- •1. Various definitions of Langauge and Culture
- •Translatability - part 1
- •Translatability - part 2
- •Translatability - part 3
- •In the following units, we will see the great importance of jUrij Lotman's studies for the definition of translatability.
- •Lotman and translatability - part 1
- •Lotman and translatability - part 2
- •In the next unit, we will examine the translatability concept with the aid of the thought of one of the founders of semiotics, Charles s. Peirce.
- •Peirce and translatability
- •Лекція 6. - Torop and translatability - part 1
- •In Torop's opinion, as there cannot be a single approach to translatability, it is possible to isolate three distinct aspects:
- •- Torop and translatability - part 2
- •In the next unit, we will examine the next three parameters: text, work, and socio-political determinacy.
- •Torop and translatability - part 3
- •If someone holds that metatexts limit the reader's freedom, readers often do not have the necessary information to understand a text polysemy, its mechanisms, and its dominants.
- •Loss, Redundancy, Translatability
Language, culture, translation
Various definitions of Langauge and Culture
Views on the interaction between the language and the culture.
Noam Chomsky on Translability
Torop’s Approach
Three Aspects of Translatability according to Torop
Torop's scheme of culture translatability. Translatability Parameters and Translation strategies
Loss, Redundancy, Translatability
Holmes’s Model
Lotman and translatability
Pierce and translatability
Література:
Chaoyang Liao. Translatability and Cultural Difference: Toward an Ethics of “Real” Translation - http://www.concentric-literature.url.tw/issues/Literature%20in%20the%20Age%20of%20Cultural%20Studies%20and%20Globalization/8.pdf
http://cyberleninka.ru/article/n/znachenie-idey-ch-s-pirsa-dlya-filosofii-kommunikatsii
http://major-theoretic.narod.ru/english/theory_translation.doc
http://referaty.com.ua/ukr/details/9013/
http://study-english.info/article077.php
http://transeurope.ru/publications/deskriptivnoe-perevodovedenie.html
http://www.academia.edu/3616202/_._._
http://www.ahrc.ac.uk/Funding-Opportunities/Research-funding/Themes/Translating-Cultures/Pages/Translating-Cultures.aspx
Б. Озімо. Лекції 5 і 6 (додаються)
Валеева Н.Г. Принципиальный характер категории переводимости - http://www.rusnauka.com/32_PVMN_2011/Philologia/6_97584.doc.htm
Усачева А. Н. ПЕРЕВОД:ОТ ЛИНГВИСТИЧЕСКОЙ ТЕОРИИ К КОГНИТИВНОЙ МОДЕЛИ. - http://www.academia.edu/3463845
Успенский Б.А. Языки культуры и проблемы переводимости. - http://mirknig.com/2013/03/15/yazyki-kultury-i-problemy-perevodimosti.html
Ю.М. ЛОТМАН. Избранные статьи в трех томах.
Языки культуры и проблемы переводимости. М., 1987. - http://www.inslav.ru/resursy/elektronnaya-biblioteka/1396--1987
Лекція 5
Language, culture, translation
1. Various definitions of Langauge and Culture
2. Views on the interaction between the language and the culture.
3. Noam Chomsky on Translability
4. Torop’s Approach
5. Holmes’s Model
6. Lotman and translatability
7. Pierce and translatability
In order to comprehend the activity of translation, we need to clarify what we mean by "language" and by "culture" and to point out the relationships between culture and language. A purely linguistic approach to translation is no longer conceivable but, on the other hand, it is not possible, either, to concentrate exclusively on the interrelation between different cultures. Various studies on translation admit both these extremist conceptions, although they lead to a unilateral vision - as Witherspoon (Witherspoon, John (1723-1794) Уизерспун, Джон Религиозный и общественный деятель, педагог. Выходец из Шотландии, окончил Эдинбургский университет. Получил сан пресвитера в 1743. В 1768 переехал в Америку, чтобы возглавить Колледж Нью-Джерси [College of New Jersey] (позднее ставший Принстонским университетом [Princeton University ]). Был его президентом до конца своих дней, значительно повысил его статус. Трижды был делегатом Нью-Джерси на Континентальных конгрессах [Continental Congresses ]; единственный священник, чья подпись стоит под текстом Декларации независимости [Declaration of Independence ]. Сыграл значительную роль в распространении пресвитерианства в США) clearly states: If we look at culture from a linguistic point of view, we get a one-sided view of culture. If we look at language from a cultural point of view, we get a one-sided view of language.
