scholarly journals Literêre vertaling as kruiskulturele kommunikasie: Kortonnen dozen van Tom Lanoye in Afrikaans

Literator ◽  
1998 ◽  
Vol 19 (3) ◽  
pp. 29-52
Author(s):  
M. Erasmus
Keyword(s):  
Cross Cultural ◽  
Literary Translation ◽  
Literary Texts ◽  
Source Text ◽  
Cross Cultural Communication ◽  
System A ◽  
Short Novel ◽  
Foreign Culture ◽  
Literary System ◽  
Opening Up

Literary translation as cross-cultural communication: Kartonnen dozen by Tom Lanoye in Afrikaans Literary texts are more frequently translated from Afrikaans into Dutch than vice versa. The translation of the popular Flemish writer Tom Lanoye's short novel Kartonnen dozen by Daniel Hugo is indeed one of the very few examples of the latter. In this article I explore, inter alia, the politics of translation which may underlie this imbalance; literary translation as a way of "opening up" a foreign culture; the ideology of translatability. To establish whether Hugo's translation may be seen as adequate, and thus as functioning effectively within the Afrikaans (target) literary system, a comparative analysis is made of the two texts (i.e. Kartonnen dozen and Kartondose) in respect of certain textemes which I regard as imperative for the target text to convey the intention of the source text. In conclusion, I voice my opinion on a literary translation such as Kartondose and its role in the endeavour of decolonisation to resist globalisation.

TRANSLATION AS MENTAL INTERPRETATION ACTIVITY IN LINGUISTICS AND LITERATURE

2019 ◽  
Vol 18 (28) ◽  
pp. 43-53
Author(s):  
Svitlana Gruschko
Keyword(s):  
Literary Criticism ◽  
Literary Work ◽  
Cross Cultural ◽  
Literary Translation ◽  
Literary Texts ◽  
Cultural Dimension ◽  
Cultural Communication ◽  
Original Text ◽  
Cross Cultural Communication ◽  
Cross Language

In the article the phenomenon of translation is regarded as mental interpretation activity not only in linguistics, but also in literary criticism. The literary work and its translation are most vivid guides to mental and cultural life of people, an example of intercultural communication. An adequate perception of non-native culture depends on communicators’ general fund of knowledge. The essential part of such fund of knowledge is native language, and translation, being a mediator, is a means of cross-language and cross-cultural communication. Mastering another language through literature, a person is mastering new world and its culture. The process of literary texts’ translation requires language creativity of the translator, who becomes so-called “co-author” of the work. Translation activity is a result of the interpreter’s creativity and a sort of language activity: language units are being selected according to language units of the original text. This kind of approach actualizes linguistic researching of real translation facts: balance between language and speech units of the translated work (i.e. translationinterpretation, author’s made-up words, or revised language peculiarities of the characters). The process of literary translation by itself should be considered within the dimension of a dialogue between cultures. Such a dialogue takes place in the frame of different national stereotypes of thinking and communicational behavior, which influences mutual understanding between the communicators with the help of literary work being a mediator. So, modern linguistics actualizes the research of language activities during the process of literary work’s creating. This problem has to be studied furthermore, it can be considered as one of the central ones to be under consideration while dealing with cultural dimension of the translation process, including the process of solving the problems of cross-cultural communication.

scholarly journals A Relevance Theory Perspective on Translating the Implicit Information in Literary Texts

2006 ◽  
Vol 2 (2) ◽  
pp. 43-60
Author(s):  
Zhonggang Sang
Keyword(s):  
Relevance Theory ◽  
Cross Cultural ◽  
Literary Translation ◽  
Literary Texts ◽  
Cultural Communication ◽  
Theory Approach ◽  
Cross Cultural Communication ◽  
Implicit Information ◽  
Language Boundaries ◽  
Cognitive Study

As one type of cross-cultural communication, the literary translation is more difficult for the translator as he has to deal with a large chunk of implicit information. The implicit information has as its characteristics, such as graded communicability, context-dependence, the correlation among the implicit information, text and context, etc. These characteristics restrict the communicability of the literary texts in another context, so the translator of the literary texts often finds more difficulties in translating. Encouraged by Gutt’s theory and his recent findings, this article adopts a relevance-theory approach and attempts to present a cognitive study of the implicit information in literary texts. It experiments with building an explanatory framework for translating the implicit information in literary texts. The framework is based on a new notion: translation is clues-based interpretive use of language across language boundaries.

