by the operations related to
translating business letters. However, they encounter many difficulties when
translating them. In class, they usually get stuck in troubles with translating
letter, expressing as well as finding materials, so they cannot get good mark.
Translating business letters requires not only thorough understanding of
linguistic aspects and corresponding subjects but also logic thinking to ensure
deep understanding of characteristics and nature of business language. They
have not got them yet .Thus, it is necessary to make the difficulties clear and
suggest some strategies for translating such kind of letters.
During the previous four years, my friends and I have had chances to
study English thoroughly in terms of language practice (i.e. listening, speaking,
etc.) as well as language theory (i.e. grammar, lexicology, discourse analysis and

XieYongqiu (2013) carried out the study: “A Brief Analysis on the
Translation Skills of Business Correspondence “.This paper made a brief
analysis of translation skills of business correspondence. At first, the
characteristics of business correspondence translation discussed above require
translators to translate practically, correctly and concisely. And then skills in
translating the words, sentences and text of business letters were briefly
introduced. What we can learn from this paper was that translators should not
only pay attention to the translation skills and strategies but also become
sensitive to the cultural differences between China and English-speaking
countries. The curacy of translation cannot be emphasized more. Therefore, to
understand and study the original letters correctly was the first and most
important strategies, at the same time; it was indispensable to think of its
cultural backgrounds and connotations in the intercultural view.
Another research was conducted by FU Qing-lian (2009): “Application of
Nida’s Theory of Equivalence to Business Translation” through the introduction
of Nida' s Theory of Equivalence and the characteristics of Business English,
this essay mainly discusses that Nida's theory of functional equivalence can be
best applied in business English translation and functional equivalence can be
achieved in both meaning and style at the word level, the sentence level and the
discourse level. It also provided some useful methods and techniques which can


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be applied to maximizing equivalence in Business English translation.
Huan Wang, Yuhang Bai and Jianhua Jiang (2013) carried out a study called:
“On Business English E-C Translation Model Based on Equivalence Theory
Based on Equivalence Theory”. This paper aimed to propose a model which
can put Equivalence Theory into BE (Business English) translation practice. It
applied the model to BE E-C (Business English English- Chinese) translation

reference value. The paper will offer some functional theories applied in
translating business English. It was quite reasonable to employ functional theory
for business translation and the application of the main functional theories in
business English translation was bound to be useful and valuable. The paper
opened a new view for the principles of business English translation. It explored
a systematic analysis from the functional view and proposes two specific
principles and several strategies in the business translation practice, which can
set up a set of practical and comprehensive principles for business English
translation as well as to provide some help to those whose profession was
business English teaching or who were intending to work in this field.
Duong Thuy Trang and Tran Van Tuan (2011) conducted the research: “A
Review of Business English Translation”. This paper summarized a part of
studies on the Business English translation, arranging the contents,
characteristics and translation strategies of Business English. The only purpose
was to provide some help for the people who were working for Business English
translation or interested in Business English translation. This paper can really
contribute to improve their translation abilities and make them do a good job in
Business English translation.
Ha Anh Tu (2017) studied: “Common errors committed by the fourth-year
English linguistics students in translating legal documents into English”. The
study aimed to find out the common errors in terms of linguistics committed by
the fourth-year English linguistic students at Hung Vuong University when
translating legal documents from Vietnamese into English. It was also used to
discover the possible causes of these errors as well as suggest some solutions to
this situation


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1.3. Research gap

1.8.

The scope of the research
This study focuses on common errors in terms of linguistics committed

by 30 students in K12 English Pedagogy at Hung Vuong University in
translating business letters from Vietnamese into English.


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1.9.

Design of the research
The study consists of three main parts: Introduction, Development and

Conclusion.
PART I: INTRODUCTON
In this part, the researcher gives an overall introduction about research
rationale, research purpose, previous research, research question, the scope of
research, research method and the significance of the study.
PART II: DEVELOPMENT
This part consists of three main chapters.
Chapter 1: Literature review
This part presents theoretical background of translation, translation
studies, translation methods, translation errors, business letters translation and its
significance, types and characteristics.
Chapter 2: Methodology
Research questions, participants, methods of the study, instruments,
data collection and data analysis are discussed in this chapter.

the translator has to choose the vocabulary, has to reproduce different meanings
of the words and for example when dealing with a literary translation, the rules
were to know the language, the culture and the history of people, as well as their
habits, described in the original work. So, one of the greatest accomplishments
of a good translation was an excellent knowledge of the two languages and
cultures.
Regarding the possibility of translation, there were two opinions that have
always contrasted and that were still present nowadays:
On the other hand, the development of the activity of translation in
Renaissance period, together with its interest in antiquity, renders evident the
practical difficulties of translation. The tendency of preserving the local color