Peeter Torop, chief of the Department of Semiotics at the Tartu University, did extensive work on translation science. In his latest book Total´nyj perevod2 [Total Translation], published in Italian and English by Guaraldi-Logos , he says that "language" can be considered "culture", by resorting to a figure of speech called "synecdoche" that consists in using a part (language) for the whole (culture). Doing that, we can say that the approach is "linguistic", as we observed in R. Jakobsón, because the concept of "linguistics" extends to many other subjects such as semiotics, cultural anthropology, narratology, and literary theory.
A second possible view considers "language" not as an object of study as such, but as a metalanguage: a language used as a means to describe another code, the cultural code. In other words, according to this conception, the language is seen as a tool to describe and express the culture to which it belongs.
Torop suggests a third possible description of "language": to see it as one of the many semiotic systems that can be found in any given culture. By "semiotic system", we mean every sign system, such as music, painting, and, of course, the natural language. In order to examine the translation activity we must consider all these three concepts of language.
While considering cultural and linguistic differences simultaneously - and speaking of translatability in general terms, without focusing on specific works or cases - it is important to keep in mind that two languages can be more or less translatable into one another according to how they differ in one of these four ways:
Languages that have neither the culture nor the language in common, such as Eskimo and English, or Chinese and Italian or Greek and German;
Languages with similar linguistic structures but different cultural backgrounds, such as Czech and Slovak. They are both Slavic languages, but the territories occupied by Czechia and Slovakia were historically more often divided than united. Bohemia experienced various periods of autonomy or, at times, was absorbed into the German territory, whereas Slovakia was part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire for long periods. Another case which may be assimilated to this category, considering the cultural developments of the past centuries, is that of British English and American English, which - before the advent of the Internet and of globalization - had rather independent linguistic developments;
Languages with a completely different linguistic structure but with a similar cultural background, like Hungarian and Slovak; the former belongs to the Ugric-Finnish stem - to which belong few other languages, such as Finnish and Estonian - whereas Slovak is Slavic; the two regions, though, were often administered by the same central government (the Kingdom of Hungary, the Austrian Empire or the Austro-Hungarian Empire);
Languages with similar linguistic structure and cultural background, like Spanish and French . In this case, we have two Neo-Latin languages and two peoples that have always had frequent and considerable mutual cultural exchanges.
When - rather than consider couples of language/cultures - we concentrate on a single text, Torop isolates four different kinds of relationships between culture and language:
Monolingual and monocultural texts;
Monolingual and multicultural texts (in which within a society more than one culture is foun D). It is the case of The Blue Flowers by Queneau, where two plots are developed, set in two distant historical periods and social areas;
Multilingual and monocultural texts (in which, for instance, when narrating the same events, various languages are used. It is the case of Ortiz Vásquez and other examples we quoted while talking about Foreign Languages and Linguistic Awareness);
Multilingual and multicultural texts (like War and Peace by L. N. Tolstój, in which two languages are used - Russian and French - to represent different aspects and various classes of the Russian society and of Napoleon's personality);
Whatever approach to the analysis of the translatability of a text into another language/culture, it is important to realize that, even under the least favorable of conditions (cultural and/or linguistic distance, complexity and heterogeneity of the text), the linguistic tool - the natural language, the language of man - is always potentially able to express elements belonging to another language/culture. Therefore, the important prerequisite for a text to be translatable is the translator's awareness: translators must know the differences existing between languages and cultures so that they can work out translation strategies able to cope with the various translatability problems.