Influence of Culture on the Translation Process - Essay Example

Influence of culture on the translation process Introduction The available literature on translation constantly refers to the concept of closest natural equivalent to ensure preservation of the intended meaning of words spoken in the source language. To achieve this objective requires the inclusion of cultural perspective during the translation process. The appreciation of the target culture was experienced during the translation of the Koran in 1980s. Likewise, the translators have successfully domesticated the vulgar language in the Shakespeare’s works to suit the target cultures. This paper examines the common types of modifications, and the cultural and extra-textual factors influencing translation process. Background According to Nord translation refers to the process of replacing textual materials in one language by equivalent textual material in another language (23). On the other hand, Chen and Zhang define translation as the process of transferring thoughts and ideas from the source language into the target language (67). Translation could also be viewed as the process of finding a target language equivalent for a source language equivalent. From the available literature concurs that process of translation has several commonalities. Firstly, there is a change of expression from one language to another. Secondly, the meaning and message are rendered in the target language. This means that the translator has an obligation to ensure the concepts captured by the source language are well captured in the target language. Thirdly, the translator is under obligation to seek for the closest equivalent in the target language. This responsibility is very monumental as it requires the translator to be well conversant with both the source and target language. Beside preserving the surface meaning of words, the translator should at the same time, ensure the structure if maintained as closely as possible but not so closely such that the target language structure will be distorted. For proper translation, translators are required to gain syntactic, semantic and pragmatic understanding as well as engage fully in the analytical processing of the source language. Culture and translation The connection between culture and language was first suggested by Wilhelm Von Humboldt who envisioned language as being dynamic. He further envisioned a language as being an expression of culture and individuality of the speakers. Wilhelm views were later supported by Edward Sapir and Benjamin Lee who suggested that context of situation and culture precedes text. Without a proper context, it would then be impossible for a translator to best capture the best meaning of words in text. To achieve the best results especially when translating culturally-bound sentences, it is important for the translators to use tools such as componential analysis, cultural and descriptive equivalents, literal translations, modulations, recognized translations, reductions, synonyms, transferences, deletions and combinations. To understand, the importance of these tools it would be advisable to check how modulations could be used in handling words that do not have exact equivalents in the target language. Modulation refers to the practice of adding or removing meaning within the text for easier or accurate interpretation of a particular sense. In a cultural context, modulations become very essential in suppressing all readings that might cause semantic clash. Translators may also use modulations to create contextual effects or enriching words to achieve the intended purpose. Katan observes that meaning-based translation is very important and culture determines the translation process and the final version (78). The appreciation of the cultural perspective during the translation process was apparent during the translation of the Greek language into Roman. The importance of the culture during the translation process is again appreciated in the book titled, translation, rewriting and the manipulation of literary fame by Ander Lefevere. In this book, Levefere observes that there are several sociological and cultural factors that affect the translation process and they include the ideology and the literary norm dominant in the receptor culture. Ideological considerations are more important compared to the linguistic considerations during the interpretation process, and it is on this basis that the selection of the original text should be based. Likewise, the dominant literary norms influence the strategy that the translator will choose, as was the case during the 19th century’s translations of Catullus’ second poem. The translated poem included rhymes while the original one did not have meters and rhymes. The difficulties are incorporating the cultural aspects implicit in a source text are illustrated in many texts. For instance, Chen and Zhang observe that the cultural implications for translation range from the lexical content and syntax to ideologies (14). At the same time, the translators may find it hard conferring equal importance to both linguistic and cultural differences between the source language and the target language. The aspect of culture is better appreciated by Katan who observed that language cannot exist unless it is steeped in the context of culture while a culture should be supported by a natural language (48). This statement implies that there is need to conduct the translation in the cultural context. More importantly, during the translation process it is very imperative for the target language version to correspond with the source language version. Extra textual reasons for shifts in translation According to the available literature, the work of a translator can be influenced by many intra-textual factors including: subject matter, lexis, sentence structure and non-verbal elements. According to Munday the subject matter, content and presupposition affect the content of the text while the rest of the elements influence the structural linguistic properties of the text (89). The non-linguistic properties such as supra-segmental features are equally important in influencing the actions of the translators. The intra-textual factors are well captured by the Katharina Reiss model which dates back to the 1960s. The Reiss’s model is based on the top-down strategy and it classifies the text into three: informative, expressive and operative text. The informative text seeks to communicate news, knowledge and opinions to the readers while the expressive text seeks to organize the content according to the aesthetic criteria. On the other hand operative texts hope to transmit persuasive contents of persuasive character to induce the intended action. These text types are appreciated only by the Reiss model but form a key part of the translations. After the establishment of the text types, the next steps are to establish the genres and analyzing the style. In sum the Reiss model is an effective framework which helps the translators to treat the translation problems in a systematic way. The model has also been found to be effective in deriving translation strategies by crisscrossing text types and genres and creating room for textual idiosyncrasies. Another key framework is the Nord model which is based on the Vermeer’s and Reiss’s Skopos