Introduction to Translation Studies Translation Practice and Contrastive Grammar

Main texts M. Ulrych, Translating Texts. From Theory to Practice, pp. 21-114 C. Taylor, Language to Language, pp. 48-64

Mark Shuttleworth, Dictionary of Translation Studies (1997) Source Text Source Language Text ST Target Text Target Language Text TT Translation is the rendering of a Source Language text into a Target Language text. But translation is not a merely automatic substitution of linguistic structures. “Translation is an incredibly broad notion, which can be understood in many different ways” Mark Shuttleworth, Dictionary of Translation Studies (1997)

Some definitions Traducere: trans (al di là) + ducere (portare) Translation is the transfer of a meaning, a semantic core from one linguistic code to another

Prego Ciao Pronto? You know the truth He delivered the punch Ha il senso della realtà A gentle slope Of gentle birth Antonio è arrivato È arrivato Antonio! È successa una disgrazia.

Pronto? Pronto. Parla Mary, potrei parlare con Susan Si, cara Allora andiamo Hello? Hello, this is Mary, could I speak to Susan please? Are you ready? Yes, I am Right, then let’s go

Potrebbe passarmi quel libro per favore? Prego? Vorrei leggere quel libro Prego Grazie Could you give me that book please? Sorry? I would like to read that book Here you are Thank you You’re welcome

Prego? Vorrei comprare un libro Prego, dopo di lei Can I help you? I’d like to buy a book After you

Non hanno un bel niente Niente affatto La goccia che fa traboccare il vaso Mi piace il tiramisù Il rosso dell’uovo A buon mercato Buon Natale e buon anno He went (andò, andava, è andato) Egli andava (he went, he would go, he used to go, he was going)

Linguistic Variations Communicative Functions Language Use Structure Context and culture (situation) (register) Phonology Graphology Lexicon Grammar Style Linguistic Variations Communicative Functions

To break: distruggere, fare a pezzi Ewe Turn: sheep stop the traffic in Madrid Ewe Turn – U Turn Pecore in fuga bloccano il traffico di Madrid Could breaking news be starting to break us instead? To break: distruggere, fare a pezzi E se le ultime notizie fossero davvero le ultime?

Coleridge, The Rime of the Ancient Mariner “The fair breeze blew, the white foam flew, The furrow followed free; We were the first that ever burst Into that silent sea.” La ballata del vecchio marinaio (trad. T. Tommaso Pisanti) Soffiava il buon vento, volava la bianca spuma seguiva libera la scia; I primi fummo che irrompemmo In quel tacito mare.

It is dangerous to lean out Vietato sporgersi Valone, 20 aprile 1917 Un’altra notte, In quest’oscuro Colle mani Gelate Distinguo Il mio viso Mi vedo Abbandonato nell’infinito Ungaretti In this dark With hands Frozen I make out My face I see myself abandoned in the infinite Traduzione di Charles Tomlison In this dark With frozen hands I make out My face I see myself Adrift in infinite space Traduzione di Peter Creagh

There was another problem to be solved: how to protect bank deposits from the risk of disappearing into thin air as a result of the overwhelming losses which were threatening to bring down the three main banks. C’era anche un altro problema da risolvere: come proteggere i depositi bancari dal rischio di dissolversi nell’aria in seguito alle perdite schiaccianti che minacciavano le tre banche principali. Restava inoltre scoperto il problema della salvaguardia dei depositi bancari esposti al rischio di volatilizzarsi a fronte della gran massa di perdite che ormai schiacciava i tre principali Istituti di credito.

