Ways of handling equivalent lacking words

Many English words have no regular equivalents, and a number of techniques has been suggested for rendering the meanings of such equivalent-lacking words in TT. Now the practising translator most often has to resort to such techniques when he comes across some new-coined words in the source text or deals with names of objects or phenomena unknown to the TL community (the so-called "realia").

When new words come into being to denote new objects or phenomena, they naturally cannot have regular equivalents in another language. Such equivalents may only gradually evolve as the result of extensive contacts between the two nations. Therefore the translator coming across a new coinage has to interpret its meaning and to choose the appropriate way of rendering it in his translation. Consider the following sentence: "In many European capitals central streets have been recently pedestrianized.'1 First, the translator will recognize the origin of "pedestrianize" which is coined from the word "pedestrian" — «пешеход» and the verb-forming suffix -ize. Then he will realize the impossibility of a similar formation in Russian (опешеходить!) and will opt for a semantic transformation: «движение транспорта было запрещено», «улицы были закрыты для транспорта» or «улицы были отведены только для пешеходов».

As often as not a whole set of new words may enter in common use, all formed on the same model. Thus, the anti-segregation movement in the United States in the 1960's introduced a number of new terms to name various kinds of public demonstrations formed from a verb + -in on the analogy of "sit-in": "ride-in" (in segregated buses), "swim-in" (in segregated swimming pools), "pray-in" (in segregated churches) and many others.

Translating equivalent-lacking words calls for a good deal of ingenuity and imagination on the part of the translator who should be well trained to use the appropriate semantic transformations, whenever necessary. At the same time he must be prepared to look for new ways of solving his problems whenever the standard methods cannot be applied to the particular context.

13. There are words in the source and target languages which are more or less similar in form. Such words are of great interest to the translator since he is naturally inclined to take this formal similarity for the semantic proximity and to regard the words that look alike as permanent equivalents.Their formal similarity suggesting that they are interchangeable, is, therefore, deceptive and may lead to translation errors. For that reason they are often referred to as the translator's false friends.

The pseudointernational words can be classified in two main groups. First, there are words which are similar in form but completely different in meaning. Here the risk of making a bad mistake is very great whenever the translator fails to consult his dictionary. Lots of mistakes have been made translating such English words as "decade, complexion, lunatic, accurate, actual, aspirant" and the like. E.g.:

It lasted the whole decade.

Second, there are many pseudointernational words which are not fully interchangeable though there are some common elements in their semantics. They may become the false friends if the translator substitutes one of them for the other without due regard to the difference in their meaning or to the way the English word is used in the particular context. The translator should bear in mind that a number of factors can preclude the possibility of using the formally similar word as an equivalent. Among these factors the following are most important:

The semantic factor resulting from the different subsequent development of the words borrowed by the two languages from the same source. For instance, the English "idiom" can be well rendered by its Russian counterpart to convey the idea of an expression whose meaning cannot be derived from the conjoined meanings of its elements but has developed such additional meanings as dialect (local idiom) and individual style

2. The stylistic factor resulting from the difference in the emotive or stylistic connotation of the correlated words. For example, the English "career" is neutral while the Russian «карьера» is largely negative. The translator has to reject the pseudointernational substitute and to look for another way out, e.g.:

Davy took on Faraday as his assistant and thereby opened a scientific career for him.

Дэви взял Фарадея к себе в ассистенты и тем самым открыл ему путь в науку.

The co-occurrence factor reflecting the difference in the lexical combinability rules in the two languages. The choice of an equivalent is often influenced by the usage preferring a standard combination of words to the formally similar substitute. So, a "defect" has a formal counterpart in the Russian «дефект» but "theoretical and organizational defects" will be rather «теоретические и организационные просчеты». A "gesture" is usually translated as «жест» but the Russian word will not be used to translate the following sentence for the combinability factor:

The reason for including only minor gestures of reforms in the program...

Причина включения в программу лишь жалкого подобия реформ...

4. The pragmatic factor reflecting the difference in the background knowledge of the members of the two language communities which makes the translator reject the formal equivalent in favour of the more explicit or familiar variant. The reader of the English original will usually need no explanation concerning the meaning of such terms as "the American Revolution", "the Reconstruction" or "the Emancipation Proclamation" which refer to the familiar facts of the US history. In the Russian translation, however, these terms are usually not replaced by their pseudointernational equivalents. Instead, use is made of the descriptive terms better known to the Russian reader:

The American Revolution was a close parallel to the wars of national liberation in the colonial and semi-colonial countries.

