Худа Лекції / Лекція 6

Lecture 6

Transformations in the Process of Translation.

Alterations in the structural form of language units performed with the aim of achieving faithfulness in translation are referred to as translator’s transformations.

They are carried out either because of the incompatibility of the target language means of expression, which makes the transplantation of some source language units to it impossible, or in order to retain the style of the source language passages and thus maintain the expressiveness of the source language sense units.

The most regular are the following two types of transformations:

1. “inner” transformations;

2. “outer” transformations.

Example of inner transformation: the noun icon apart from its direct Ukrainian meaning ікона may have in some context also the meanings зображення, портрет, статуя. Similarly with the noun idea which may mean apart from its genuine international sense ідея also думка, задум, гадка.

Outer transformations may sometimes change the structural form of the sense unit under translation. Thus, the noun the Orkneys becomes a word-group Оркнейські острови and the Hebrides become Гебридські острови.

Grammatical transformations usually become necessary because of the difference in the means of expressions in the target language. They are mainly employed in the following cases:

1. when translating antonymically;

2. when rendering the meaning of most passive constructions;

3. when translating sentences with an inverted word order.

Ways of Translating of Passive Voice

Depending on the form of the passive construction, this voice form may have in Ukrainian some other transformations, which express the same meaning of passive construction; the may acquire the following outer forms of expression in Ukrainian:

1. that of an indefinite personal sentence\clause:

e.g.: I’m told that pork-packing is … - Кажуть, що …

2. that of a single predicative words\simple nominal predicate:

e.g.: They’are prepared to sacrifice everything to satisfy their yearning. – Вони ладні пожертвувати всім, аби здійснити свої прагнення.

3. a finite form of a verb\simple verbal predicate:

e.g.: He has never been answered. – Його ще ніхто і ніколи не спростував.

d. an indefinite personal past participle ending in –но\-то:

e.g.: It is a sound instinct of the common people which persuades that this all, that needs to be said, is said. - Це здоровий глузд простого люду переконує його, таким чином, що все те, що треба сказати, - сказано.

e. any other contextual and structural substitution of the English passive voice predicate verb:

e.g.: I must be left to myself for a while. – Мені треба якийсь час побути самому.