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and the necessity of transposing the reader in another country and in another era,
bring the translator face to face with new problems that were difficult to solve
out. From a theoretical point of view, these hardships generated the idea that a
complete translation shall never be possible.
1.1.1. The concept of translation
Catford (1965) considered translation the replacement of textual material
in one language by an equivalent textual material in the other language. This
point of view was shared by Hartman and Stork (1972) “translation is the
replacement of a representation of a text in one language by a representation of
an equivalent text in a second language”. These definitions emphasize on
importance of equivalence when textual material was replaced from source
language (SL) to target language (TL).
Bell, RT. (1991) says “Translation is the expression in another language
(or TL) of what has been expressed in another, source language, preserving
semantic and stylistic equivalences”. Hatim and Mason (1990) see translation as

qualities, actions; it can easily lead to the idea that translation is a simple change
of “labels”. Ferdinand de Saussure sees that “for some people language, reduced
to its essential principle, it's a nomenclature, meaning a list of terms that
correspond with many things.” (Martinet, 1969)
Martinet says that: “learning a language doesn't mean to assign new
“labels” on some known objects, but to analyze the object of linguistic
communication” (Saussure, 1998)
The idea that every language has it was own way of analyzing the facts
from the surrounding world presents a serious theoretical objection against the
possibility of performing a translation.
If it is admitted the fact that languages differ not only in their exterior
aspect- through an individual vocabulary and through a specific grammatical
structure- but also through the way of organizing the semantic content of the
lexicon, people who spoke different languages do not present things in the same
way.
Comparing the lexical elements of two languages, one can observe only a
partial coincidence between them: the semantic entities of words coincide only
partially. These factors make translation even difficult.
Saussure said “In our country, translation has had a rapid growth, but the


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translation theory is at its beginnings. We have to differentiate translation from
translation theory that is a special scientific discipline. The aim of the translation
theory is to follow rules that are the basis of the translation from one language
into another, to establish the correlation between the original and the translation,
to generalize reliance on particular cases that afterwards could be used in
performing a translation. Translation theory helps practice in that it emphasizes
different possibilities of language, it helps choosing from the wide variety of

intellectual development of mankind as reflected in the arts, but it refers to all
socially conditioned aspects of human life” (Snell Hornby, 1988)
In conclusion, the purpose of translation is to pass on an understanding to
people in their own language and create the same impact as the original text.
"Translation, seen as a mode of being in the world, should be contextualized as a
social system. Infidelity was built in translation because it inevitably describes
domestic scenes that were loaded not only linguistically and culturally, but also
socially and politically. Translation was simultaneous decontextualization and
recontextualization, hence was productive rather than reproductive. Translation
should be seen as an attempt to guess the mind of an author correctly (Nord,
1997)”.
1.1.2. Translation methods
1.1.2.1. The methods of Newmark
Newmark (1988) categorizes translation methods according to their
emphasis on SL or TL.
In terms of SL emphasis, translation methods include word-for-word
translation; literal translation; faithful translation and semantic translation.
Word-for-word translation
Newmark (1988) demonstrates this method as interlinear translation with
the TL immediately below the SL words. Interlinear translation means the
primary senses of all words in the original are translated as though out of context
and the word order of the original was retained. Take as an example the sentence
“The most common network arrangement is known as a client/serve system.” in
a T.T material of Information Technology for third year students, ED, HaUI.
Students would prefer to translate “Cách bố trí mạng phổ biến nhất được biết
đến là hệ thống máy khách/chủ”. Passive voice in the English original sentence
is remained unchanged in Vietnamese translation version. Word for word


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free translation; idiomatic translation and communicative translation.


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Adaptation
Newmark (1988) mentioned “Adaptation is the freest form of translation;
it was used mainly for plays and poems”. The text was rewritten considering the
SL cultures which were converted to the TL culture where the characters,
themes, plot were usually preserved. Adaptation was rarely used in T.T.
Free Translation
Newmark (1988) defined free translation as the way to reproduce the
matter without the manner, the content without the form of the original. It was
usually a paraphrase, a so-called “intra-lingual translation”. Free translation was
again rarely used in T.T.
Idiomatic Translation
The method reproduces the “message” of the original but tends to distort
nuances of meaning by preferring colloquialisms and idioms where these did not
exist in the original (Newmark, 1988). For example, “There was no accounting
for taste” was idiomatically translated into Vietnamese “Được voi đòi tiên”.
Idiomatic translation was not used in T.T.
Communicative Translation
This method attempts to render the exact contextual meaning of the
original in such a way that both content and language were readily acceptable
and comprehensible to the readership (Newmark, 1988). The example in free
translation “To allow smooth shifting from one gear to another, a clutch was
provided to disengage the engine from the transmission” can be shortly
translated in communicative way as “Để xe ko bị giật khi sang số, người lái xe
phải cắt côn”. This translation version was for a group of people that share
common background and knowledge of Automobile Technology.

