MALL_Definition_Types_History-of-Translation.pptx

THIS MIGHT HELP YOU

1. Theories and Practice of Translation

2. Translation: Definitions

3. The English word translation has been derived from the Latin word translatio , which itself comes from trans - and latum —together meaning "a carrying across" or "a bringing across”. In other words, it is the business of carrying across a message/written content from one text to another, from one person to another and from one language(source language) to a different language (target language). It can happen within the same language (from one dialect to another dialect or from one form to another) or between languages. It is best seen as a communication process where the transfer of a message/written content from one language into a new language takes place.

4. Poets engaged in the job of translation often think of translation as ‘interpretation’, ‘taking a view’, ‘bringing to life’, or ‘transformation’. Whatever may be its meaning, every act of translation involves the expression of sense. A translation is a text that is considered to be different from the original (the source text) but it is also a fact that the source text and the translated text are the same in terms of the sense they convey. It is often said that translation gives new clothes to a piece of writing by putting it in a different form. This interactive relationship between source and translation goes on in the hands of mature translators of prose and drama but it is the best in poetry.

5. Roman Jakobson , a leading linguist and noted expert in the subject of translation, defined translation as " the interpretation of verbal signs by means of some other language."' Some scholars define translation as an “art” or “craft” and some others call it a “science”. It is called an art as all good translations are expressions of the creative urge of the translators. Likewise, it is a science because of the technical formalities and complexities involved in its process.

6. Oxford University defines translation as ‘ The process of translating words or text from one language into another:’ The Cambridge Dictionary also endorses that. This can mean the word to word rendering of the text in one language to another or replacing the equivalents of the words or phrases in one text to another. The translated text may have formal equivalence when the source text and the translated text look alike in form. It may have functional equivalence when the source text and the target text or translated text convey the same sense or perform the same function, though they have formal differences. It is often seen that the idioms and usage of the source language creep into the target language through translations which often enrich and shape the target language.

7. Nida and Taber (1969: 12) postulate Translation consists in reproducing in the receptor language the closest natural equivalent of the source language message, first in terms of meaning and secondly in terms of style.

8. Dubois (1974 ): Translation is the expression in another language (or the target language) of what has been expressed in another, source language, preserving semantic and stylistic equivalences.

9. The definitions given earlier stress the significance of ‘equivalence’ which underlies the following definitions, among others: given by Meetham and Hudson (1972) and Catford (1965): Translation is the replacement of a text in one language by a replacement of an equivalent text in a second language. ( Meetham and Hudson, 1972: 713) Translation is the replacement of textual material in one language (SL) by equivalent textual material in another language (TL). ( Catford , 1965: 20)

10. On the other hand, functionalists view translation differently: Translation is the production of a functional target text maintaining a relationship with a given source text that is specified according to the intended or demanded function of the target text. (Nord, in shutttleworth and Cowie,2007:182)

11. Widening the above definitions, Sager maintains that translation should reflect the environment in which the professional translation activity takes place: Translation is an extremely motivated industrial activity, supported by information technology, which is diversified in response to the particular needs of this form of communication. (Sager, 1994: 293)

12. In a similar vein, Koller describes translation as a ‘text processing activity and simultaneously highlights significance of ‘equivalence’: Translation can be understood as the result of a text-processing activity, by means of which a source-language text is transposed into a target-language text. Between the resulting text in L2 (the target-language text) and the source text L1 (the source language text) there exists a relationship which can be designated as translational, or equivalence relation. ( Koller , 1995: 196)

13. The scholar Mary Snell- Horby (1988) defines the concept as an interaction process between the author, the translator and the reader; and mentions their complexities in the following quotation: Translation is a complex act of communication in which the SL–author, the reader as translator and translator as TL–author and the TL–reader interact. The translator starts from a present frame (the text and its linguistic components); this was produced by an author who drew from his own repertoire of partly prototypical scenes. Based on the frame of the text, the translator-reader builds up his own scenes depending on his own level of experience and his internalized knowledge of the material concerned (1988: 81).

14. Carbonell’s (2006: 48) definition of translation is as follows: Translation is a form of communication and a means of achieving things. However, in translation the original communicative act is relocated to a different setting, where different actors perform for different purposes: there is a mediation mechanism which qualifies the whole act at different levels.