Translation Studies

In his article On Linguistic Aspects of Translation (1959) Roman Jakobson distinguishes three kinds of translation Intralingual translation: rewording (riformulazione) (an interpretation of verbal signs by means of other signs in the same language) Interlingual translation: translation proper (an interpretation of verbal signs by means of some other language) Intersemiotic translation: transmutation (an interpretation of verbal signs by means of non verbal signs) (parola-immagine)

Translation Studies refer to what Jakobson defines INTERLINGUAL Translation Translation Studies date back to the 1970s. 1972 James S. Holmes, “The Name and Nature of Translation Studies” during the Third Conference of Applied Linguistics (in Copenhagen) used the expression “Translation Studies” to define a new area of analysis that is not simply a part of linguistics. 1978 André Lefevere proposed that the name Translation Studies should be adopted for the discipline that concerns itself with the problems raised by the production and description of translations

Linguistic Variations Communicative Functions Language Use Structure Context and culture (situation) (register) Phonology Graphology Lexicon Grammar Style Linguistic Variations Communicative Functions

Translation: From Theory to Practice

The translatability of a text depends on many aspects. It depends on the degree to which the source text is embedded in its own culture. The more culture-bound a text is, the more difficult it is to translate. The less culture bound a text is, the less it needs to be adapted to suit the TL readership. We should speak of a sliding scale of translatability, largely depending on the degree to which a text is embedded in SL culture.

2. The translatability of a text is deeply connected with the communicative function of the text. Promotional leaflets, business letters and poetry are meaningful examples of different degrees of translatability.

Translation Strategies (Malone) In 1988 Malone introduces a list of nine translation strategies, that is nine different procedures adopted by translations in order to cope with the lexical and syntactical differences between Source Language and Target Language Approfondimento: C. Taylor, Language to Language, pp. 48-64.

Equation Spaghetti, Lasagna, Pizza (however the absolute equivalence of these terms must be questioned, as they are used outside their home context) One of the most well-known traps associated with the word-for word equation if that of false friends, where the meanings of deceptively similar terms do not match across languages (Actual/attuale; editor/editore) Some lexical items have a particularly high frequency in Italian (much higher than their English equivalents)

(ex. Realtà) reality: the English lexical item has too high a level of abstraction L’arte come imitazione della realtà/Art as imitation of nature La realtà è dura/Life is hard La sua malattia è una realtà/Her illness is genuine Progetti che diventano realtà/plans which are realised Spesso la realtà ci sfugge/Often we don’t see things as they really are Ha il senso della realtà /He is realistic Bisogna tenere il senso della realtà locale/We must keep local needs in mind La realtà economica/the economic situation

Examples that deviate from equation The Holy Bible (La Sacra Bibbia) (not The Sacred Bible) (not La Santa Bibbia)

2. Substitution (the antithesis of equation: the translation has little or no morpho-syntactic or semantic relation to the source text. Ex. The Italian subjunctive replaced by an English infinitive Farò in modo che si convinca a venire I’ll try to get her to come The straw that broke the camel’s back La goccia che fa traboccare il vaso

3. Divergence: The strategy of choosing one possible solution from a potential range of alternatives panna vetro Cream glass Crema bicchiere If it should happen should it happen Se dovesse succedere If it were to happen Were it to happen

She saw a beautiful dress in the window She opened the window She lowered the window NIENTE Non ho niente da dire Niente male Niente scherzi Non hanno un bel niente I have nothing to say Not bad No messing about! They have nothing at all

4. Convergence Commercialista Accountant Ragioniere Contabile Tu Lei You Voi

Swansea is the birthplace of Dylan Thomas 5. Amplification Swansea is the birthplace of Dylan Thomas Swasea è il luogo natale del famoso scrittore e poeta Dylan Thomas

6. Reduction Carta geografica Map

Per quanto riguarda il tempo 7. Diffusion A source text item or utterance is expanded without adding any extra layer of meaning Cheap A buon mercato Weatherwise Per quanto riguarda il tempo The nineteen century sex role system La divisione dei ruoli in base al sesso nel XIX secolo

8. Condensation A source text item or utterance is contracted without omitting any layer of meaning To look at guardare To fall in love innamorarsi inseguire To run after

The time has not yet come 9. Reordering It occurs when various procedures are introduced to the syntactic units into the most familiar patterns of the target language Black and white Bianco e nero Non è ancora giunto il tempo The time has not yet come Something terrible has happened È successa una disgrazia

HIGH PRESSURE Pressione alta: high blood pressure Alta pressione: in the meteorological sense

Da questi elenchi apparirà evidentissima la minima percentuale delle opere da noi tradotte in confronto al totale annuo delle opere importate. The very small percentage of works trnaslated by us compared to the total number of works imported per year is clear from these lists.