Language representation in the Spanish, Italian and French versions of Xiaolu Guo’s A Concise Chinese-English Dictionary for Lovers: On the translation of ungrammatical idiolect and language-based jokes

2021 ◽  
Vol 22 (1) ◽  
pp. 82-99
Author(s):  
F. Javier Díaz-Pérez
Keyword(s):  
Relevance Theory ◽  
Cross Cultural ◽  
The Novel ◽  
Source Text ◽  
Cross Cultural Communication ◽  
Opposite Pole ◽  
Language Representation ◽  
Different Types ◽  
Chinese Girl ◽  
Basic English

AbstractXiaolu Guo’s A Concise Chinese-English Dictionary for Lovers is a novel in which language has a special protagonism. The main character, Z, is a Chinese girl who goes to London to improve her basic English. Her idiolect is thus characterised by a great quantity of linguistic errors of different types. This lack of proficiency in English makes cross-cultural communication really difficult. Therefore, language becomes in this novel not only a characterisation tool, but also an essential aspect of the plot. Moreover, it is also a paramount source of humour, since there is plenty of jokes based, for instance, on puns, many of which derive from Z’s lack of linguistic competence. The main objective of this paper is to analyse language representation in the source text as well as in the Spanish, Italian and French versions of the novel from the perspective of relevance theory. Out of the three versions, the Spanish one reflects the highest interpretive resemblance in this regard, whereas the Italian one occupies the opposite pole of the scale. With regard to the translation of wordplay, the pragmatic scenario is normally maintained in the TT, although there are statistically significant differences between the three versions and across different types of puns.

Cross-cultural literary translation strategies within a Maltese bilingual context

Babel ◽  
2018 ◽  
Vol 64 (1) ◽  
pp. 135-168
Author(s):  
Kenneth Grima
Keyword(s):  
Cross Cultural ◽  
Point Of View ◽  
Literary Translation ◽  
Target Language ◽  
Source Text ◽  
Cultural Elements ◽  
Translation Strategies ◽  
Strategic Processes ◽  
Useful Flow ◽  
Culture Bias

Abstract The process of literary translation includes the source culture-specific elements that constitute an integral part of the source text. This paper aims to identify and analyse various translation strategic processes that could be adopted in translating cultural factors within the parameters of a Maltese bilingual, but not necessarily bicultural, context. Each of the suggested strategic procedures is presented in useful flow-chart formats, varying from source language/source culture to target language/target culture bias approach in order to keep cultural losses to a minimum whilst maximising cultural gains and, therefore, to make the transformation of the source text into the target text successful. Such flow-charts are aimed to provide the literary translator with a rapid means of achieving an adequate and satisfying suggested solution for a quality cross-cultural transposition of the cultural elements encountered within a bilingual context. In certain instances, it is also suggested that some strategies are used concurrently with others. To achieve this aim, an extended practical translation exercise by the author himself is used. This paper also helps to strengthen further both the level of research in narrative translation studies in general, and the research done in Maltese narrative literary translation from a cultural point of view.

scholarly journals THE CONCEPT OF FIDELITY IN COMICS TRANSLATION

2016 ◽  
Vol 8 (2) ◽  
pp. 8
Author(s):  
Erico Assis
Keyword(s):  
Literary Translation ◽  
Literary Texts ◽  
Reading Process ◽  
Fair Share ◽  
Source Text ◽  
Topological Relations ◽  
Page Layout ◽  
Translation Fidelity ◽  
Linguistic Sign

The long-discussed – and frequently dismissed – concept of translation faithfulness or translation fidelity, though usually applied to literary texts, has its fair share of applications when considered for comics translation. In literary translation, non-linguistic portions such as illustrations are often considered addenda or “paratexts” relative to the main, linguistic text. Comics, by its turn, present a certain set of features which single them out as a form that demands a new concept of “text” and, therefore, of translation fidelity. The comic-reading process, as pertaining to cognitive apprehension, implies interpretative accords that differ from the ones in purely linguistic texts: each and every element of the comics page – non-linguistic (mainly imagetic) signs, linguistic signs, panel borders, typography and such – are intertwined and should be perceived in regards to its spatial and topological relations. This approach to understanding comics is based on Groensteen (1999) and his concepts of arthrology, spatio-topia, page layout, breakdown and braiding. As for translation fidelity, we rely on authors such as Berman (1984), Guidere (2010) and Aubert (1993). On comics translation, Zanettin (2008), Rota (2008) and Yuste Frías (2010, 2011) are of particular interest. Based on various concepts of fidelity – supported by samples of translated comics with varied degrees of fidelity to the source text – we discuss the different grounds of source-text fidelity, target-reader fidelity and source-author fidelity in the following instances: linguistic sign fidelity, imagetic sign fidelity, spatio-topia fidelity, typographic fidelity and format fidelity.

scholarly journals Pragmatic Coherence and Equivalence in Literary Translation

2021 ◽  
Vol 1 (1) ◽  
pp. 142-154
Author(s):  
Shushanik Paronyan
Keyword(s):  
Cultural Context ◽  
Research Work ◽  
Literary Work ◽  
Cross Cultural ◽  
Literary Translation ◽  
Original Text ◽  
Source Text ◽  
Pragmatic Analysis ◽  
The Cross ◽  
Pragmatic Equivalence

The topic of the present paper concerns cultural translation and focuses on the cross-cultural aspect of pragmatic equivalence. It is based on the hypothesis that the pragmatic framework of the literary work, i.e.  the deliberate choice of  tied verbal actions and the interpretations of these actions, forms  an important slot in the overall structure of cultural context and displays the artistic literary idea of the writer.  Hence the research work clearly shows that literary translation should adequately transmit the intentions and ideas encoded in the original text to the readers from the respective culture. The cross-cultural pragmatic analysis of the speech act sequences and reporting words carried out on the material of a literary work in English and its Armenian translation has enabled us to determine that the violation of pragmatic coherence of the source text distorts the cultural context planned by the author.

