Lesson 6. Helpful Information about the Translation of Scientific and Technical Text

Before you start translating the scientific and technical text you should get acquainted (ознакомлен) with some really important stylistic, lexical and syntactic peculiarities of the process. The characteristic features of the scientific and technical style ones consider to be:

1. richness of content; изобилие содержимого

2. logic (strict consistency, precise connections between the main ideas and details); логика (строгая согласованность, точные связи между основными идеями и деталями);

3. accuracy and objective nature; точность и объективность;

4. lucidity and clear understanding; ясность и четкое понимание

Speaking about the vocabulary we can say that the greater amount of words in such texts are scientific and technical terms. As to their syntactic nature scientific and technical texts have several specific features. So be attentive and mind them while translating. Remember that so called verbs-operators (глаголы оказывающее действие) are widely used in the sentences:

to effect smth., to assure — ~ of, to perform, to obtain, to provide, to give, to involve to, to entail, (e.g. this work entails expenses),to imply, to result in, to lead to, to be ascribed to, to attributed to (e.g. His success is attributed to hard work).

Для осуществления чего-л, для обеспечения - ~ из, чтобы выполнить, чтобы получить, чтобы обеспечить, чтобы дать, чтобы привлечь к, чтобы повлечь за собой (например, эта работа влечет за собой расходы), подразумевает, чтобы привести, чтобы привести, к приписать, чтобы объяснить (например, его успех объясняется напряженной работы).

The meaning and translation of the verbs-operators in the scientific and technical text depend on the nouns which carry the basic semantic significance.

The adverbs-intensifiers (наречия с усилением) play an important role to make the text scientific:

Clearly, actually, completely, considerably, essentially, fairly, greatly, significantly, markedly, materially, perfectly, positively, reasonably (e.g. The energy loss is markedly reduced.)

Понятно, на самом деле, полностью, значительно, существенно, справедливо, значительно, значительно, заметно, материально, идеально, положительно, разумно (например, потеря энергии заметно снижена).

Desire for nominal constructions leads to the substitution (замена) of some adverbs for the prepositional (предложный падеж) nominal combinations:

e.g. accurately — with accuracy

very easily — with the greatest ease

Very often the infinitive is used in the role of attribute (определение), for example

the temperature to be obtained; температуру, которую необходимо получить;

the properties to be expected; ожидаемые свойства

the product to be cooled.

In many cases the article is absent, especially the definite one:

e.g. General view is that.... Общее мнение таково, что

First uranium mine in the region was .... Первая урановая шахта в регионе была

The nouns which denote substances(обозначают вещества) and as a rule are used only in singular can obtain plural forms in scientific and technical text, for example:

fats, oils, sheets (тонколистовое железо), sands, wools (шерсть), gasolines (бензин), etc.

There is a great number of attributive combinations (атрибутивные сочетания) with such word as:

type, design, pattern (шаблон, образец), grade

e.g. : the dry-chemical-type; сухой химический тип

a good-planned-design.

Very important in scientific and technical literature is the use logical conjunctions (союзы) and connections, such as: since then, however, therefore, it follows that, so, it implies, it leads to, it results in.

С тех пор, однако, таким образом, отсюда следует, что, таким образом, это означает, что приводит к, это приводит.

Therefore, perfect knowledge of all these peculiarities will lead you to success. Good luck!

Ex. 1. Read and translate:

1. translation – a) rendering from one language into another;

b) a change to a different substance, form, or appearance;

2. c) radiocast, TV cast;