On Pun in Corporate Mission Statements of China’s Enterprises: Categories and C-E Translation

Abstract

Pun, a typical figure of speech, usually has a surface meaning and an underlying meaning. Pun is frequently employed in Chinese corporate mission statements (CMS), but there exists a lack of corresponding discussion and research. This paper firstly analyses CMS of China’s Top 500 enterprises as examples, then roughly classifies pun in CMS into three categories, namely, homophonic pun, semantic pun and grammatical pun. In order to perform the informative and vocative function of CMS, two corresponding translation strategies are proposed with the guidance of Peter Newmark’s text typology and communicative translation, that is, fit translation and paraphrasing pun in two terms. This paper contributes to enriching the research content and research perspective of China’ corporate mission statements and pun.