Introduction: Filming Russian Classics—Challenges and Opportunities

2016 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alexander Burry
Keyword(s):  
Russian Literature ◽  
Cross Cultural ◽  
Literary Texts ◽  
Cultural Communication ◽  
Adaptation Studies ◽  
Cross Cultural Communication ◽  
Challenges And Opportunities ◽  
Made In

This chapter presents an overview of the history and process of transposing classic Russian literature into film, surveying the progress recent scholars of adaptation studies have made in overcoming fidelity criticism. Borrowing Gerard Genette’s concept of “hypertextuality,” it offers an approach to studying films of Russian literature based on cross-cultural communication, in which literary texts undergo semantic shifts as they enter different temporal, spatial, social, and historical contexts when they are transformed into film.

scholarly journals Translating The Waste Land: Literal accuracy, poetic fidelity and cross-cultural communication

Literator ◽  
2001 ◽  
Vol 22 (2) ◽  
pp. 21-38
Author(s):  
A. Wessels
Keyword(s):  
Cultural Identity ◽  
Cross Cultural ◽  
Cultural Dimensions ◽  
Literary Translation ◽  
Cultural Communication ◽  
Translation Theory ◽  
The Waste Land ◽  
Cross Cultural Communication ◽  
Waste Land ◽  
The Impact

The author of this article published an Afrikaans translation of T.S. Eliot’s The Waste Land in 1992. This article is a personal contemplation and evaluation of the process of literary translation as experienced in the particular case, referring to aspects of translation theory where relevant. It discusses the unremitting balancing act that literary translation requires, where the translator has to pose the need for as close a literal translation as possible against the need to render, again as faithfully as possible, the comprehensive poetic effect of the work, as regards, for example, stylistic features, emotive force and symbolic significance. Through all of this runs the thread of (a sometimes unconscious) transculturation of the work, partly the result of the desire on the part of the translator to communicate the impact of the poem as successfully as possible to a specific audience with a specific cultural identity and cultural presuppositions. Sometimes the inescapable interpretative nature of literary translation could be attributable to the cultural identity of the translator himself and sometimes it could be the result of the innate cultural dimensions or temper of the recipient language. The problems encountered, solutions arrived at and transcultural evolution effected are illustrated from the (original and translated) texts.

The Concept of Function of Translation and its Application to Literary Texts

Target ◽  
1992 ◽  
Vol 4 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-16 ◽  
Author(s):  
Roda P. Roberts
Keyword(s):  
Functional Approach ◽  
Literary Translation ◽  
Literary Texts ◽  
Source Text ◽  
Language Functions ◽  
Concept Of Function

Abstract Many translation theorists have adopted a functional approach to translation in an attempt to guide and explain the difficult choices a translator must make. This paper argues that it is the function of the translation, and not the functions of language or the function of the source text, that is the translator's guiding force. Having defined the function of translation as the application or use which the translation is intended to have in the context of the target situation, various functions that a literary translation may serve are examined. Finally, using the criteria of functions of language, functions of (source) text and functions of translation, an attempt is made to show that the type and degree of coincidence between the formal manifestations of the functions of language in the source text, the function of the source text and the translation depend on the precise function of the latter.

scholarly journals Translating on Purpose: Domestication in English Translations of Chinese Publicity Materials

2019 ◽  
Vol 7 (1) ◽  
pp. 10
Author(s):  
Licheng Lu
Keyword(s):  
Negative Impact ◽  
Cross Cultural ◽  
Syntactic Structures ◽  
Cross Cultural Communication ◽  
Skopos Theory ◽  
Great Progress ◽  
English Translations ◽  
International Image ◽  
Reform And Opening Up ◽  
Opening Up

English translations of Chinese publicity materials play an important role in introducing China to the outside world and in helping foreigners know more and better about the country. Since the implementation of the Reform and Opening-up Policy in China four decades ago, great progress has been recorded in translating Chinese publicity materials into English. However, poor translations still exist, such as those with linguistic errors, cultural inappropriateness, missing of information, inconsistency in the use of proper names, etc. These problematic translations exert a negative impact on China’s international image and the cross-cultural communication and exchange between China and the outside world. Under such circumstances, the present study proposes the application of domestication in translating Chinese publicity materials into English from the perspective of Skopos theory. Through illustrations with specific examples, three types of domestication are identified, namely, domestication of culturally-loaded words, domestication of syntactic structures and domestication of rhetorical devices.

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