without losing the natural form of the source language.
- Idiomatic translation reproduces the meaning of the source language
(that was the meaning intended by the original communicator) in the natural
form of receptor language.
- The unduly free translation adds extraneous information, which was not
stated in the source text. It changed the meaning of SL; it distorted the fact of
the historical and cultural setting of the source text.
1.1.2.3. The methods of Robet Holmes
Prior to Newmark and Larson, Robet Holmes (1970) cited in Gentzler
(1993) mentions that there were four methods of translation:


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- First method retains the form of the original.
- The second attempts to discern the function of the text in the receiving
culture and seeks parallel function within the target language tradition.
- The third is content-derivative, taking the original meaning of the
primary text and allowing it to develop into its own unique shape in the target
language.
- The fourth deliberately retains minimal similarity for other purposes,
for which Holmes gives no example.
1.1.2.4. The methods of André Lefevere
André Lefevere (1975) quoted in Gentzler (1993) further enrich Holmes’
description. He stated that there were seven methodologies which tend to govern
the translation process –especially in the translation of poetry. They were:
- Phonemic translation, which attempts to reproduce the SL precisely in TL.
- Literal translation, which distorts the sense and the syntax of the
original through word-for-word emphasis.
- Metrical translation, which reproduce the SL metre.

natural equivalent’ was the ideal product of translating, which required the
translator to avoid awkwardness or translation see in order to produce a
translation which did not sound like a translation in the target language culture.
Based on the discussion of definition of translating, Nida established four sets of
priorities to guide real translating practice: (1969:14-32)
- The priority of contextual consistency over verbal consistency: Nida believed
that ‘strict verbal consistency may result in serious distortion of the meaning
(1969:21)’ and a translator should depend on context rather than word-for-word
concordance to (1) determine the word meaning and (2) find the right word in
the receptor language to produce the same response. (1969:16-17).
- The priority of dynamic equivalence over formal correspondence: Nida defined
two types of equivalence: ‘formal equivalence’ and ‘dynamic equivalence’
(Nida, 1964:159). Formal equivalence focuses on transferring the message.
Dynamic equivalence focuses on producing the equivalent effect of the message.
In dynamic translation, ‘one is not so concerned with matching the receptorlanguage message with the source-language message, but with the dynamic
relationship, that the relationship between the receptor and the message should
be substantially the same as that which existed between the original receptors
and the message (Nida, 1964: 159).’ ‘Dynamic equivalence was therefore to be
defined in terms of the degree to which the receptors of the message in the
receptor language respond to it in substantially the same manner as the receptors
in the source language. (Nida and Taber, 1969:24).‘ Nida was aware that this


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response can never be the same due to different culture, but a high degree of
equivalence of response should be achieved to reproduce the closest natural
equivalent in the receptor language. The response of the receptors in receptor
language was not only informative, but also expressive and imperative for
communication. (Nida and Taber, 1969:24). That was to say, dynamic

used in translating poems and songs, not all kinds of texts. A more thorough
notion of error is proposed by Pym (1992). This scholar supposes that translation
errors may be attributed to lack of comprehension, misuse of time,
inappropriateness to readership, language, pragmatics, culture, over-translation,
under-translation, discursive or semantic inadequacy. Compared to the definition
by Mossop, Pym (1992) suggests a large number of translation errors. However,
these errors were not systematically classified.
Ten years later, Aveling (2002) illustrates a more comprehensive and
systematic notion of translation errors. According to Aveling, translation errors
occur when translator fails to gain equivalence, adequacy and accuracy. This
definition was more comprehensive as it stressed that equivalence covers many
different types. Besides, it was more systematic because Aveling emphasized
that translation errors can be divided into two categorization including “dumb
mistakes” and “deliberate mistakes”. The former was due to the lack of
translator’s competence, and the latter occurs when translator poses a purpose to
recreate the text.
1.1.3.2. Classification of translation errors
Not only the definition but also the classification of translation errors has
attracted a myriad of efforts from scholars and researchers. Nevertheless, due to
the complexity of this practice, it remained intricate to establish a single
comprehensive list of all the translation errors observed. Krzysztof (1992)
divides translation errors into four main types: errors of syntagmatic surface
translation, errors of mistaken interpretation, realization errors and metatranslation errors.
- The first type includes equivalents, false friends, calques and
unjustified borrowings.
- The second type covers misreading syntagms and wrong interpretation
of verb frame, misinterpret scenes and scripts and misreading the text modality.
- The third type covers TL errors, wrong evaluation of recipients’
knowledge and insufficient of knowledge of subject-matter.