15. To state a simplistic definition of translation we can say that it is re-telling , as exactly as possible, the meaning of the original message in a way that is natural in the language into which the translation is being made. However such a definition disregards many of the underlying complexities pertaining to the nature of translation. One reality about translation is that it is a multi-disciplinary activity. Translators have to master two languages and negotiate the difficulties that arise when trying to transfer a message in one language and culture to another language (which differs from the first in phonology, morphology, syntax, and discourse conventions) and culture (which differs from the first in history, geography, material culture, values and religion).

16. Amongst the above definitions, Nida and Taber's may serve as a basis for our concept of translation as a TL product which is as semantically accurate, grammatically correct, stylistically effective and textually coherent as the SL text. In other words, the translator's main attention should not be focused only on the accurate semantic transference of SL message into the TL, but also on the appropriate syntax and diction in the TL, which are explicitly the translator's (not the source author's) domain of activity which displays his true competence. According to Wilss (1969:95), "the notion of translation competence," "is aptly assessed in transfer situations that require at least some degree of adaptation to new and challenging textual demands." He describes such situations as " accommodatory situations" which need "structural adjustment" and generally textual manipulation. In point of fact, the competent translator performs multiple tasks with inevitable intricacies of performance.

17. History of Translation

18. The very pioneers of the field are luminary Roman commentators, such as Cicero , Quintillian , who deem translation as a pedagogical exercise whose debate on translation practice pertains to word-for-word and sense-for-sense translation. Cicero (first century B.C), in composing Latin versions of speeches by the Greek orators, writes: I did not translate as an interpreter, but as an orator, keeping the same ideas and the forms, or as one might say, the figures of thought, but in a language which conforms to our usage and in so doing, I did not hold it necessary to render word-for-word, but I expressed the general style and the force of language (Cicero 46 BCE/1960 CE, p. 364).

19. Another period is brought about by St. Jerome (fourth century B.C) whose approach to translating the Septugint Bible into Latin would affect later translations of the Scriptures ( Munday , 2001, p. 7). He negates the word-for-word approach, for by closely following the form of the original, the sense of the original is masked and an absurd translation is created. In vindicating his own strategy, St. Jerome (395 CE/ 1997, p. 25, in J. Munday , 2001, p. 20) writes: Now , I not only admit but freely announce that in translating from the Greek- except in the case of the Holy Scripture, where even the syntax contains a mystery- I render not word-for-word, but sense-for-sense.

20. In the seventeenth century, influential theories emerge; the most obvious is that of John Dryden (1631-1700) whose trichotomy on translation types ( metaphrase , paraphrase and imitation) makes big strides. He (1680/1992, p.17), as quoted in Venuti (2004, p. 17-18), negates metaphrase (word-for-word) for lacking fluency or easy readability and imitation as well, that adapt the foreign text so as to serve the translator's own literary ambitions, instead he is in favour of paraphrase or translation with latitude, which seeks to render meanings.

21. At the outset of the nineteenth century, the Romanticism discusses the issue of translatability and untranslatability. In 1813, the German translator Friedrich Schleiermacher writes a seminal paper on "The Different Methods of Translating." He moves beyond word-for-word, literal, sense-for-sense or free translation. He argues the real question is how to bring the ST writer and the TT reader together, he writes: Either the translator leaves the writer alone as much as possible and moves the reader towards the writer or he leaves the reader alone as much as possible and moves the writer towards the reader (Schleiermacher, 1813/1992, p. 41-2, In Munday , 2001, p. 28). His preferred strategy is the first. To achieve this, the translator has to render in such a way so as to procure the same impression as the original reader would have. This cannot be done but by having recourse to an "alienating" rather than "naturalizing" method of translation, ensuring that the language and the content of the ST are in translating language (ibid: 43).

22. During the 1900s to 1930s, in translation theory the crucial trends are rooted in German literary and philosophical traditions and hermeneutics. It is considered that language is not communicative, but constitutive in its representations of thought and reality. For translation, taking this into account, it is viewed as an interpretation which necessarily reconstitutes and transforms the foreign text. For scholars as Schleiermacher and Bolt, translation is a creative force in which specific translation strategies serve a variety of cultural and social functions, paving the way for the construction of nations, literatures and languages (in Venuti, 2004, p. 74)

23. Another theorist who is more in line with the German interest is Ezra Pound . In Pound's view, the "autonomy of translation" takes two forms. A translated text might be interpretive, written next to the foreign poem and composed of linguistic peculiarities that direct the reader across the page to foreign textual features, or a translation can be original writing in which the TT literary standards are an impetus to rewriting the ST poem so as to seem a new poem (1934: 55). This second stance is in line with the translation of Khayyam by Fizgerald . Pound's standards are modernist; he adopts the first so as to recover foreign poetries to advance these values in the TT.