theory. Just like the Reiss model, this Nord’s framework too appreciates the text types but give more emphasis on the idea of textual genres and sketching a solution to prototypes. The parameters proposed by the Nord model identify five extra-textual factors: sender, sender’s intention, receiver, medium, place, time, motive and function. Each of these factors is further discussed below. Sender, senders’ intention and audience The sender of the text is regarded as the individual who uses the text to convey a certain message to the audience or produce a certain effect. The sender is one of the actors involved in the text’s production and reception. The work of the sender is not complete without the input of the text producer who writes the text according to the instructions given and the designer who organizes the text for presentation to the targeted audience. The citation and the bibliographies are some of the richest sources of information which is useful in identifying the sender and the text producer. According to the available literature the sender influences the formulation process of the text and the information about the sender can be obtained from the text environment including the imprints, blurbs, preface, epilogue and footnotes. During the translation process, the translator should provide the audience with adequate information about the writer of the text. Further information about the sender can be provided through other unconventional means. The sender influences the quality of the translation and his subjective self could actually interfere with the entire process. When the process is interrupted by personal views then the objective of the translation is never achieved. The intention of the sender, during the translation process determines whether the original text is preserved or not. In this regard, the sender may choose to distort the original intention of the text or preserve it using the appropriate tools. The sender is regarded as the autonomous text producer and is required to recognize the purpose, define the goal and choose the strategies to achieve those goals. The role of the sender in the translation process is very important and is likely to be affected by major problems. The sender or the translator can be affected by the difficulties arising from the deficient linguistic and translational competence. In order to deal with the cultural translation problems the translator is required to understand the norms and conventions guiding verbal and non-verbal behavior in the two cultures involved. Failure to understand, the two cultural backgrounds involved has a significant impact on the final results of the translation process. The translator could also be affected by the linguistic translation problems arising from the structural differences in vocabulary, syntax and supra-segmental features. To deal with these problems, the sender or the autonomous text producer is required to understand the source-language elements and he could opt for the bottom-top or the top-bottom process. According to Katan the bottom-up process involves three components: surface structures, conventions and pragmatics (78). The entire process is dependent on the translators’ stylistic preferences and their levels of linguistic and translational competence. While the bottom-up approach may have serious drawbacks such as linguistic interferences and mistakes. At the same time, the translator could lose sight of how the text functions in its communicative situation. To enhance the translation process, the translator could consider embracing the ‘top-down’ approach which is considered as a more functional translation process. By approaching such an approach the translator is able to adapt the source text to the receiver’s background knowledge, expectations and communicative needs. The input of the translator in the entire process is very vital as failure to use the correct tools could lead to gross mistakes. In this regard, the translation process could be affected by the pragmatic translation errors and cultural translation errors. To correctly adapt the source text to the target audience it would be appropriate to ensure the sender understands the culture-specific conventions. Other possible errors which the translator should address include linguistic translation errors and text-specific translation errors. To improve the capabilities of the sender, Bassnett and Lefevere insist on the importance of ample training and providing translators with the necessary tools (31). To achieve the desired results Bassnett and Lefevere further insists on the importance of systematizing translation problems through comparison of the source text and the translation scopos (32). Likewise, the translators should be trained in the following key areas: grammatical structure, linguistic variety, semantics and pragmatics. According these four aspects of the translation provides the translators with a good starting point for assessing the quality of the translated text .The importance of these four fundamentals in the translation process is well highlighted by Munday (56). According to the translators should acquire skills in dynamic translation or communicative translation. Likewise, strong knowledge of the linguistic varieties sic considered pivotal in analyzing, transferring, restructuring, and judging a text. The sender’s intention ought to be preserved during the translation process. According to preserving the sender’s intention is particularly important when translating literary texts marked as personal opinion. The receivers can be able to identify the sender’s intentions by analyzing the intra-textual features. Beside the sender, the message should be modified in a way as to suit the target audience. According to Munday the translated text cannot be addressed to the same receiver as the original (45). Medium The translated text could be relayed to the receivers in various forms including print form. Medium is considered an important element during the communication process, and is comprised of many forms. The choice of the medium in the communication process is appreciated by the available literature, and the lack of a proper channel could distort the message. In the translation process, the translators are interested in the aspects of perceptibility, storage of information and the presuppositions of communicative interactions. The medium determines ways in which information will be presented, how the arguments will be arranged, the choice of sentence types and whether the non-verbal elements will be incorporated. In this regard, you find that through speeches the translators can be able to preserve the non-verbal elements of the text being translated better than when it is written form. Space Space influences the linguistic aspects of the translation process as well as the comprehension and interpretation of the text. During the translation process, the translators should take into account that the relative geography from the standpoint of production could be different from that source production. Words have different meaning depending on where they are used. To preserve the original meanings of the text, it thus becomes imperative to adopt the contextual situation in which they are adopted. The influence of space can be understood using an appropriate example. Censorship