scholarly journals A functional comparison of recurrent word-combinations in English original vs. translated texts

ICAME Journal ◽  
2017 ◽  
Vol 41 (1) ◽  
pp. 31-52
Author(s):  
Signe Oksefjell Ebeling ◽  
Jarle Ebeling
Keyword(s):  
Quantitative Methods ◽  
Translation Studies ◽  
Functional Categories ◽  
Source Language ◽  
Frequent Use ◽  
Functional Classes ◽  
Object Of Study ◽  
Tertium Comparationis ◽  
Shed Light ◽  
Recurrent Word

Abstract The study explores the potential of quantitative methods to shed light on how texts originally written in English (EO) and texts translated into English (ET) from Norwegian cluster in terms of functional classes. The object of study are sequences of three words (3-grams), classified into 15 functional categories. The investigation establishes that EO and ET do not differ significantly in half of the categories. As for the categories that do differ, two (Comparison and Spatial) are investigated in more detail, uncovering that the more frequent use of Comparison and Spatial 3-grams in ET is most likely a result of source language shining through. The findings are important in the context of both descriptive translation studies and translation-based contrastive studies. With regard to the former, the current study shows that, in many cases, ET does not seem to constitute a ‘third code’ at the level of 3-gram functions, since the same functions are equally attested in EO. As far as contrastive studies are concerned, the investigation reveals few, if any, lexico-grammatical differences between EO and ET that overturn the belief that translations are a good tertium comparationis when comparing and contrasting language systems.

Distribution and translation

2021 ◽  
Vol 0 (0) ◽  
Author(s):  
Tong King Lee
Keyword(s):  
Applied Linguistics ◽  
Translation Studies ◽  
Second Order ◽  
Media Ecology ◽  
Target Language ◽  
Language And Culture ◽  
First Order ◽  
Language System ◽  
Object Of Study ◽  
Distributed Language

Abstract Translation has traditionally been viewed as a branch of applied linguistics. This has changed drastically in recent decades, which have witnessed translation studies growing as a field beyond, and sometimes against, applied linguistics. This paper is an attempt to think translation back into applied linguistics by reconceptualizing translation through the notions of distributed language, semiotic repertoire, and assemblage. It argues that: (a) embedded within a larger textual-media ecology, translation is enacted through dialogical interaction among the persons, texts, technologies, platforms, institutions, and traditions operating within that ecology; (b) what we call translations are second-order constructs, or relatively stable formations of signs abstracted from the processual flux of translating on the first-order; (c) translation is not just about moving a work from one discrete language system across to another, but about distributing it through semiotic repertoires; (d) by orchestrating resources performatively, translations are not just interventions in the target language and culture, but are transformative of the entire translingual and multimodal space (discursive, interpretive, material) surrounding a work. The paper argues that distributed thinking helps us de-fetishize translation as an object of study and reimagine translators as partaking of a creative network of production alongside other human and non-human agents.

scholarly journals A Translator’s Wanderings in TranslationStudiesWorld

2019 ◽  
Vol 30 (1-2) ◽  
pp. 79-99
Author(s):  
Brian Mossop
Keyword(s):  
Applied Linguistics ◽  
Translation Studies ◽  
Point Of View ◽  
Full Time ◽  
Canadian Government ◽  
Definition Of ◽  
Object Of Study

This semi-autobiographical article reflects on the discipline known as Translation Studies from the point of view of the author, who was a full-time Canadian government translator from 1974 to 2014, but also taught and wrote about translation. The narrative begins with the emergence of Translation Studies in Canada and in Europe and continues through the present neoliberal era, with reflection on a variety of topics including the English name of the discipline, the lack of definition of an object of study, the original role of the journal Meta, and the notion of translation as applied linguistics. The last section considers two fictive scenarios in which Translation Studies does not emerge, and translation is studied, right from the start, in ways much more closely linked to the translation profession, with a focus on translators rather than translations, and therefore on translational production rather than the analysis of completed translations.