24. In the 1940s to 1950s, the prevalent concept is "translatability". During this decade, the main issue to be tackled by linguists and literary critics is that whether the differences that separate the languages and culture can be brought back to friendship via translation or not. To achieve this, the impediments to translation are jotted down, to see whether they are surmountable or not, and translation methods are formulated. Ideas are formed by disciplinary trends and change to a great extent, ranging between the extremes of philosophical skepticism and practical optimism (in Venuti, 2004, p. 111).

25. Another figure who theorizes about the problem of translating between different realities is Eugene Nida (1945). Nida by working on the translation of Bible comes to this conclusion that solutions to translation problems should be ethnological, contingent upon the translator's acquisition of sufficient "cultural information." He brings up a cultural word in the Bible like "desert" which should, according to him, be rendered as "abandoned place" so that the "cultural equivalent of the desert of Palestine" is established (1945: 197). By adopting such a procedure, though it is a paraphrase, the linguistic and cultural differences will boil down to a shared referent, causing the concept to be comprehensible in the translating language.

26. Roman Jakobson's study of translatability gives a new impetus to the theoretical analysis of translation since he introduced a semiotic reflection on translatability. On the basis of his semiotic approach to language and his aphorism 'there is no signatum without signum ' ( Jakobson , 1959, p. 232), he suggests three kinds of translation:  Intralingual (within one language, i.e. rewording or paraphrase)  Interlingual (between two languages)  Intersemiotic (between sign systems) Jakobson claims that, in the case of interlingual translation, the translator makes use of synonyms in order to get the ST message across. This means that in interlingual translation, there is no full equivalence between code units. He conceives of meaning not as a reference to reality, but as a relation to an endless chain of signs. According to his theory, 'translation is a process of recoding involving two equivalent messages in two different codes' (ibid.:233).

27. The concept of translatability is drawn on by Jean-Paul Vinay and Jean Darbelnet (1958). Unlike Jakobson who negates empiricist semantics, these two figures say that descriptions of translation methods involve some reduction of linguistic and cultural differences to empiricist semantics: according to them "Equivalence of message," ultimately relies upon an identity of situations, where the term "situations" indicate an undefined "reality." (Vinay and Darbelnet , 1995, p. 42). They provide six translation procedures. "Borrowing, calque and literal translation" are implemented in situations where the translation is "direct". By "direct" they mean "the possibility of transposing the SL message element by element into the TL. The other three are "transposition, modulation and equivalence." These three procedures are applied in situations where the translation is "oblique". These latter procedures are applied when certain stylistic effects cannot be transposed into the TL, because of structural or metalinguistic differences, without upsetting the syntactic order, or even the lexis (Vinay and Darbelnet in Venuti, 2004, p. 128).

28. In the 1960s to 1970s, the main prevailing concept in translation studies is "equivalence." When this concept is applied to translation, translation is viewed as a process of communicating the ST via the creation of a relationship of identity with the ST. George Mounin (1963) negates the concept of "relativity" that made translation not feasible, and instead draws on the concept of "equivalence", arguing that it hinges upon the "universals of language and culture (p. 38)." In this period, it is believed that there are identifiable units in a text which are stable and invariant, with defined units and categories of language which can be broken down. There are some scholars who theorize about this concept as Werner Koller and Eugene Nida . Koller (1979a, p. 185), in answering what this concept means, enunciates five types of equivalence (ibid: 99-104): " Denotative equivalence" or equivalence of the extralinguistic content of a text. It is called "content invariance." " Connotative equivalence," depending on the similarities of register and style. Koller refers to this as "Stylistic equivalence." " Text-normative equivalence," relating to text types, with different kinds of texts behaving in different ways. " Pragmatic equivalence," or "communicative equivalence," oriented towards the receiver of the text or message . 5. " Formal equivalence," relating to the aesthetics and the form of the text