Война за независимость в Америке была прямым прототипом национально-освободительных войн в колониальных и полуколониальных странах.

14. The first group of problems stems from the broader semantic relationships between the attribute and the noun. As has been pointed out the attribute may refer not only to some property of the object but also to its location, purpose, cause, etc. As a result, the translator has to make a thorough analysis of the context to find out what the meaning of the group is in each particular case. He must be also aware of the relative freedom of bringing together such semantic elements within the attributive group in English that are distanced from each other by a number of intermediate ideas. Thus a resolution submitted by an executive body of an organization may be described as "the Executive resolution" and the majority of votes received by such a resolution will be the Executive majority. If a word-for-word translation of the name of the executive body (e.g. the Executive Committee — исполнительный комитет) may satisfy the translator, the other two attributive groups will have to be explicated in the Russian translation as «резолюция, предложенная исполкомом» and «большинство голосов, поданных за резолюцию, которая была предложена исполкомом», respectively.

The second group of problems results from the difficulties in handling multi-member attributive structures. The English-speaking people make wide use of "multi-storied" structures with complicated internal semantic relationships. The tax paid for the right to take part in the election is described as "the poll tax". The states where this tax is collected are "the poll tax states" and the governors of these states are "the poll tax states governors". Now these governors may hold a conference which will be referred to as 'the poll tax states governors conference" and so on.

The semantic relationships within a multi-member group need not be linear. Consider the following sentence:

It was the period of the broad western hemisphere and world pre-war united people's front struggle against fascism.

Here we have a whole network of semantic ties between the attributes and the noun: "broad" is directly referred to "struggle", "western hemisphere" is joined with "world" and together they express the idea of location, i.e. "the struggle in the western hemisphere"; "pre-war" may be referred either to "struggle" or to the "united people's front"; "united" and "people's" belong to "front" and together they qualify the "struggle" implying either the "struggle by the united people's front" or the "struggle for the united people's front".

In translation this complexity of semantic ties will result in replacing the group by a number of different structures in which the hidden relations within it will be made explicit:

Это был период широкой предвоенной борьбы против фашизма за единый народный фронт в Западном полушарии и во всем мире.

Given the multiplicity of possible translations such structures should be analysed in terms of factors influencing the choice of Russian variants rather than with the aim of listing regular correspondences.

The same goes for attributive groups with latent predication where a whole sentence is used to qualify a noun as its attribute "He was being the boss again, using the its-my-money-now-do-as-you're-told voice". Here correspondences can also be described in an indirect way only by stating that the attribute is usually translated into Russian as a separate sentence and that this sentence should be joined to the noun by a short introductory element. There was a man with a don't-say-anything-to-me-or-I'll-contradict-you face. (Ch. Dickens)

Там был человек, на лице которого было написано: что бы вы мне ни говорили, я все равно буду вам противоречить.

There is one more peculiar feature of the English attributive group which may be the cause of trouble for the translator. It may be transformed into a similar group with the help of a suffix which is formally attached to the noun but is semantically related to the whole group. Thus "a sound sleeper" may be derived from "sound sleep" or the man belonging to the "Fifth column" may be described as "the Fifth columnist". The translator should be aware of the derivation process and should not rack his brains trying to figure out how a sleeper can be sound or in what kind of enumeration this particular columnist is the fifth. Rather, he should consider the meaning of the original groups "sound sleep" and "the Fifth column" and then realize that the added suffix makes the group refer to a person who enjoys this kind of sleep or is one of the subversive elements.

15. Introductory Notes

Phraseological units are figurative set expressions often described as "idioms". Such units have an important role to play in human communication. They produce a considerable expressive effect for, besides conveying information, they appeal to the reader's emotions, his aesthetic perception, his literary and cultural associations. Whenever the author of the source text uses an idiom, it is the translator's duty to try and reproduce it with the utmost fidelity.

