Les 3: translating cultural-specific items (CSI’s)
Introduction:
“Op de Groenplaats vindt u een standplaats van Rubens” = not translatable
Most transcultural references only have one linguistic reference like for example “Rubens”,
you would have to keep it.
Fixed references like “Groenplaats” that only have one linguistic reference.
“Frituur Max van Antwerpen” =
Sometimes there is a fixed translation like Antwerpen – Antwerp.
Frituur Max = it’s a proper name that you should keep. After that you can say “frituur (snack
bar)” or “the oldest of its kind” which is an omission because you omit “frituur” which can be
essential information. You have to explain it in some way eventually.
Definition of “frituur” = typically Belgian snack bar that sells local French fries
“onze-lieve-vrouwe-kathedraal" = Notre Dame cathedral (borrowed from a third culture
which is known from both the source and target text)
5 euro = you keep it, but put it in plural (5 euros)
Micro-cultural elements: elements that are even difficult to explain to people in the source
culture.
Aixela
Research in the field seems to indicate that in the Western World there is a clear trend, with
the important exception of technical genres, towards maximum acceptability.
Venuti: ‘a labour of acculturation which domesticates the foreign text, making it intelligible
and even familiar to the target-language reader, providing him or her with the narcissistic
experience of recognizing his or own cultural other.
Americans domesticate everything, in Belgium we don’t (because we have a culturally
inferior language). This has to do with power relations.
Toury (Descriptive Translation Studies): it only looks at the target text and the target culture.
What works do we find worth to translate from the source culture into the target culture?
Laws of translatability (Even-Zohar): translatability is high when the textual traditions
involved are parallel and when there has been contact between the two traditions.
Loyalty to your target culture: translation should read as an original text in the target
language.
Loyalty to your source culture: it should also read as THE original text.
Focus on cultural diversity: cultural asymmetry between two linguistic cultures
Conservation (source-focused) vs naturalization (target-focused)
Cultural internationalisation focused on the Anglo-Saxon pole.
Anglo-Saxon culture for example is a domesticating culture because it’s the “superior”
culture. But in 15 years it will be China.
How do we domesticate and foreignize cultures?
James S. Holmes: tendency towards modernization and naturalization of the linguistic
context, opposing tendency towards exotizing and historicizing in the socio-cultural
situation.
Culture-specific items: textual + a translation problem
CSIs are historically evolving: things that were CSIs are not CSI’s anymore for example
“perestrokja” and “glasnost”.
Two categories:
, Conventional: there’s no motivation behind them for example Groenplaats
Loaded terms: they are motivated for example The White House
The strategies:
Conservation (source-focused)
· Repetition: the translators keep as much as they can of the original reference, mostly with
toponyms. For example, Seattle – Seattle.
· Orthographic adaptation: this has to do with transcription and transliteration and is mainly
used when the original reference is expressed in a different alphabet from the one target
readers use. This procedure is reserved mainly for the integration of references from a third
culture.
· Linguistic (non-cultural) translation: this has to do with pre-established translations where
the translator chooses a denotatively very close reference to the original but increases its
comprehensibility by offering a target language version which can still be recognized as
belonging to the cultural system of the source text. This is mainly used for institutions or
units of measures and currencies. For example, dollars – dolares.
· Historical persons with pre-established translations into Spanish for example, Queen
Elizabeth – la reina Isabel.
· Extratextual gloss: the translator uses one of the above-mentioned procedures but
considers it necessary to offer some explanation of the meaning or implications of the CSI as
a footnote, glossary, etc. This procedure is used all the time in the treatment of quotations
in third languages.
· Intratextual gloss (the strategy of explicitness): this is the same as the previous one, but
translators feel like they can include the explanation as a part of the text without disturbing
the reader. For example, St. Mark – Hotel St. Mark.
Substitution
· Synonymy: the translator resorts to some kind of synonym or parallel to avoid repeating the
CSI.
· Limited universalization: the translators feel that the CSI is too obscure for their readers or
that there is another more usual possibility and decide to replace it by a CSI that is closer to
their readers, but less specific. For example, underdog – outsider, five grand – cinco mil
dolares.
· Absolute universalization: the translators don’t find a better-known CSI or prefer to delete
any foreign connotations and choose a neutral reference for their readers. For example, pina
colada – cocktail, een bic – a pen.
· Naturalization: the translator decides to bring the CSI into the intertextual corpus felt as
specific by the target language culture. Ex dollar – duro (a currency denomination still in use
in Spain).
· Deletion: the translators consider the CSI unacceptable on ideological or stylistic grounds or
they think that it’s not relevant enough for the effort of comprehension required of their
readers or that it’s too obscure.
· Autonomous creation: this is a very little-used strategy in which the translators decide that
it could be interesting for their readers to put in some nonexistent cultural reference in the
source text. For example, the translation of film titles. Home Alone – Maman, j’ai raté l’avion
(Mom, I missed the train).
· Other potential strategies:
· Compensation: deletion + autonomous creation at another point of the text with a similar
effect.
