填空题 Translation from English to Chinese．(北京师范大学2008研，考试科目：英语语言文学)The establishment of communication between people belonging to different speech communities has long been an important form of linguistic performance. Under the influence of the Department of "Theoretical and Applied Linguistics" of Karl-Marx University of Leipzig, the word Translation recently made its way into the German language: this word is now often, though not generally used in the German speaking world as an umbrella term for translating and interpreting to denote interlingual communication. Little is known about the beginnings of Translation: it is known only that interpreting, i. e. the oral form of Translation, is older than its written counterpart: under what conditions the first interlingual language contacts took place, however, what factors played a role(commercial, military, political, cultural), and how individual speech communities developed such language contacts, are all questions whose answers are of a largely hypothetical nature and can thus easily get lost in the realm of mythological or theological speculation. This can easily lead to mistaking cause for effect, as for example in the biblical story of the building of the Tower of Babel:"...men were not scattered around because they could not understand one another"s speech. They could not understand one another because they were scattered: in the(Babel)story cause and effect have been turned around".(Wolfram Wilss: The Science of Translation)