Now an idiom's semantics are a complex entity and there are five aspects of its meaning that will influence the translator's choice of an equivalent in the target language. They are the idiom's figurative meaning, its literal sense, its emotive character, stylistic register and national colouring. The figurative meaning is the basic element of the idiom's semantics. Thus "red tape" means bureaucracy, "to kick the bucket" means to die, and "to wash dirty linen in public" means to disclose one's family troubles to outsiders. The figurative meaning is inferred from the literal sense. "Red tape", "to kick the bucket", and "to wash dirty linen in public" also refer, respectively, to a coloured tape, an upset pail and a kind of laundering, though in most cases this aspect is subordinate and serves as a basis for the metaphorical use.

Idioms can be positive, negative or neutral. It is clear that "to kill two birds with one stone" is good, "to find a mare's nest" is a ludicrous mistake while "Rome was not built in a day" is a neutral statement of fact. They can also differ in their stylistic usage: they may be bookish (to show one's true colours) or colloquial (to be a pain in the neck). Besides, an idiom can be nationally coloured, that is include some words which mark it as the product of a certain nation. For instance, "to set the Thames on fire" and "to carry coals to Newcastle" are unmistakably British.

The complex character of the idiom's semantics makes its translation no easy matter. But there are some additional factors which complicate the task of adequate identification, understanding and translation of idioms. First, an idiom can be mistaken for a free word combination, especially if its literal sense is not "exotic" (to have butterflies in one's stomach) but rather trivial (to measure one's length, to let one's hair down). Second, a SL idiom may be identical in form to a TL idiom but have a different figurative meaning. Thus, the English "to lead smb. by the nose" implies a total domination of one person by the other (cf. the Russian «водить за нос») and "to stretch one's legs" means to take a stroll (cf. the Russian «протянуть ноги»). Third, a SL idiom can be wrongly interpreted due to its association with a similar, if not identical TL unit. For instance, "to pull the devil by the tail", that is to be in trouble, may be misunderstood by the translator under the influence of the Russian idioms «держать бога за бороду» or «поймать за хвост жар-птицу». Fourth, a wrong interpretation of a SL idiom may be caused by another SL idiom similar in form and different in meaning. Cf. "to make good time" and "to have a good time". Fifth, a SL idiom may have a broader range of application than its TL counterpart apparently identical in form and meaning.

There are four typical methods to handle a SL idiom in the translating process. First, the translator can make use of a TL idiom which is identical to the SL idiom in all five aspects of its semantics, e.g. "to pull chestnuts out of the fire for smb." — таскать каштаны из огня для кого-либо.

Second, the SL idiom can be translated by a TL idiom which has the same figurative meaning, preserves the same emotive and stylistic characteristics but is based on a different image, that is, has a different literal meaning, e.g. "make hay while the sun shines" — куй железо, пока горячо.

Third, the SL idiom can be translated by reproducing its form word-for-word in TL, e.g. "People who live in glass houses should not throw stones." - Люди, живущие в стеклянных домах, не должны бросать камни.

Fourth, instead of translating the SL idiom, the translator may try to explicate its figurative meaning, so as to preserve at least the main element of its semantics.

Proverbs and sayings

Proverbs often have an equivalent in the target language. However, even if a linguistic equivalent exists, there may be cultural differences to consider. For example, translation into English could vary based on whether the target is the Uk or the US. It often helps to determine the origin of the proverb, especially if it isn’t an entirely common saying. An obscure literary proverb should not be translated into a very familiar proverb in the target language. It is best to aim for equivalence between the proverb’s standing within the context of the source culture and the target.Often, proverbs deal directly with societal customs that might not translate directly to certain other societies. In these cases, it might help to find a saying that approximates the intended message of the proverb and use that.Ultimately, the challenges of translating proverbs depend on the case at hand, and therefore, it it is best for translators to adjust their method on a case by case basis.

Lexical transformations

In substitutions of lexical units words and stable word combinations are replaced by others which are not their equivalents:

A concrete definition – replacing a word with a broad sense by one of a narrower meaning: He is at school – Он учиться в школеж; У мактабда укийди. He is in the army – Он служит в армии; У армияда хизмат килади.Generalization- replacing a word’s narrow meaning by one with a broad sense: A Navajo blanket – жун адёл; индийское одеяло.Antonymic translation is employed for the sake of achieving faithfulness in conveying content or the necessary expressiveness of sense units. It represents a way of rendering when an affirmative in structure language unit (word, word-combination or sentence) is con­veyed via a negative in sense or structure but identical in content language unit, or vice versa: a negative in sense or structure sense unit is translated via an affirmative sense unit. Cf.: to have quite a few friends мати багато (немало) друзів.Compensation is used when certain elements in the original text cannot be expressed in terms of the language it is translated into. In cases of this kind the same information is communicated by other or another place to as to make up the semantic deficiency.