Introduction:
“Op de Groenplaats vindt u een standplaats van Rubens” = not translatable
Most transcultural references only have one linguistic reference like for example “Rubens”,
you would have to keep it.
Fixed references like “Groenplaats” that only have one linguistic reference.
“Frituur Max van Antwerpen” =
Sometimes there is a fixed translation like Antwerpen – Antwerp.
Frituur Max = it’s a proper name that you should keep. After that you can say “frituur (snack
bar)” or “the oldest of its kind” which is an omission because you omit “frituur” which can be
essential information. You have to explain it in some way eventually.
Definition of “frituur” = typically Belgian snack bar that sells local French fries
“onze-lieve-vrouwe-kathedraal" = Notre Dame cathedral (borrowed from a third culture
which is known from both the source and target text)
5 euro = you keep it, but put it in plural (5 euros)
Micro-cultural elements: elements that are even difficult to explain to people in the source
culture.
Aixela
Research in the field seems to indicate that in the Western World there is a clear trend, with
the important exception of technical genres, towards maximum acceptability.
Venuti: ‘a labour of acculturation which domesticates the foreign text, making it intelligible
and even familiar to the target-language reader, providing him or her with the narcissistic
experience of recognizing his or own cultural other.
Americans domesticate everything, in Belgium we don’t (because we have a culturally
inferior language). This has to do with power relations.
Toury (Descriptive Translation Studies): it only looks at the target text and the target culture.
What works do we find worth to translate from the source culture into the target culture?
Laws of translatability (Even-Zohar): translatability is high when the textual traditions
involved are parallel and when there has been contact between the two traditions.
Loyalty to your target culture: translation should read as an original text in the target
language.
Loyalty to your source culture: it should also read as THE original text.
Focus on cultural diversity: cultural asymmetry between two linguistic cultures
Conservation (source-focused) vs naturalization (target-focused)
Cultural internationalisation focused on the Anglo-Saxon pole.
Anglo-Saxon culture for example is a domesticating culture because it’s the “superior”
culture. But in 15 years it will be China.
How do we domesticate and foreignize cultures?
James S. Holmes: tendency towards modernization and naturalization of the linguistic
context, opposing tendency towards exotizing and historicizing in the socio-cultural
situation.
Culture-specific items: textual + a translation problem
CSIs are historically evolving: things that were CSIs are not CSI’s anymore for example
“perestrokja” and “glasnost”.
Two categories:
, Conventional: there’s no motivation behind them for example Groenplaats
Loaded terms: they are motivated for example The White House
The strategies:
Conservation (source-focused)
· Repetition: the translators keep as much as they can of the original reference, mostly with
toponyms. For example, Seattle – Seattle.
· Orthographic adaptation: this has to do with transcription and transliteration and is mainly
used when the original reference is expressed in a different alphabet from the one target
readers use. This procedure is reserved mainly for the integration of references from a third
culture.
· Linguistic (non-cultural) translation: this has to do with pre-established translations where
the translator chooses a denotatively very close reference to the original but increases its
comprehensibility by offering a target language version which can still be recognized as
belonging to the cultural system of the source text. This is mainly used for institutions or
units of measures and currencies. For example, dollars – dolares.
· Historical persons with pre-established translations into Spanish for example, Queen
Elizabeth – la reina Isabel.
· Extratextual gloss: the translator uses one of the above-mentioned procedures but
considers it necessary to offer some explanation of the meaning or implications of the CSI as
a footnote, glossary, etc. This procedure is used all the time in the treatment of quotations
in third languages.
· Intratextual gloss (the strategy of explicitness): this is the same as the previous one, but
translators feel like they can include the explanation as a part of the text without disturbing
the reader. For example, St. Mark – Hotel St. Mark.
Substitution
· Synonymy: the translator resorts to some kind of synonym or parallel to avoid repeating the
CSI.
· Limited universalization: the translators feel that the CSI is too obscure for their readers or
that there is another more usual possibility and decide to replace it by a CSI that is closer to
their readers, but less specific. For example, underdog – outsider, five grand – cinco mil
dolares.
· Absolute universalization: the translators don’t find a better-known CSI or prefer to delete
any foreign connotations and choose a neutral reference for their readers. For example, pina
colada – cocktail, een bic – a pen.
· Naturalization: the translator decides to bring the CSI into the intertextual corpus felt as
specific by the target language culture. Ex dollar – duro (a currency denomination still in use
in Spain).
· Deletion: the translators consider the CSI unacceptable on ideological or stylistic grounds or
they think that it’s not relevant enough for the effort of comprehension required of their
readers or that it’s too obscure.
· Autonomous creation: this is a very little-used strategy in which the translators decide that
it could be interesting for their readers to put in some nonexistent cultural reference in the
source text. For example, the translation of film titles. Home Alone – Maman, j’ai raté l’avion
(Mom, I missed the train).
· Other potential strategies:
· Compensation: deletion + autonomous creation at another point of the text with a similar
effect.