29. Nida argues that there are two different types of equivalence, namely formal and dynamic equivalence. Formal correspondence 'focuses attention on the message itself, in both form and content', unlike dynamic equivalence which is based upon 'the principle of equivalent effect' ( Nida , 1964, p. 159). Dynamic equivalence is defined as a translation principle according to which a translator seeks to translate the meaning of the original in such a way that the TL wording will trigger the same impact on the TL audience as the original wording did upon the ST audience ( Nida and Taber, 1982, p. 200 ). Inevitably, upon considering the concept of equivalence, the term "shift" comes to the fore. This concept is defined by Catford (1965). He (1965) defines it as "departures from formal correspondence in the process of going from SL to TL, departures that can occur at linguistic level as graphology, phonology, grammar and lexis (p. 73). Yet, he concludes that translation equivalence does not entirely match formal correspondence and such deviations occur (ibid. 82).

30. Translation in the Philippines

31. Translation in the Philippines started as part of a religious undertaking. The Spanish missionaries used translation as a tool to spread Christianity among the natives, thus fulfilling a utilitarian role: to conquer mind and body. The Spanish missionaries, aware that a foreign language would meet resistance as medium in teaching a new religion, studied the native languages instead and undertook the first translations from Spanish into Tagalog and other Philippine languages.        The first printed book in the Philippines, the Doctrina Christiana , which came out in 1593, is a translation of prayers and Christian doctrines with which the Spanish friars spread the new religion. Other books that came out after Doctrina were translations or adaptations of Biblical stories, or explications of Christian doctrines.        In 1627, the first dictionary, Vocabulario de la lengua tagala by Fray Pedro de San Buenaventura came out. It is an important tool for the Spanish missionaries to learn Tagalog.

32. Other books of translation worth mentioning are the following : Meditaciones cun manga mahal na pagninilay na sadia sa sanctong pag-Exercisios , by Fray Pedro de Herrera, a translation into Tagalog of the spiritual exercises of San Ignacio de Loyola from the Spanish of Fray Francisco de Salazar. Manga panalanging pagtatagobilin sa calolova nang tauong naghihingalo (1703), by Gaspar Aquino de Belen, a Batangueno who worked in the printing press of the Jesuits. The book is a translation of Recomendacion del alma (1613) by Tomas de Villacastin . Aral na tunay na totoong pagaacay sa tauo , nang manga cabanalang gaua nang manga maloualting santos na si Barlaan ni Josaphat (1712) by Fray Antonio de Borja based on the text of San Juan Damaceno .

33. It should be noted that the source language was not always Spanish. There were also what is called relay translation, where Spanish was an intervening language of a text that was originally written in other languages. The translation language (or target language) was not only Tagalog, either. Since Manila was the seat of the colonial government, most of the publications were of Tagalog texts; however, there were also translations in Ilokano, Kapampangan, Cebuano and others.        The earliest translations were therefore directly related to religion. Toward the end of the 18th century, translation took a new direction. This time, the texts were not purely religious, though still containing religious ideas. From Europe came the narrative poetry and the metrical romance which became popularly known as awit and korido . The theatrical presentations komedya and moro-moro became very popular.

34.        There were also translations from Tagalog and other native languages into Spanish. Fray Pedro Chirino retold in Spanish two legends in Panay. Fray Ignacio Francisco Alzina summarized in Spanish two narrative poems in Boholano.        Our national hero, Jose Rizal, translated into Tagalog Schiller’s Wilhelm Tell from the original German.        Toward the end of the 19th century, translation had a new use, no longer to conquer, but to inspire the spirit of nationalism and thus to liberate. Ang mga Karampatan ng Tawo (1891-92) is a translation of Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen which summarized the spirit of the French Revolution. Jose Rizal’s “Amor Patrio ” was translated into Tagalog as “ Pag-ibig sa Tinubuang Lupa .” Rizal’s “ Mi Ultimo Adios” was translated by Andres Bonifacio as “ Huling Pahimakas .”

35.        With the coming of the Americans and the introduction of English as medium of instruction, the direction of translation is now from English into Tagalog/Filipino and other Philippine languages. The translation texts are no longer religious in nature, but now have a wider range. Translation is now a tool for liberating the masses from ignorance. Through translations, those who do not fully understand English may still benefit from the wisdom of the west through the translation into Filipino and other Philippine languages of informative materials on science and technology. In the field of education, translation is a necessary tool in the production of textbooks and reference materials in the language understandable to the greater number of the people.        English is also used as intervening language in the translation into Filipino of various materials from French, German, Japanese, and other languages.