could affect the way the translators handle some words, and in this regard those in free countries have a wide choice to use unlike their counterparts where literature is censored. The element of space is also appreciated during the interpretation of text and in this regard, knowing where the text was written could help the readers to identify the deictic elements more precisely. Indicating where the original text was written provides the readers with additional insights such as the cultural affiliation of the sender, the medium (whether culture bound or culture specific), the motive and the intra-textual features. According to the dimension of the space can be enhanced by including the following information: the place of publication, the publishing company and the author’s details. Time Problems are likely to arise from the different temporal deixis. Of course the source and the target texts should put into consideration the time factor. The text meant for a modern target audience may be modified to suit the right audience. It is well acknowledged that language is subject to constant change in its use and its norms. Moreover, time affects some type of text types. The aspect of time could help us to determine the communicative background of the sender and the addressed audience. Most importantly, the temporal deixis can be determined accurately if the receiver is aware of the time of text production. Motive and function Needless to say, the translators’ actions should be guided by the intended function of the translated text. In this regard, if the translated text is required for the official reasons then the translator should that into consideration. Understanding the function of the translated text, from the start of the translation process facilitates the translators in the choice of words, and tone. Motives provide the readers with answers to why the text was produced and the sender’s intentions. Beside the motive text function is an important factor in translation-oriented text analysis. Importance of modification during text translation The goal of the transition process is to ensure the meaning of the original text is preserved as much as possible but this could mean making modifications wherever necessary. The available literature has identified several types of modifications; one of which is the lexical modifications. According to Munday this type of modification entails replacing a word in the source text with another from the target language with both words having formal and communicative equivalence (67). Lexical modifications make the translation intelligible to the readers and can be achieved through numerous avenues including use of schemata. On the other hand, discoursal modifications go beyond the use of single words and are often used for grammatical adjustment, and achieving linguistic or cultural equivalence. Translators adopt the source text, in order to fit the target audience. The need for the modification is also justified by the presence of many linguistic systems of languages and different discourse systems. In this regard, it is hard to find exact words that mean the same thing in two different countries, in which case the translators are forced to modify the source text using a variety of methods such as exploitation, deletion and modulation. Likewise, direct translation from the source text to the target text could to the loss of meaning, and so it becomes very necessary for the translator to use situational words that will preserve the original meaning. Just to illustrate further, to preserve the structural equilibrium between two languages, the translator could alternative phrases, clauses, sentences and paragraphs. In addition, the translator could opt to change some parts of the original text by adding propositions, articles, conjunctions and changing the word order. Influence to the translator’s behavior? The behavior of the translator can be achieved by his or her attitudes towards the source and target culture. The behavior of the translator during the translation process is also influenced by the expectations of the target readers. The translators must conform to particular cultural constructions otherwise their work is not going to be acceptable to the target audience. The behavior of the translators is also subject to morality and this event can be understood using a perfect example. Some of the Shakespeare original writings contain vulgar words, and while translating these words into Chinese, Zhu Shenghao was forced to ‘purify’ them. This is because unlike the English culture which is liberal, the Chinese one is conservative and does not condone foul language. During the selection of source texts, the translators’ decisions are influenced by the religion. In this regard, to appease the target religion the translators should respect their religious beliefs and the tone of the text should be domesticated to suit them. The behaviors of the translators are also influenced by the socio-cultural norms of the target audience. As suggested by Munday ethics also determines the stance a translator adopts during the translating process (48). The translators must respect the norms of the target culture, and failure to do so reduces the acceptability of the translated texts. Another important point in respect to ethics is that the source language may appear shocking to the target culture. Faced with such dilemma the translators have no choice to adapt it to the dominant ethics prevalent in the target culture. The importance of respecting the target culture was apparent during the translation of the English novel, Joan Hoaste (Chen and Zhang 70). During the process, the translator, H.R. Haggar removed the offensive language to fit with Chinese feudal ethics and at the same time modified the contents of the novel by taking up the dominant position in the Chinese people’s lives (Chen and Zhang 70). Conclusion Communicative interaction between members of two different cultures should take into consideration the extra-textual factors of communication. The extra-textual factors pertain to the constellations or the communicative situation in which translation happens. The extra textual factors seek to enquire about the author and sender of the text and his or her intention. The extra-textual factors are associated with the entire communication channels and its accompanying entities. The above literature has not only appreciated the importance of observing extra-textual and intra-textual factors, but also the cultural context in which translation occurs. Works Cited Bassnett, Susan and Lefevere Andre. Constructing Cultures: Essays on Literary Translation. Shanghai: Shanghai Foreign Language Education Press, 2001. Chen, Dehong. and Zhang Nanfeng. Western Theories of Translation (in Chinese). Hong Kong: University of Hong Kong Press, 2000 Katan, David. Translating Cultures, An Introduction for Translators, Interpreters and Mediators. Manchester: St. Jerome Publishing, 1999 Lefevere, Andre. Translation, Rewriting, and the Manipulation of Literary Fame. London: Routledge, 1992 Munday, Jeremy. Introducing Translation Studies: Theories and Applications. London: Routledge, 2001 Nord, Christiana. Translating as a Purposeful Activity: Functionalist Approaches Explained. Shanghai: Shanghai Foreign Language Education Press, 2001 Read More