Explicitation, simplification and neutralisation in the translation of reference

2020 ◽  
Vol 13 ◽  
pp. 29-43
Author(s):  
Mona ARHIRE
Keyword(s):  
Discourse Analysis ◽  
Qualitative Methods ◽  
Translation Studies ◽  
Referring Expressions ◽  
Training Environment ◽  
John Fowles ◽  
Characteristic Features ◽  
Quantitative And Qualitative Methods ◽  
Theoretical Component ◽  
Shed Light

Recurrent features of translation, sometimes labelled as ‘translation universals’, have been intensively investigated within Descriptive Corpus-based Translation Studies. Numerous language pairs have been set under researchers’ lens with a view to observing languages from a contrastive viewpoint, but also individually, in their translational manifestations. This has enabled the identification of characteristic features of the translational facets of languages, which have generated more and more nuanced scholarly theories. This paper examines the occurrence of some of the most frequent features of translation, namely: explicitation, simplification and neutralisation in the translation of reference as a cohesive device. Methodologically speaking, the investigation combines the theoretical and applied areas of Translation Studies, with an interdisciplinary dimension provided by the fusion of methodological input borrowed from Descriptive Translation Studies, Discourse Analysis and Contrastive Studies. The theoretical component of the research refers to issues of contrastiveness between English and Romanian viewed from a translational angle, in terms of equivalence and the occurrence of the three features of translation. The applied area of Translation Studies comprises the empirical approach to the translation of reference, while addressing not only the researchers’ community, but also the practitioners in translation and the translator training environment. The research applies both quantitative and qualitative methods to investigate the data selected from John Fowles’ novel Mantissa (1982) and its translation into Romanian by Angela Jianu (Fowles 1995). The findings provide insights into the nature and functions of referring expressions as formal links, but also as stylistic devices, and shed light into issues related to contrastiveness of reference between English and Romanian, to aspects of equivalence and translatability, as well as to the occurrence of translation universals.

scholarly journals The Effect of Collocation on Meaning Representation of Adjectives such as Big and Large in Translation from Two Languages Used in the Article to English Language Texts

2011 ◽  
Vol 4 (1) ◽  
pp. 70
Author(s):  
Malahat Minaabad
Keyword(s):  
English Language ◽  
Translation Studies ◽  
Target Language ◽  
Source Language ◽  
Meaning Representation ◽  
Contextual Meaning

Translation is the process to transfer written or spoken source language (SL) texts to equivalent written or spoken target language (TL) texts. Translation studies (TS) relies so heavily on a concept of meaning, that one may claim that there is no TS without any reference to meanings. People’s understanding of the meaning of sentences is far more reliable than their understanding of the meaning of words. Since what people know when they know the meaning of a word is important, but the skill of incorporating that word appropriately into meaningful linguistic contexts is more important. Our interest here lies in the shift of emphasis from referential or dictionary meaning to contextual meaning of adjectives such as big, and large in translation to English language texts or vice versa. Since big and large are synonyms, it is not surprising that they can be used to describe many of the same nouns. However, they are not perfect synonyms, and there are some differences in the distribution of these adjectives which make some problems for translators especially from those languages which these kinds of differences are not so obvious.    

Translating the translingual text

2016 ◽  
Vol 11 (1) ◽  
pp. 100-117 ◽  
Author(s):  
Julie Hansen
Keyword(s):  
Russian Translation ◽  
Translation Studies ◽  
Target Language ◽  
Soviet Period ◽  
The Novel ◽  
Source Language ◽  
American Writer ◽  
Russian Linguistic

This article examines strategies applied in selected passages of Elena Petrova’s Russian translation of Olga Grushin’s anglophone novel The Dream Life of Sukhanov (2005). The novel is set in Moscow during the late Soviet period and depicts a crisis precipitated by the changes brought by glasnost in the life of a loyal apparatchik. Although the Russian-American writer Grushin composed the novel in her adopted language of English, it reflects a Russian cultural subtext and contains numerous Russian linguistic elements and cultural allusions. It is therefore interesting to analyze how these elements are rendered in the Russian translation, entitled Zhizn’ Sukhanova v snovideniiakh (2011). The analysis is followed by a consideration of challenges posed by translingual texts to theoretical understandings of translation. It argues that established concepts within translation studies, such as domestication, foreignization, source language and target language, are not well-suited to cases of literary translingualism.

