Basics of Translation Theory
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Національний університет біоресурсів і природокористування України Гуманітарно-педагогічний факультет Кафедра романо-германських мов і перекладу Г.І. Сидорук BASICS OF TRANSLATION THEORY Навчальний посібник Kиїв 2016 УДК 811.111: 81ʹ25:63 (073) ББК 81.432.1Я73 С 347 Затверджено на засіданні вченої ради НУБіП України Укладач: Сидорук Г.І., канд. філол. наук, доцент кафедри романо-германських мов і перекладу НУБіП України. Рецензенти: Амеліна С.М., доктор педагогічних наук, професор, завідувач кафедри іноземної філології і перекладу НУБіП України, Малихін О.В., доктор педагогічних наук, професор, завідувач кафедри романо- германських мов і перекладу НУБіП України, Юденко О.І., канд. філол. наук, доцент, завідувач кафедри іноземних мов Національної академії образотворчих мистецтв і архітектури. Вступ до перекладознавства: навчальний посібник (англійською мовою). – К.: НУБіП України, 2016. – 320 с. Навчальний посібник «Вступ до перекладознавства» укладено відповідно до програми курсу, який викладається студентам 2 курсу ОС «Бакалавр» зі спеціальності 035 "Філологія" ГПФ НУБіП України. Він містить базовий теоретичний матеріал з перекладознавства і практичні завдання з метою набуття та удосконалення навичок перекладу з англійської на українську мову та навпаки. © Г.І. Сидорук, 2016 INTRODUCTION The course book “Basics of Translation Theory” is one of the fundamental disciplines, studied by the 2nd year students of the specialty 035 “Philology” at the Institute for Humanities and Pedagogy of the National University of Life and Environmental Sciences of Ukraine. The main goal of the course book is to give students basic knowledge of the profession, its retrospective and perspective, professional and ethical qualities an interpreter/translator should possess, linguistic and translational theories aimed at doing correct interpretation/translation from English into Ukrainian and vice versa. The material, compiled in succession, assists in training highly qualified experts in the translation theory and practice, which is difficult to overestimate in our time of rapid development of international relations, growing necessity of language professionals to establish and maintain contacts with partners all over the world. The course book unfolds a versatile theoretical foundation of the profession, its methodological, psychological and ethical aspects, outlines the main language units as the units of translation, transformational devices, basic lexical, grammatical and stylistic problems of translation. Theoretical material is backed up by numerous examples from fiction, poetry, scientific prose, provided with linguistic and translational analysis. After each topic a number of questions on checking the theoretical material, texts for translation from English into Ukrainian and vice versa, assignments for translation are given. The course book “Translation Theory Foundations” will help students distinguish linguistic phenomena, analyse them from the view-point of their translation, unmistakably identify necessary and sufficient ways of translation and make adequate translation of the stylistically dissimilar texts, correctly apply proper translational transformations. The topics proposed are diverse and 3 promote interest, desire to investigate and excel; they develop linguistic insight, scientific thinking, creativity and practical skills. The course book helps to systematize and extend the knowledge gained at other practical and theoretical classes, assimilate special linguistic and translational terminology, to coordinate theory with practice. It is foreseen that the students take notes of fifteen basic scientific sources on the subject which add to the material presented in the course book. The notes are checked at the end of the semester and add grades to the final results. The course book has extended practical part if compared with the previous edition. Exercises on false friends of interpreter, idioms and some texts for two-way translation have been added. 4 St. Jerome’s Oath I swear to keep this Oath to the best of my ability and judgement. I swear to be a loyal member of the translator’s profession, respecting its history. I am willing to share my expertise with colleagues and to pass it on to trainee translators. I will not work for unreasonable fees. I will always translate to the best of my ability. I will use my expertise to maximize communication and minimize misunderstanding across language barriers. I swear that my translations will not represent their source texts in unfair ways. I will respect my readers by trying to make my translations as accessible as possible, according to the conditions of each translation task. I undertake to respect the professional secrets of my clients and not to exploit clients’ information for personal gain. I promise to respect deadlines and to follow clients’ instructions. I will be honest about my own qualifications and limitations; I will not accept work that is outside my competence. I will inform clients of unresolved problems, and agree to arbitration in cases of dispute. I will do all I can to maintain and improve my competence, including all relevant linguistic, technical and other knowledge and skills. ♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦ 5 TOPIC 1. TRANSLATOR’S ACTIVITY Western Europe owes its civilization to translators. Louis Kelly 1.1. Profession of Translator In the profession of translation two types of translators/interpreters – free-lance and in-house ones work. It is a very specific profession, and the people involved in it, both would-be translators and those who work with translators are often interested in how to survive, how to know the criteria of a good translator. A translator converts written material, such as newspaper and magazine articles, books, manuals, documents, etc., from one language into another. This is not to be confused with an interpreter, who converts spoken material, such as speeches, presentations, depositions and the like, from one language into another. Although there is some vague connection between the two abilities: translators cannot necessarily interpret, nor can interpreters necessarily translate. Moreover, the best translators are not good interpreters and likewise, truly great interpreters are not much for translation. And while many professional training programs require interpreters to develop some skill in translation, professionally trained translators often have no exposure to the skills of interpretation. Four psychological groups of people – sanguines, melancholics, phlegmatics and cholerics – perform in different way depending on their psychological type and knowing this they are more inclined either to translation or interpretation. The most neutral and reserved, balanced and moderately emotional is a sanguine person, able to work in both translation and interpretation. Melancholic and phlegmatic persons, being 6 excessively tranquil and immovable, might make their oral presentation a bit dull and monotonous, though in translation they can show the best of their skills. Cholerics, on the contrary, might undeliberately jesticulate too much, lose control of their voice and body language and make interpretation too noisy and emotional. We’ll also use the following words in this book. Source text or language will refer to the language which the material first appears in. Target text and language refer to the language that the material is translated into. 1.2. Bilingualism Translator speaks his native language(s) and some non-native languages. In our case English is the one which the translator can speak, read, and write virtually as a native speaker does. German is the one which the translator can read and understand like a native, but does not necessarily speak or write so well. For instance, Russian and Ukrainian are our native languages. English and German are our non-native languages. A good translator is by definition a bilingual person. However, the opposite is not necessarily true. A born and bred bilingual will still need two things to become a translator. First, the skills and experience necessary for translation and second, the knowledge of the field in which he or she will translate. The skills and experience for translation include the ability to write well in the target language, the ability to read and understand the source language material very well, and the ability to work with the latest word-processing and communications hardware and software. This brings up the question: does a born and bred bilingual makes a better translator than someone who learned the non-native language later in life? There is no definite answer, but the following issues are important. First, a born and bred bilingual often suffers from not truly knowing any language well enough to translate. Second, born and bred bilinguals often don’t know the 7 culture of the target language well enough. And last, they often lack the analytical linguistic skills to work through a sticky text. However, the acquired bilingual might not have the same in- depth knowledge of slang, colloquialisms, and dialect that the true bilingual has. As well, the acquired bilingual will not be able to translate as readily in both directions. Finally, true bilinguals often have a greater appreciation of the subtleties and nuances of both their languages than someone who learns their non-native language later in life can ever hope to have. 1.3. Professional Education Translators come from all backgrounds. Some have Masters Degrees in translation from prestigious institutions, some have certificates