Chapter 14. Translation studies and style

14.1. Rendering newspaper headlines

As was pointed out above, a translator faces a great number of problems at textual level especially when he deals with written register. Translating texts (technical, scientific, newspaper, publicistic, diplomatic, etc) which are written in accordance with the accepted standards in SL he has not only to solve translation problems that arise at the level of elements and segments of a text, but also to pay attention to categories that exist on the level of a text. One of the most essential features of any text is that it refers to this or that functional style and is supposed to meet its demands.

In Russian linguistics problems of translating newspaper materials were traditionally linked with the functional styles theory which is based on several main assumptions. It should be mentioned that prominent Russian and foreign scholars (V.V.Vinogradov, R.A.Budagov, I.R.Galperin, V.G.Kostomarov, Yu.S.Stepanov, F.P.Filin, D.Shmelev, L.V.Shcherba and others) treated the system of language as comprising a number of functional styles. According to prof. I.R. Galperin a functional style of language is a system of interrelated language means which serves a definite aim in communication [Galperin 1977, 32-33]. On the basis of their functions functional styles are generally classified into several types: the language of belles-lettres, the language of publicistic literature, of newspapers, of scientific prose and the language of official documents. The division of the literary standard of any language into functional styles is important to take into account in translation for several reasons:

1. any SL text that has to be translated into TL can be referred to this or that functional style that must be retained in translation although its many features will be modified in translation in keeping with the TL requirements set for a respective type of text (cf. an English advertisement text and its translation into Russian);

2. though the types of functional styles may correlate in SL and TL their linguistic peculiarities do not coincide fully as functional styles are the product of the development of a particular language system in particular historical conditions;

3. functional styles reflect norms, rules of speech etiquette of a given lingo-cultural community which impose certain restrictions on language forms which are considered to be appropriate or inappropriate for a given situation.

In modern linguistics a new approach to newspaper studies initiated in major works of both foreign (G.Brown and G.Yule, M.Coulthard, J.Frow, J.P.Gumperz, van Th.Deiik, ) and Russian authors (M.L.Makarov, A.P.Chudinov, E.Budayev, Ye.I.Sheigal) is based on their analysis in terms of discourse. A discourse as distinct from a text is dynamic and is understood as the process of creating a text in certain conditions, for a certain purpose, with a certain intention, by participants of a certain linguacultural community in keeping with the norms accepted in it. This view of newspapers shifts emphasis on their study in terms of political discourse in the new branch of linguistics known as political linguistics, in the terminology of A.P. Chudinov.

Scholars are not at one concerning the status of the language of newspaper materials. Some linguists (V.L.Naer) set apart the newspaper style proper and the publicistic style qualifying the newspaper style as an informative style that is characterized by a number of grammatical peculiarities I.V.Arnold regards the newspaper style in its own right as it possesses a set of style-forming features like any other style. G.Ya.Solganik claims that there is a single newspaper-publicistic style within which lexicon comprises groups of units with various stylistic colouring. M.D.Kuznets and Yu.M. Skrebnev argue that the language of newspapers is so varied that it is impossible to speak about a single style that is realized in them.

For translation purposes V.N.Komissarov divides all newspaper materials into 4 groups:

• informative and descriptive,

• publicistic,

• official and business,

• scientific and technical [Комиссаров 1965].

In our further discussion we take into consideration the first two groups that are found both in English and Russian newspapers.

The translation of newspaper articles depends not only on the linguistic peculiarities of newspaper materials in the two languages, but also on the composition of a newspaper article. In his cognitive approach to news materials Th.van Deiik singles out the following elements in the structure of a news discourse:

the superstructure of a news report contains two large blocks: summary and story (= narrative); Summary ismade up of the headline and the lead (= the leading paragraph). The story includes a situation (covering an episode and background) and comments (verbal reactions=quotations and conclusions = expectations and evaluations). The episode is made up of main events and consequences, while background includes context and history.

The informative value of the narrative depends on the correlation of different kinds of information: new information, background information and the author’s comment. All the parts of an article are interdependent both structurally and functionally which is reflected in the language features important from a translator’s viewpoint. This can be best of all illustrated in the translation of newspaper headlines.

Headlines occupy a prominent place in newspapers in which they carry out more that 10 functions out of which the following 4 functions are of special importance for translation:

1. to draw the reader’s attention to what is described in a newspaper,

2. to give the gist of the matter by summing up the content of an article,

3. to convince the reader of the point of view expressed in an article,

4. to prepare the reader for an adequate reaction to what is described.

The comparison of English and Russian headlines reveals the following differences:

a) in content: English headlines are concerned with giving the gist of the matter and drawing the reader’s attention. This influences the character and volume of content information of an English headline, e.g. France begins to grow weary with the Sarkozy soap opera. Michelle Obama: a new type of First Lady.

b) in form – English headlines tell the story in a highly compact and condensed form, e.g. New hospital put on ice (the building of the new hospital has been suspended). Russian headlines often lay stress on some element of the story which is regarded as the most important, cf. a number of subtitles following the caption in an English quality newspaper : Education > Highly qualified, they can earn huge sums in Great Britain. But there is the culture shock ……… Russians hired to ease teaching crisis (from Independent on Sunday, 2003). Typical headlines from Russian newspapers may be as follows: Дорогой мой юбиляр, Посольский междусобойчик, Открытое письмо. Alongside such patterns there are Russian headlines which like English headlines tell the story in more detail: Конфликт обошёлся бюджету в 100 миллионов рублей, Президент Республики предложил сертифицировать башкирскую лошадь.

c) cultural connotations – headlines are based on shared cultural knowledge which is the essential condition of the proper understanding of their sense, e.g. MI5, police and SAS practice for a ‘Beslan’ siege.