36. The government agency that has pioneered in translation is Komisyon sa Wikang Filipino (formerly Surian ng Wikang Pambansa later renamed Linangan ng mga Wika sa Pilipinas ). Now, the National Commission on Culture and the Arts is also mandated to undertake translation work through one of its national committees, the Committee on Language and Translation. Nowadays , there are many individuals and institutions undertaking translation, aside from the KWF and the NCCA. There are religious organizations which translate the Bible into the Philippine languages; there are individuals who translate literary works and non-literary texts. There are two existing professional organizations of translators, Pambansang Samahan sa Pagsasalingwika and Pambansang Unyon ng mga Tagasalin .

37. Qualities of a good translation The differences of language or culture underlie the multi-disciplinary nature of the translation task and are the twin sources of translation problems. But even though it is a multi-disciplinary activity, there are some qualities according to which we can judge translations as good or not. They include the following three basic qualities: ACCURACY : it means correct exegesis (interpretation) of the source message, and transfer of the meaning of that message as exactly as possible into the target language .   CLARITY : there may be several different ways of expressing an idea, a translator normally chooses the way which communicates most clearly; the way which ordinary people will understand . NATURALNESS : it is important to use the natural form of the target language, if the translation is to be effective and acceptable. A translation should not sound foreign.

38. Types of Translation There has been a plethora of classifications of types of translation albeit the basically overlapping and polarized dichotomy in a binary oppositions starting with the oldest ‘literal’ vs (versus) ‘free’. Others subsume ‘literary’ vs ‘non-literary’, semantic vs communicative, static vs dynamic, among others. The first type of the afore mentioned pairs concerns the closeness , sometimes referred to as fidelity or faithfulness to the ST (source text). This type tends to emphasize the inseparability of form from content . The second type deems the source message conveyable in a different form. The above pairs are classified according to the criterion of method or approach. Two criteria of classification will be elaborated, namely: code and mode .

39. Translation types according to CODE Roman Jakobson distinguishes three ways of interpreting a verbal sign: it may be translated into other signs of the same language, into another language, or into another code that is nonverbal system of symbols. These three types are succinctly put as follows : Intralingual translation or rewording : It is an interpretation of verbal signs by means of other signs of the same language. Interlingual translation or translation proper : It is an interpretation of verbal signs by means of some other language. Intersemiotic translation or transmutation : It is an interpretation of verbal signs by means of signs of nonverbal sign system.

40. Translation types according to MODE: Written vs. Oral Nida and Taber’s above definition, may best accommodate interpreting as the reproduction of “ the closest natural equivalent” of the SL message in the TL serves as a common ground or interface of translating and interpreting ”, the former is not mainly or exclusively concerned with the accurate, semantic transference. The translated text should, at least ideally and theoretically, be as semantically accurate, grammatically correct, stylistically effective and textually coherent as the source text . On the other hand, we may analogously postulate the following workable definition for interpreting: Interpreting consists in conveying to the target language the most accurate, natural equivalent of the source language oral message.

41. Convergent Requirements for Translating/Interpreting Competence The five requirements for competent translators are: mastery or proficiency of SL and TL thorough knowledge of source and target cultures familiarity with the topic/register vocabulary wealth awareness of the three–phase process, i.e., SL decoding, transcoding or SL-TL transfer and TL encoding

42. Convergent Requirements for Translating/Interpreting Competence Interpreting , on the other hand, requires at least five more: short-term memory for storage and retrieval acquaintance with prosodic features and different accents quick wittedness and full attention knowledge of short-hand writing for consecutive interpreting self-composure

43. References: As-Safi, A.B. (Prof.). Translation theorties , strategies and basic theoretical issues . Batnag , Aurora E. Translation in the Philippines . https://ncca.gov.ph/about-ncca-3/subcommissions/subcommission-on-cultural-disseminationscd/language-and-translation/translation-in-the-philippines / Ghanooni , Ali Reza. A Review of the History of Translation Studies Pardo, Betlem Soler . Translation Studies: An Introduction to the History and Development of (Audiovisual) Translation