The infinitive

n many cases, however, equivalence in translation can be best achieved if the translator does not try to mirror the grammatical forms in the source text. There are no permanent grammatical equivalents and the translator can choose between the parallel forms and various grammatical transformations. He may opt for the latter for there is never an absolute identity between the meaning and usage of the parallel forms in SL and TL. For instance, both English and Russian verbs have their infinitive forms. The analogy, however, does not preclude a number of formal and functional differences. We may recall that the English infinitive has perfect forms, both active and passive, indefinite and continuous, which are absent in the respective grammatical category in Russian. The idea of priority or non-performed action expressed by the Perfect Infinitive is not present in the meaning of the Russian Infinitive and has to be rendered in translation by some other means. Cf. 'The train seems to arrive at 5." - Поезд, видимо, приходит в 5. and 'The train seems to have arrived at 5." - Поезд, видимо, пришел в 5.A dissimilarity of the English and Russian Infinitives can be also found in the functions they perform in the sentence. Note should be taken, for example, of the Continuative Infinitive which in English denotes an action following that indicated by the Predicate:Parliament was dissolved, not to meet again for eleven years. Парламент был распущен и не созывался в течение 11 лет. Не came home to find his wife gone. Он вернулся домой и обнаружил, что жена ушла.

 

The passive voice

 

Some ways of expressing the passive voice in both languages may coincide in form and structure. Others should be transformed, in order to achieve faithfulness in translation. English passive forms referring to present tense have mostly no structural equivalents in Ukrainian where the auxiliary verb to be is usually omitted and the past participle acquires other morphological and semantic expression. One more faithful Ukrainian transformation of this passive sentence construction may be achieved by way of conveying it through the so-called middle voice form or -ся/-сь verb. Depending on the form of the passive construction and still more on the lexical verbal meaning, this voice form may have in Ukrainian some still other transformations, which express the same meaning of the passive construction; they may acquire the following outer forms of expression in Ukrainian: a) that of an indefinite personal sentence/clause; b) that of single predicative word/simple nominal predicate; c) a finite form of the verb/simple verbal predicate:

The common English passive voice constructions with the prepositional object as their subject have generally no equivalent passive constructions in Ukrainian. They are rendered then with the indefinite personal forms of the verb.

Some English passive voice constructions often change their outer and inner form and become active voice forms in Ukrainian.

 

 

The Word order

 

A most common example of dissimilarity between the parallel syntactic devices in the two languages is the role of the word order in English and in Russian. Both languages use a "direct" and an "inverted" word order. The predominantly fixed word order in the English sentence means that each case of its inversion makes the object carry a great communicative load. This emphasis cannot be reproduced in translation by such a common device as the inverted word order in the Russian sentence and the translator has to use some additional words to express the same idea.

The first group of problems stems from the broader semantic relationships between the attribute and the noun. The attribute may refer not only to some property of the object but also to its location, purpose, cause, etc. As often as not, translating the meaning of an English attributive group into Russian may involve a complete restructuring of the sentence.

The second group of problems results from the difficulties in handling multi-member attributive structures. The English-speaking people make wide use of "multi-storied" structures with complicated internal semantic relationships. Given the multiplicity of possible translations such structures should be analysed in terms of factors influencing the choice of Russian variants rather than with the aim of listing regular correspondences.

 

Modal Verbs and modal forms

 

Modality is a semantic category indicating the degree of factuality that the speaker ascribes to his message. Modal relationships make up an important part of the information conveyed in the message. Obviously a translation cannot be correct unless it has the same modality as the source text. The translator must be able to understand various modal relationships expressed by different means in SL and to choose the appropriate means in TL. Modal verbs are widely used in English to express various kinds of modality. The translator should be aware of the fact that an English modal verb can be found in some phrases the Russian equivalents of which have no particular modal forms. Most English modal verbs are polysemantic. So "must" can express obligation or a high degree of probability. "May" implies either probability or moral possibility. "Can" denotes physical or moral possibility, etc.

While handling modal forms the translator should not forget that while the English language has practically no modal particles, the Russian language has. Whenever necessary, Russian particles (ведь, хоть, мол) should be used to express modality which is expressed in the source text by other means or only implied