Summary：
1. Causing of the mistakes: The tone of speech is sometimes too strong on the restricting and compelling public signs. Target readers can understand them without problem, but may feel uncomfortable. Changes should be made to the expressions on such signs in order to make them more friendly and politely.
2. Ways of avoiding such mistakes:
1) Avoid using too many “no” on signs, which is a definitely negative word. It can be replaced by a good deal of other expressions, such as “hand off”, “keep away”, “staff only” etc.
2) “Please” , as an interjection which serves as a mitigation of the strong tone of speech, should be added in the translation, such as “Please don’t enter in”, “Please don’t go through”, etc.
3) Negative expression can be replaced by positive one, which is more acceptable. Hence, “no touch” can be changed into “hands off’, and “The visitor halts” into “staff only”.

4.2. Neglect of cultural differences
There is always an interaction between translation and culture, in which culture
impacts and constrains translation. Translation of public signs is not an exception. The translators of the signs should aware that they have both the power of representing the source culture, and the power of manipulating the signs’ reception in the target culture.
Some mistranslations of public signs are caused by the mishandling of cultural
differences between Chinese and western culture. Such mistakes have been classified into two categories: 1) neglect of different associative meaning, and 2) mishandling of Chinese specialized terms.

4.2.1. Neglect of different associative meaning
Such mistranslations are always found on the brand names of shops and place names in parks. The literal meanings have been rendered out, while the associative meaning in the source culture have been neglected. These signs are set up with an intention to welcome visitors, unfortunately, the using of words which has bad associative meanings have kept them away unintentionally.

Example 26
  



（Shot at Andingmennei Street）(Ordinary photo is provided)

Response: Rena wrote in her letter: “A dragon is something dangerous and scary with a lot of power. In Western culture, dragons breathe fire, and they are usually destructive in stories. The hero has to go and fight the dragon.” “It might be a good name for a security office if they wanted people to think that they would be very good at protecting because they are powerful and good fighters. If they wanted to sound friendlier than that, it might be a bad name.” (Appendix – letter 4)
Analysis: “华龙”, which is the brand name of the security office, has been translated as “China dragon”.
“Dragon” is defined as “a large fierce imaginary animal, usually represented with wings, a long tail and fire coming out of its mouth” (http://dictionary.cambridge.org/define.asp?key=23640&dict=CALD). From this definition we can see that the associative meaning of “dragon” in western culture is quite negative. While in Chinese culture, it has commendatory meaning, and  represents majesty and power. Since the associative meaning of the word in target culture is derogative, changes should be made to.
Suggestion: From the definition, it can be seen that it’s not appropriate and reasonable to translate 龙 into dragon. But what is/are the possible translation(s) of the Chinese totem? The authors searches “translation of 龙” in Google, and have the following results:
1. Translate 龙 as Long
Reasons: The pronunciation of “long” is similar to that of 龙; also, it is an English word defined as “measuring a great length or a greater length than usual from one end to the other” (Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English, 2005: 1157), just as a depiction of the animal “dragon”, who is indeed “very long”.
Example: 龙卡, a kind of smart card developed in China, has been translated as Long Card instead of Dragon Card. And the responses are positive.
2. Translate 龙 as Liong.
Reasons: The English and Chinese pronunciations are very much alike, and “liong” is alike the English word “lion”, which is a favorite animal in English language system.
Example: A kind of game software 一龙 has been translated as “liong”.
3. Translate 龙 as Loong
Reasons: The pronunciations are alike. What’s more, it is a vivid word: two “o” in the middle of the word are just like the two round eyes of dragon.
Examples: Some person’s name and place names which contain 龙 have been translated as “loong”: 李晓龙 as Lee Siu Loong, 袷隆 as Yue Loong; 李显龙 as Lee Hsien Loong, etc.
“China dragon” can be replaced by any of the three alternatives.

Example 27




(Shot at Dashilan)
        
Response: Rena wrote in her Email: “If I saw "Silver Fox" for a beauty salon, it would make me think of the sexy meaning. That is probably okay for a beauty salon unless they were afraid that older or more conservative women wouldn´t go there, or they might want male customers and would be afraid that Western men wouldn´t go there because they don´t want to look like women and seem gay. I think if a beauty salon gave itself a name like that in the West, it would be trying to get only young, stylish women customers.” (Appendix – letter 5).
Analysis: The brand name of the beauty salon has been translated into “silver fox”.
In the source culture, the associative meaning of this word is cunning and deceitful. Idioms which involve the word “fox” are usually derogatory, such as “play the fox”, “a fox in lamb” etc. Thus, it should be avoided from using on the name of a shop.
Suggestion: “Fox” should be deleted from the name of the shop, or can be replaced by another word.

Summary
1. Causing of the mistakes: The names are simply be translated from the literal meaning, while the associative meaning of the words used has been neglected.
2. Ways of avoiding such mistakes: The translators should ensure that the words to be used on the signs have positive associative meaning. They can gain such knowledge by either consulting an English-English dictionary of showing the translation to a foreigner for his valuation. Otherwise, if they are not sure for the associative meaning, pinyin can be used on the translation. It does no harm to the understandability.