Pragmatic Aspects of Translation

Date: 2015-10-07; view: 1042.

Pragmatics of translation is a wide notion which covers not only pragmatic meaning of a word, but some problems connected with various levels of understanding by speech acts communicants of certain meanings or messages, depending on linguistic or paralinguistic factors [6, 214], that is, background knowledge. A well-known linguist Konissarov points out that pragmatic aspect of translation should be considered from three points. One of them is conveying pragmatic meaning of words [2, 101]. This point chiefly pertains to the translation of national realia and equivalent lacking words that is, various names.

The term pragmatic meaning of a word is not yet fully investigated. But some linguists point out that the pragmatic component of the word meaning, which is realized in various kinds of emotive and stylistic connotations, is individually-occasional or collectively used meanings [3, 43-44]. They reflect the conditions of a language unit use, the conditions such as situation and place of communication, subject and purpose of communication; social, ethnic, and individual peculiarities of communicants, their attitude towards one another [1, 38-39] Irrespective of the fact whether pragmatic aspects are singled out into a certain type of a word meaning or whether it is considered among other components of its meaning, pragmatic meaning, which is fixed in a word, plays an important role and its retention ensures complete communicative adequacy of translation to the original.

Pragmatics as a linguistic term means the analysis of language in terms of the situational context, within which utterances are made, including the knowledge and beliefs of the speaker and the relation between speaker and listener [5, 1518]. Pragmatic information is actualized in translating the equivalent–lacking lexical units, first of all personal names, geographical names, national realia by way of transcription and transliteration. But in some cases, while translating the names of states, boroughs, counties and provinces explication of their implicit information is needed. For example: Georgia – штат Джорджія (США) (In case the context indicates that the author writes or speaks about the USA)

Alberta – провінція Альберта (Канада)

Surrey – графство Сурей (Англія).

Explication is also required in cases when one and the same name designates several notions: ALBANY – Олбані – поетична назва Шотландії

Олбані – чоловіча тюрма на острові Уайт (Англія)

Олбані – річка у центральній частині Канадu.

Олбані – порт і курортне місто у південно-західній частині Австралії.

The communicative situation at translating names having different meanings should be also taken into consideration. Thus, the wordLINCOLN may be used in the following phrases: 1) He is from Lincoln only last year – Він закінчив коледж Лінкольна (в Оксфорді) тільки минулого року. 2) He participated in Lincoln while a student – Коли він був студентом, він брав участь у скачках “Лінкольн”. 3) He owns Lincoln breeds – Він є володарем лінкольнської породи довгошерстих вівців.

As a rule, personal names are translated be means of transcription or transliteration (or both combined). But when a proper name acquires the connotation as an important pragmatic factor, it should be translated on a communicative but not on a semantic level. For example: MIDAS – 1)Багата людина; 2) Людина, яка постійно примножує багатство.

ADEQUATE AND EQUIVALENT TRANSLATION
Translation theorists have long disputed the interrelation of the two terms. V. Komissarov considers them to denote non-identical but closely related notions. He claims that adequate translation is broader in meaning than equivalent translation. Adequate translation is good translation, as it provides communication in full. Equivalent translation is the translation providing the semantic identity of the target and source texts. Two texts may be equivalent in meaning but not adequate, for example:
Никита грозил: «Покажу тебе кузькину мать.» – Nikita threatened , “I'll put the fear of God into you!” The Russian sentence is low colloquial, whereas the English one, though it describes a similar situation, has another stylistic overtone, a rather pious one.
A. Shveitser refers the two terms to two aspects of translation: translation as result and translation as process. We can speak of equivalent translation when we characterize the end-point (result) of translation, as we compare whether the translated text corresponds to the source text. Adequacy characterizes the process of translation. The translator aims at choosing the dominant text function, decides what s/he can sacrifice.²⁸ Thus, adequate translation is the translation corresponding to the communicative situation. For example, Здравствуйте, я ваша тетя! can be inadequate to Hello, I'm your aunt!, when the Russian sentence is used not in its phatic (i.e. contact supporting) function but in the expressive function (as an interjection) to express the speaker's amazement.
Close to this understanding of translation adequacy is E. Nida's concept of dynamic equivalence, “aimed at complete naturalness of expression” and trying “to relate the receptor to modes of behavior relevant within the context of his own culture.” Nida's principle of dynamic equivalence is widely referred to as the principle of similar or equivalent response or effect.

Y. Retsker states that the notion of adequate translation comprises that of equivalent. According to him, an adequate target text describes the same reality as does the source text and at the same time it produces the same effect upon the receptor. Translation adequacy is achieved by three types of regular correlations:

1. equivalents, that is regular translation forms not depending upon the context (they include geographical names, proper names, terms): the Pacific Ocean – Тихий океан, Chiang Kai-shek – Чан Кайши, hydrogen – водород.
2. analogs, or variable, contextual correspondence, when the target language possesses several words to express the same meaning of the source language word: soldier – солдат, рядовой, военнослужащий, военный.
3. transformations, or adequate substitutions: She cooks a hot meal in the evening. – На ужин она всегда готовит горячее.