Question

 

The increase in global trade means that international companies cannot afford to make costly advertising mistakes if they want to be competitive．Understanding the language and culture of target markets in foreign countries is one of the keys to successful international marketing．Too many companies，however，have jumped into foreign markets with embarrassing results．Translation mistakes are at the heart of many blunders in international advertising．

General Motors，the US auto manufacturer, got a costly lesson when it introduced its Chevrolet Nova to the Puerto Rican market. “Nova”is Latin for “new (star)”and means “star” in many languages，but in spoken Spanish it can sound like “no va”, meaning “it doesn’t go”．Few people wanted to buy a car with that cursed meaning. When GM changed the name to Caribe，sales picked up dramatically．

Marketing blunders have also been made by food and beverage companies. One  American food company’s friendly “Jolly Green Giant” (for advertising vegetables)  became something quite different when it was translated into Arabic as “Intimidating Green ogre(吃人妖魔)”．

When translated into German，Pepsi’s popular slogan，“Come Alive with Pepsi” came out implying “Come Alive from the Grave”．No wonder customers in Germany didn’t rush out to buy Pepsi.

Even a company with an excellent international track record like Kentucky Fried Chicken is not immune to the perils of faulty translation．Many sales were lost when the catch phrase “finger licking food” became “eat with your fingers off” in Chinese translation．

A manufacturer of one laundry detergent also made an expensive mistake in the Middle East. Its advertisements showed a picture of a pile of dirty clothes on the left, a box of the company’s detergent in the middle, and clean clothes on the right．Unfortunately，the message was incorrectly interpreted because most people looked at it from right to left, the way Arabic is read．

Having awakened to the special nature of foreign advertising，companies are becoming much more conscientious in their translation and more sensitive to cultural distinctions．The best way to prevent errors is to hire professional translators who understand the target language and its idiomatic usage, or to use a technique called “back translation” to reduce the possibility of blunders. The process uses one person to translate a message into the target language and another to translate it back. Effective translators aim to capture the overall message of an advertisement because a word-for-word duplication of the original rarely conveys the intended meaning and often causes misunderstandings．

1.The underlined word “blunder” in paragraph 1 has the closest meaning to _____________．

A. dispute   B. issue    C．obvious error  D．ignorance

2.Paragraphs 2 to 6 are developed primarily by means of ______________．

    A. descriptions          B．analysis     

C．contrasts             D．giving examples

3.Which of the following statements BEST explains the failure of the laundry detergent ad in the Middle East?

    A．The advertisement is offensive to the Arabic religious belief．   

B．The advertiser is ignorant of the reading habit of the Arabs．   

C．The advertisement is mistakenly translated by the Arabs．

    D. The advertisement is poorly designed regardless of Arabic social customs．

4.It can be inferred from the passage that _______________．

    A．Jolly Green Giant didn’t attract many customers in Arabic countries

    B. advertisements must avoid jokes since what is considered funny in one part of the world may not be so humorous in another

    C．marketers do not have to appreciate the values of a culture in order to capture the target market   

D. word-for-word translation should be abandoned in advertisement translation

5.What is the best title for this article?

A．Cultural Importance in Advertising． 

B．How to Translate Advertisement．

C. Avoidance of Culture Oversights.

D. Prevention of Translation Blunders.

 

 

Answer 1

【答案】

1.C

2.D

3.B

4.A

5.A