【正文】 wer”(花 “the colored part of a plant from which the seed or fruit develops ”). It will easily cause ambiguity in oral translation. In example (2), the first “can” is a modal verb, means “能”(it is possible for somebody or something to do something, or for something to happen) ；the second “can” is a verb, means “裝罐頭”(to preserve food by putting it in a can) . Such kinds of ambiguous words will cause ambiguity in the interpretation because they all have the same pronunciation. It is hard to distinguish which word it is in oral English. Therefore, the wrong interpretation es. Lexical ambiguityLexical ambiguity is caused by homonymy and polysemy. One speaks of ‘polysemy’ when an expression has two or more definitions with some mon features that are usually derived from a single basic meaning. (Hadumod Bussmann, 2000:371) For example: there are 15 meanings of “hand” and 12 meanings of “face” in Oxford Advanced Learner’s Dictionary of Current English with Chinese translation. Such kind of words is called polysemic words which have more than one meaning. Therefore, they are ambiguous when translated into Chinese, which causes lexical ambiguity.Most English words are polysemic words. For the nouns, verbs, adjectives and adverbial words, the more frequently they are used, the more meaning they have. The origin of polysemy is the word’s derivation. In the cause of derivation, the original meaning is divided into a new meaning, and then the two or more meanings coexist in one word which forms the polysemic words. For example, the adjective “l(fā)ight” means “not dark” or “not heavy”, the verb “l(fā)ight” means “to move fast” or “to direct or manage”, and the noun “bank” means “financial institution” or “the edge of a river”. Some examples below will well illustrate lexical ambiguity.(1) The food isn’t hot. (An Yan, Li Shaofeng, 1995)(2) Let me drive you to the bank.(3) He is going to marry Jane at the church. (Huang Huijun, 2002)In the abovementioned examples, it is clear that each sentence has two translations. “Hot” can be put into “熱的”(having a high temperature) and “辣的”(containing pepper and spices and producing a burning feeling in your mouth), for “hot” is a polysemic word, and each meaning seems right in the example. “Bank” and “marry” are also polysemic words, therefore, “bank” can be translated into “銀行”(a financial organization) or “河岸”(the side of a river) , and “marry” can be rendered into “與(某人)結(jié)婚”(to bee the husband or wife of somebody。(She cannot accept children’s noise.) (Qiu Shude, 2003:53)(5) She didn’t take his tip.a. 她沒(méi)有接受他給的小費(fèi)。(This manuscript like the one which produced for the first time most)。 creative) 。(to put an end to。(to destroy)g. He killed three bottles of whisky in a week.她一周內(nèi)喝了三瓶威士忌。 if the writer or speaker use them unintentionally, using speech sounds or extralinguistic situation will have a lot help in disambiguating and translating them into correct one. Methods in translating English ambiguous words Using the literal translationLiteral translation means to translate or express the literal meaning of an original phrase, sentence, and text faithfully. (Liu Jichun, 1996) However, the literal translation used here means to translate the original by understanding the municators’ words or intention, and then the ambiguity will be resolved by context. Using this method can keep the special pragmatic effect in the text. For example: The Clerk (entering): Are you engaged? Augustus: What business is that of yours? However, …The Clerk: That isn’t what I mean. Can you see a female?Augustus: Of course I can see a female as easily as a male. Do you suppose I am blind?The Clerk: You don’t seem to follow me somehow. There is a female downstairs… She wants to know “can you see her if I let her up”.Augustus: Oh, you mean am I disengaged…The following translation might be far from right without using literal translation to translate the ambiguous words “be engaged” and “see”.職：（進(jìn)來(lái)）你有事嗎？奧：與你有什么相干？不過(guò)…….職：我不是說(shuō)訂婚的事，你能接見(jiàn)一個(gè)女人嗎？奧：當(dāng)然可以，我看見(jiàn)一個(gè)女人就像看見(jiàn)一個(gè)男人那樣容易。 there are many differences between the two languages, such as pronunciation, grammar and culture. Therefore, the transferring between the two languages is in the collar sometimes. In order to translate the original which contains ambiguous words correctly and make the readers understand the translation well, by keeping English words and adding note when translating, the translator can not only translate the original correctly but also keep the humor and the special style of the original. For examples:(1) The professor rapped on his desk and shouted, “Gentlemen, order!” The entire class yelled, “Beer!”——教授敲擊講臺(tái)并大聲說(shuō)：“先生們, order (注)”, 全班齊聲喊道： “要啤酒！”注：Order 既可理解為“安靜”，又可理解為“點(diǎn)菜”或“點(diǎn)飲料”。Note: “Serve crabs” can be understood by “serving a sea animal with a broad flat shell and five pairs of legs” as well as “serving the people with cantankerous temper”. Therefore, the waitress gave an irrelevant answer. (Yuan Chuandao, 2007)In the two examples above, “order”, “serve” and “crabs” are ambiguous. The translator used the method of keeping English words and adding notes to translate the original well. This method can not only help the translators keep the original style and translate it correctly but also help the readers to understand the translation well. Other methods of translating English ambiguous wordsExcept the methods discussed above, to translate ambiguous words, the means of speech sounds or the use of extralinguistic situation also can be used to translate ambiguous words. Using speech sounds is to use the intonation, stress and pause to help to translate English ambiguous words used in interpretation.(1) She is an English teacher.a. 她是一名英語(yǔ)老師。(He is a man who is thirsty for power.)b. 他是一個(gè)有抱負(fù)的人。（英）(We will put the motion on the schedule.)b. 我們是要把這項(xiàng)議案擱