The Characteristics and Translation Strategies of Fuzzy Language in Diplomatic Communiqués

Fuzzy language mainly refers to the vagueness of words, phrases, and fuzzy meanings. In the official documents of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of China, the appropriate use of vague language can make the language more polite and show the position and attitude of the issue. After collecting the information of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs’ communiqués of China from 2019 to 2021, this paper uses the software of AntConc to build a corpus and sort out the data about the use of fuzzy language in the documents. Under the guidance of the Politeness Principle, this paper summarizes the frequency and characteristics of the four fuzzy hedges in diplomatic communiqués. In addition, the Skopos Theory is further employed to explain and analyze the characteristics of relevant translation strategies.Fuzzy language mainly refers to the vagueness of words, phrases, and fuzzy meanings. In the official documents of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of China, the appropriate use of vague language can make the language more polite and show the position and attitude of the issue. After collecting the information of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs’ communiqués of China from 2019 to 2021, this paper uses the software of AntConc to build a corpus and sort out the data about the use of fuzzy language in the documents. Under the guidance of the Politeness Principle, this paper summarizes the frequency and characteristics of the four fuzzy hedges in diplomatic communiqués. In addition, the Skopos Theory is further employed to explain and analyze the characteristics of relevant translation strategies.