scholarly journals Translating English Sound Symbolism in Italian Comics: A Corpus-Based Linguistic Analysis across Six Decades (1932–1992)

Arts ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 9 (4) ◽  
pp. 108
Author(s):  
Pier Simone Pischedda
Keyword(s):  
Historical Linguistic ◽  
Comic Books ◽  
Time Windows ◽  
Translation Studies ◽  
Linguistic Analysis ◽  
Sound Symbolism ◽  
The Cross ◽  
Archival Work ◽  
Shed Light

Linking interdisciplinarity and multimodality in translation studies, this paper will analyse the diachronic translation of English ideophones in Italian Disney comics. This is achieved thanks to the compiling of a bi-directional corpus of sound symbolic entries spanning six decades (1932–1992)—a corpus that was created following extensive archival work in various Italian and American libraries between 2014 and 2016. The central aim is to showcase practical examples coming from published comic scripts and to highlight patterns of translation in each of the five different time windows which were chosen according to specific historical, linguistic and cultural vicissitudes taking place in the Italian nation. Overall, the intention is to shed light on an under-developed area of studies that focuses on the cross-linguistical transposition of ideophonic forms in comic books and to pinpoint how greater factors might influence the treatment of such deceptively miniscule elements in the comic books’ pages.

Contrastive Rhetoric and Text-Typological Conventions in Translation Teaching

Target ◽  
1997 ◽  
Vol 9 (2) ◽  
pp. 332-350 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sonia Colina
Keyword(s):  
Explicit Instruction ◽  
Descriptive Analysis ◽  
Translation Studies ◽  
Contrastive Rhetoric ◽  
Pedagogical Intervention ◽  
Source Language ◽  
Textual Features ◽  
Translation Pedagogy

Abstract This paper illustrates the relevance of contrastive rhetoric research to Translation Studies and shows how it can be applied to translation pedagogy. After a brief descriptive analysis of the recipe genre in English and Spanish, student translations are examined. It is shown that the work of novice translators is one case in which source-language textual features are transferred into the target text. The effects of explicit instruction on textual-features and text-typological conventions are examined by comparing student translations: a significant improvement in the work of students exposed to explicit instruction is indicative of the benefit of pedagogical intervention. The evidence presented also indicates that translation competence is in fact separate from bilingualism.

Un triangle traductologique

Translationes ◽  
2010 ◽  
Vol 2 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Jean-René Ladmiral
Keyword(s):  
Crucial Role ◽  
Translation Studies ◽  
History Plays ◽  
Research Triangle ◽  
Methodological Research ◽  
Couple Theory ◽  
History Of ◽  
Object Of Study ◽  
Or History ◽  
Three Components

Abstract The new discipline of translation studies clearly finds itself downstream among humanities and traditional disciplines. Essentially interdisciplinary, this “science” lends those major disciplines a fair amount of its methods and concepts. Within this interdisciplinary concert, history plays a crucial role: history of translation (or history of translations) and history as such. Therefore, a methodological research triangle must integrate the following three components: a) translation studies theory; b) different translation practices that form its object of study and which it is called upon to clarify; c) the poles of the couple theory / practice will be re-situated in the logic of their respective common history.

How Comparable Can 'Comparable Corpora' Be?

Target ◽  
1997 ◽  
Vol 9 (2) ◽  
pp. 287-317 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sara Laviosa
Keyword(s):  
Systematic Study ◽  
Translation Studies ◽  
Comparable Corpora ◽  
Source Language ◽  
Adequate Level ◽  
Problematic Aspect

Abstract The development of a coherent methodology for corpus-based work in translation studies is essential for the evolution of this newfield of research into a fully-fledged paradigm within the discipline. The design of a monolingual, multi-source-language comparable corpus of English as a resource for the systematic study of the nature of translated text can be regarded as an important step towards the development of such a methodology. This paper deals with a crucial and problematic aspect of the design of a monolingual comparable corpus, namely the achievement of an adequate level of comparability between its translational and non-translational components.

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