In view of such divergences in content, form and connotations a translator should read through the whole article, make out its implications and then try to render it by choosing proper means. There are a number of recommendations connected with formal peculiarities when translating headlines from Russian into English:

1. replace Russian noun phrases which can be of two types by English verb-phrases:

1.1. N + N where a noun in the nominative case denoting a process and a noun in the genitive case denoting an agent is replaced by a verb phrase in which an agent becomes a subject and a process turns into a verb-predicate, e.g. Открытие навигации – River cruise season arrives.

1.2. N + N where a noun in the nominative case denoting a process and a noun in the genitive case denoting an object of this process is replaced by a verb-phrase in which a noun object becomes a grammatical subject and a process is translated by means of a verb predicate in the Passive voice which is reduced to Part II of the notional verb, while the auxiliary verb to be is dropped, e.g. Гибель российского фотожурналиста – Russian photojournalist killed in Iraq

Quite often N+N Russian headlines are translated by similar noun phrases in English: Выплата компенсаций – Ferry fire payouts.

2) peculiar tense uses: refer to current events using one of the three ways,

2.1. sentences of various communicative types, e.g. Кое-что о подушном налоге – What is the poll tax?

2.2.Present Continuous with the verb to be dropped, e.g. Эскалация конфликта > Georgia row escalating.

2.3. Present Simple: Снижение экономических показателей > Russia’s economy shrinks 9.5 per cent.

3) refer to future events in one of the three ways:

3.1. by using sentences, e.g. В субботу – финал – Who will win on Saturday?

3.2. by infinitive forms with the link-verb to be dropped, e.g. Электрозаводскую закроют на реконструкцию – Electrozavodskaya metro station to close for Renovation. In the second case lexical means (предстоящая) very often correlates with grammatical means so it may be a case of a level shift. This tanslation is possible to describe scheduled events.

3.3. by Present Progressive, Женщинам старость едва ли будет в радость – Women facing poverty in old age.

4) refer to past events in one of the three ways:

4.1. by using sentences, e.g. Как я стал русским – How I became Russian.

4.2. by historical Present, e.g. Смерть жертвы – IRA victim dies.

4.3. by Present Perfect / Past simple (with auxiliaries dropped), e.g. Рабочим Дженерал Моторс пришлось переквалифицироваться – GM told to seed off.

5) drop functional words, e.g. Сенсационная находка – Nazi Papers Found in Attic.

6) restore all vital information in the gist of a headline to make it ‘tell the story’, e.g. В тревожном ожидании – Three department stores will close by September.

Context bound transformations of addition are frequent in order to make the Russian headline conform to the norms of English headlines, e.g. Предстоящая конференция – Physical Conference to Open in Moscow.

Укрепление рубля – From copper to gold: the Russian ruble’s success story

One of the lexical difficulties that arise when translating English headlines into Russian is connected with the so-called headline vocabulary. Practitioners recommend to resort to transformations of concretizing of meaning when translating headline vocabulary which is characterized in English as broad, abstract, general, e.g. (to) move in a headline might be translated as движение, перемена положения, переброска, передвижение, ход, акция, поступок, шаг, инициатива, предложение.

Prof. Shveitser A.D. notes 2 features in regard to the English headline vocabulary, namely, their universal character and a high frequency of occurrence [Швейцер 1973]. Common headline vocabulary embraces such units as ‘ban, bid, claim, crack, crash, cut, dash, hit, pact, probe, quit, rap, rush, etc’. In translation they have to be concretized on the basis of the headline environment as well as with the help of the whole text. E.g. CIA man quits Israel – Отъезд директора ЦРУ из Израиля; Tell US to quit – Требуйте вывода американских войск; Union boss quits – Отставка профсоюзного босса. Because of a very broad meaning of headline vocabulary units it is impossible to speak about particular correspondences they have in TL so their correct translation is contextually bound.

Another feature of English headlines which conditions translation problems is a model based on premodified noun phrases typical of English in general. A translator should apply the procedure which has been discussed with reference to this type of phrases, cf. Egypt peace bid – Мирная инициатива Египта.

Quite often English headlines contain problem vocabulary, for instance, ambiguous headlines that have double meanings: Kids make nutritious snacks. This headline sounds ambiguous because of the possibility to interpret make as become and prepare. In such cases it is necessary to take into account a broader environment, the context of the whole text or even background knowledge. The causes of ambiguity can be varied: word order, grammatical structure, lack of punctuation, polysemy and homonymy. In such cases a translator should look for support clues in the leading paragraph or in the body of the article (cf. Teacher strikes – idle kids and Teacher strikes idle kids – in which the overall sense is completely different).

Many headlines assume shared cultural knowledge and shared general knowledge between the headline writer and the reader. This indicates, for example, the use of only first names or surnames of people who are considered so well-known that stating their full name, position or title or reason for prominence is considered unnecessary. In translation this information often has to be made explicit, e.g. Kiss for Harry as he meets pop idols – where reference is made to Prince Harry, the son of the Prince of Wales) – Встреча участников Фабрики звезд с принцем Гарри.

To sum up, translation of headlines from Russian into English and from English into Russian involves changes both in the character and volume of the content contained in a headline and in form due to the functional, content and formal divergences of newspaper headlines in the two languages.