Currently, there are several problems found in Chinese document translation and they are as follows:
I. Omission of Translation, Adding Unnecessary Text and Literal Translation
In Chinese document translation, it’s common to add words or sentences that don’t exist in the original texts randomly. Some translators translate the texts without having an overall understanding of it and make the error of doing a literal translation of the document.
II. Inappropriate Style
Document usually is more complicated than general texts as they are formal and rigid in style, uses elegant yet logical words, contributing to the material’s coherence overall. The passive voice is used quite often, which is a characteristic of legal documents. However, if the translator doesn’t grasp the style properly or misunderstands it, he/she may make various mistakes in translation.
III. Inadequate Understanding of the Original English Text
In the pursuit of precision, legal text always adopts elegant wording, long sentences and complex structures. Translators who are not proficient in the source language, added to a lack of familiarity and knowledge with legal terms and styles may not thoroughly understand the original text and make various mistakes in Chinese document translation.
IV. Poor Language Culture
Some translators are only language proficient in a specific field and thus, may not be as efficient translating fields beyond their expertise. Sometimes, they may misunderstand the documents because of their poor language skills in the source language or they may use the wrong terms or translation approach in the target language even though they understood the original text just fine. With such instances, inconsistent, illogical and confusing sentence structures, and and inappropriate expressions may be used in the translation.
V. Mistakes Caused by Cultural Difference
Any kind of language is not simply a combination of words, phrases and sentences, but an incorporation of the nation's history, philosophy, art, psychology and other aspects. Different languages are a manifestation of every area’s unique culture, which makes their conversion more complex. Translation can solve the problem of language barriers, while cultural difference is a major stumbling block, which is more evident and difficult in Chinese document translation. Due to the nature of the documents and its purpose, translators must be careful in legal text translation.