Theories of Translation1&

Fundamentals of Translation
Dr. Noureldin Abdelaal
nour@unizwa.edu.om
99186022
 Contents
• 1. Definition of translation
• 2. Translation as a process and product
• 3. Translation as invisible activity
• 4. Translation as a process of decision making
• 5.Translation unit
• 6.Translation theory and its development stages
• 7. The notion of equivalence in translation
theories: Vinay and Darbelnet
 What is translation
• Halliday, Macintosh, and Strevens (1965) describe
translation as the establishment of textual rather than
lexical or grammatical equivalents
• Catford (1965) defines translation as "the replacement of
textual material in one language, i.e. the source language
(SL) by equivalent textual material in another language, i.e.
target language
• House (2001) perceives translation as a reproduction of a
text in a SL in an equivalent text in a TL.
• Widdowson (1978) sees translation as a mere
communicative job.
 Translation as a process and a product
• Hatim and Munday (2004) state that there are two
distinctive senses of translation. The first sense is that
translation is a process, while the second one is that
translation is a product.
• They view translation as: 1) the process of transferring a ST
into a TT in a specific socio-cultural context; 2) the product
which is the result of the previous step; and 3) the
cognitive, linguistic, visual, cultural and ideological
phenomena which are a principal component of 1 and 2.
• This definition seems to care more about the socio-
cultural aspects of translation.
 Translation as invisible activity
• Venuti (2004) argues that a translator should
be invisible.
 Translation as a process of decision making

• Levy (1967) sees translation as a process of decision

making, whereby the components of this decision are:
• 1. The situation: sometimes the SL expresses one
lexical item using a certain item where the TL has two
equivalents for the same word.
• 2. Instruction I: it implies defining the class of possible
alternatives.
• 3. Instruction II: it denotes making selection from the
available class alternatives. Such a selection is context-
based.”
 Translation Unit
• Translation unit, as defined by Manfredi (2014), is the linguistic level employed by a
translator during his act of translation.
• Vinay and Darbelnet proposed ‘lexicological unit’ or ‘unit of thought’ as a translation
unit
• Newmark (1988) regards ‘sentence’ as the best unit of translation.
• However, Newmark mentions that in some texts such as expressive texts, ‘word’
should be deemed as the unit of translation because it can better convey the finest
nuances.
• Bassnet (2005) states that a text should be the unit of translation, especially in
literary prose texts.
• Strangely, Snell-Hornby considers the notion of culture as the unit of translation
• Manfredi (2014), in line with Halliday and Mathiessen (2014), argues that a clause
is the most proper unit of translation. However, Manfredi states that in writen
translations, especially literary ones, a sentence should be considered as a unit of
translation.
 Theory
• The concept of translations studies was first
introduced by James Holmes, as a substitute for
‘translation science’ or ‘translatology’ in 1972.
• Newmark favors the “translation theory” over
“translation studies”.
• He views theory as an important framework,
which should be taught to translation students,
though it is not fundamental to be a good
translator to learn a theory
 Development of translation theory (1)

• 1. Linguistic stage
Up to 1950: this stage was basically concerned
with literary texts, that is, poetry, short stories,
plays, novels and autobiography. This stage is
highly concerned with the heated discussion of
the word-for-word translation (literal), as
opposed to sense-for-sense translation (natural,
liberal or idiomatic).
 Development of translation theory (2)

• Tyler (1797: 14–15) defined a good translation

as one in which “the merit of the original work
is so completely transfused into another
language as to be as distinctly apprehended,
and as strongly felt, by a native of the country
to which that language belongs, as it is by
those who speak the language of the original
work”.
 The communicative stage
• From around 1950: this stage marks the
application of linguistics to translation studies;
it mainly covered non-literary and literary
texts. It was concerned with the categorization
of text registers, the participation of a range of
readership groups (less educated to expert),
and the identification of types of procedures
for translating various segments of a text.
 The functionalist stage
• From around 1970. It covers mainly non-
literary texts, that is, ‘the real world’. It is
concerned with the intention of a text and its
essential message, rather than the language of
the ST. Translation in this period is concerned
with how to translate a text functionally.
 The ethical/aesthetic stage
• From around 2000. This stage is concerned with
authoritative and official or documentary texts,
and includes serious literary works. It highlights
translation as a truth-seeking profession. The truth
is essentially twofold: (a) the correspondence of a
factual text with reality; and the correspondence
of an imaginative text with a meaningful allegory,
and, consequentially; the correspondence of the
translation with the respective type of text.
The Notion of Equivalence in Translation
Theories
 Vinay and Darbelnet (2004).
• Influenced basically by Catford’s (1965) shifts,
they identified two strategies of translation:
direct and oblique.

• Direct translation procedures include borrowing,

calque and literal translation
• Oblique translation procedures include
transposition, modulation, equivalence and
adaptation
 1. Borrowing
• An SL word is transferred to the TT to fill a
semantic gap in TL, and one of the advantages
of this strategy is that it keeps the same
connotations of the SL (Ni, 2009); this method,
moreover, adds the flavor of the SL culture into
the TL
• Using this strategy should observe the style and
message to be conveyed accurately.
• E.g. Radio, TV
 2. Calque
• An SL expression or structure is transferred with minimum adaptation;
it is a special kind of borrowing; it is subdivided it into two types:
• A: lexical calque
• The SL lexis are transferred into the TT without violating the syntactic
structure of the TT; for example, translating the English expression
“compliments of the season” into French as “Compliments de la
saison!”.
• B: structural calque
• A new structure is introduced into the TL; for example, translating the
English expression “Science –fiction” into French as “Science –fiction”.
• For example‫ل‬ ‫ ككلكككلمقام مق ا‬can be translated as “every situation has its
saying”
 3. Literal translation
• In this procedure, a word-for-word translation
is followed
• Between close languages (e.g. French and
Italian)
 4.Transposition
• It implies changing a part of speech (i.e. word
class) without altering the meaning; there are
two types of transposition, which are
obligatory transposition and optional
transposition
 5.Modulation
• in this procedure, the semantics and point of
view expressed in the SL are changed
• This strategy is followed when literal
translation or transposition can result in
unidiomatic or unsuitable text in the TL.
Similarly to transposition, there are obligatory
and optional modulations
• E.g. lend me your ears
 6. Equivalence
It is a strategy whereby different stylistic or
structural means are used by SL and TL
respectively, as in idioms and proverbs; put in
other words, the ST and TT can render the same
message using different styles or different
structures
 7. Adaptation
• Changing and/or explaining cultural
differences between SL and TL occurs. This
strategy is employed to create situational
equivalence.
• For example, the English “hello” can be
adapted to be assalamu alikum in Arabic.