A cogliere la mela del biblico albero della conoscenza furono, il 25 aprile 1953, le mani di un bizzarro fisico inglese The hands which, on the 25 th of April 1953 picked the apple from the Biblical tree of knowledge belonged to a rather eccentic English physicist.

Linguistic Variations Communicative Functions Language Use Structure Context and culture (situation) (register) Phonology Graphology Lexicon Grammar Style Linguistic Variations Communicative Functions

Language USE language functions Ex. “Nice weather, isn’t it?”: two people at the bus stop. The main purpose is to socialise, to create a common ground for conversation and not to make a statement about the weather. Standard phrases should be translated with standard equivalents in the TL, they should not be translated literally.

La lingua è un modo di agire sociale La lingua è un modo di agire sociale. Attraverso i nostri atti linguistici che si concatenano in un testo (scritto, verbale…) e si attualizzano pragmaticamente, siamo in grado non solo di veicolare dei messaggi, ma di influenzare i comportamenti degli altri con richieste, domande, proposte, avvertimenti. Non sempre i meccanismi dell’azione linguistica sono diretti ed espliciti.

Ex. “Chiuda quella finestra Ex. “Chiuda quella finestra!” in una sala d’attesa ad uno sconosciuto: ordine efficace nel contenuto linguistico ma del tutto infelice dal punto di vista pragmatico, perché scortese. “Le dispiacerebbe chiudere quella finestra?” “Potrebbe chiudere per cortesia”: un atto linguistico strutturato a livello del discorso come una frase interrogativa, in realtà non è una domanda, una richiesta di informazione, ma di un servizio.

People use language in order to achieve different aims People use language in order to achieve different aims. Apart from conveying meaning, all utterances have some communicative force. Under the surface structure of what is being said there is the underlying force. The overall meaning of an utterance largely depends on the addresser’s intentions, and on the underlying communicative force The translator must understand the overall communicative force of the utterances of the ST in order to convey it appropriately in the TT.

A: Linguistic Functions Austin, How to Do Things with Words (1962) Functions THE LOCUTION: the literal meaning of an utterance, the formal meaning of the words THE ILLOCUTION: the communicative force (the act that is performed by it: warning, request, etc.) THE PERLOCUTION: the effect on the hearer or reader

Atto locutorio: Un atto linguistico si definisce locutorio in quanto chi lo produce compie un’azione intenzionale fonica o grafica implicante l’uso di certe informazioni. Atto illocutorio: ogni enunciato che ha come scopo di modificare la situazione degli interlocutori. (ogni atto linguistico che consiste in un’asserzione, una domanda, un ordine, una proposta…) Ex. “Io pometto…”, “Perchè…?” “Ti ordino…” “mi congratulo…” Atto perlocutorio: si esaminano le conseguenze dell’atto linguistico sul destinatario (paura, desiderio, dolore, ansia…)

B : communicative functions Elements of an act of verbal communication Jakobson (1960): communicative scheme Communicative functions Although texts are generally multifunctional, one function generally predominates

Addresser Message Addressee Contact Context Code Expressive Poetic Conative Phatic Referential Metalingual

Relationship between communicative functions and text types (1) Literary texts Emotive function autobiographies letters Technical reports referential function textbooks Scientific articles advertising Political propaganda conative function Charity appeals

Relationship between communicative functions and text types (2) Poetry songs Poetic function Nursery rhymes Greetings phatic function condolences Good wishes metalingual function grammar dictionary

C: Rhetoric functions Once the translator has determined what is the predominant language function of a ST, he has to establish what rhetorical strategies the author of the ST has used to achieve the desired effect Ex. In a vocative text, persuation may be achieved by narrating, describing, arguing… Once the predominant language function has been established, the translator’s next task will be to determine what rhetorical function the author has used to achieve the desired effect.

Linguistic Variations Communicative Functions Language Use Structure Context and culture (situation) (register) Phonology Graphology Lexicon Grammar Style Linguistic Variations Communicative Functions