5. Theoretical grounds of describing separate ways of translation

Theoretically, the discrimination of various types of translation is related to the development of special theories of translation. Practically, classification of translation types provides foundation for training translators in certain types of translation activity.

Special theories:

Genre-stylistic classification: scientific-technological and newspaper-informational material translation are of great theoretical and practical interest

Psycholinguistic classification: oral translation aspects are studied most profoundly, especially simultaneous translation.

6. Main types of theoretical description of describing the types of oral translation

Three main directions of researching the specifics of oral translation:

1. Factors influencing how an interpreter retrieves information that is contained in the original.

Perception of oral speech:

Duration of oral speech is

Short

One-time and

Non-continuous

Completeness of understanding depends on the rhythm, pausation, and the tempo of speech. Information is extracted in small portions while the chain of language units unfolds in the orator’s speech. Translator predicts the following content of the text on the basis of the “quanta” of information he already perceived, makes his prognosis more accurate in the process of further perception, which requires accumulation and preservation of previous information in memory. Theory of translation describes the psycholinguistic peculiarities of such prediction during a translation, its dependence on relative independence of meaning of minimum speech portions in various languages, as well as the character of losses of information during an oral comprehension of long portions of speech. Factors compensating for such losses are also described: the knowledge of the subject and the situation of speech, intonation, emotional colouring, etc.

2. Oral speech of a translator as a special type of speech

Difference from a usual “non-translated” speech is conditioned by the fact that the translator’s speech is oriented towards the original and is formed in the process of translation

Slower articulation, hesitational pauses (speech is 3-4 times longer) – Normative requirements to a translator’s speech, to meet which it is necessary to make more efforts: distinct articulation, uniform speech tempo, correct accentuation, obligatory meaning and structural completeness of utterances

3. Contrast to written translation

QUANTITY

Simultaneous translation

Short portions – more words (explanation, description)

Long phrases – equal number of words

Passages and longer portions – less words (intentional compression, omissions)

Consecutive – TT is also smaller than in written translation

So, causes, ways and limits of speech compression are paid special attention to.

Necessity –

1. Quick tempo – impossible to voice the whole TT

2. Speed of speech-thinking process of a translator

3. Hasty speech influences correctness and completeness

Speech compression in oral translation is not easy. It goes about not mere omission, but a compression of the original with preservation of all important meaning elements. Compression is possible thanks to informational redundancy of speech – repetitions (When does the realization of this plan start? In 1990.), politeness formulas, occasional remarks, deviations from the topic

Ways –

Shorter Synonyms

Use of abbreviations (The United Nations – ООН)

One verb instead of an expression (to render assistance – помогать)

Omission of linking elements (the policy pursued by the United States - политика США)

Replacing clauses with constructions (When I met him for the first time - при первой встрече с ним)

If the orator’s speech is quick, the use of various ways of speech compression may reduce the TT by 25 - 30% in comparison with the written translation of the same ST.

QUALITY – CHARACTER OF EQUIVALENCE achieved in various types of translation

OMISSIONS:

1) omission of a separate word of small importance, mostly an epithet;

2) omission of more important and large units due to translator’s failure to understand a portion of the text;

3) omission of a part of the text due to structural change of the text in translation;

4) omission of a meaningful part of the text through the translation’s lagging behind from the orator’s speech.

ADDITIONS are classified according to the character of excessive elements: single qualifiers, additional explanations, specifying the links between utterances, etc.

MISTAKES are classified as to their importance: small mistake in translation of a certain word, gross mistake in a word meaning translation, small mistake due to an insignificant change of structure, gross mistake due to a significant change of structure, etc.

Specifics of oral communication: in direct contact lower level of equivalence sometimes does not hinder understanding of communicants, which fact compensates the information losses to some extent.