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Baker-Chapter 2-Problems at Word Level

The document discusses 10 common problems of non-equivalence when translating between languages: 1. Culture-specific concepts that have no direct translation. 2. Concepts that are known but not lexicalized with a single word. 3. Source words that are semantically complex and express multiple meanings. 4. Languages make different distinctions in meaning for concepts. 5. The target language may lack a superordinate term for a semantic field. 6. The target language may lack specific hyponym terms. 7. Languages differ in physical and interpersonal perspectives. 8. Words can have different expressive meanings between languages. 9. Differences in

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56 views17 pages

Baker-Chapter 2-Problems at Word Level

The document discusses 10 common problems of non-equivalence when translating between languages: 1. Culture-specific concepts that have no direct translation. 2. Concepts that are known but not lexicalized with a single word. 3. Source words that are semantically complex and express multiple meanings. 4. Languages make different distinctions in meaning for concepts. 5. The target language may lack a superordinate term for a semantic field. 6. The target language may lack specific hyponym terms. 7. Languages differ in physical and interpersonal perspectives. 8. Words can have different expressive meanings between languages. 9. Differences in

Uploaded by

Delaram Safdarian
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© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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Common problems of

non-equivalence
1. Culture-specific concepts
• The source-language word may express a
concept which is totally unknown in the target
culture. The concept in question may be
abstract or concrete; it may relate to a religious
belief, a social custom, or even a type of food.
Such concepts are often referred to as ‘culture-
specific’.” Our solution may vary from one text
to another.
• E.g.:‫آبگوشت آش‬
، ‫زکات‬
، ،‫ حج‬،‫ عید ف طر‬،‫ س یزده‌ب ه‌در‬،‫ن وروز‬
‫ حریم‬،‫جودوغ‬
– airing cupboard
2. The source-language concept is not
lexicalized in the target language

The source-language word may express a


concept which is known in the target culture
but simply not lexicalized, that is not ‘allocated’
a target-language word to express it. The word
savoury has no equivalent in many languages,
although it expresses a concept which is easy
to understand.
E.g.: blockbuster, landslide
3. The source-language word is
semantically complex

The source-language word may be semantically


complex. … In other words, a single word which
consists of a single morpheme can sometimes
express a more complex set of meanings than a
whole sentence. Languages automatically develop
very concise forms for referring to complex
concepts if the concepts become important
enough to be talked about often.
e.g. ‫!چلمبه‬
arruação = ‘clearing the ground under coffee trees of rubbish and
piling it in the middle of the row in order to aid in the recovery of
beans dropped during harvesting’
4. The source and target languages make
different distinctions in meaning
• The target language may make more or
fewer distinctions in meaning than the
source language. What one language
regards as an important distinction in
meaning another language may not
perceive as relevant.
• E.g. colors in different languages, uncle
and aunt in English and their equivalents
in Persian, snow for Eskimos, camel for
Arabs
For example
• Indonesian makes a distinction between
going out in the rain without the knowledge
that it is raining (kehujanan) and going out
in the rain with the knowledge that it is
raining (hujanhujanan).
5. The target language lacks a
superordinate
• The target language may have
specific words (hyponyms) but no
general word (superordinate) to head
the semantic field.
For example
• Russian has no ready equivalent for
facilities, meaning ‘any equipment,
building, services, etc. that are provided
for a particular activity or purpose.’

• BTW: What about Persian?


‫• اسامی برخی گیاهان که چون معادلی برای آنها نداریم غالبا‬
»‫ است که‬... ‫می‌گوییم و م‍‌‌ینویسیم «نوعی‬
6. The target language lacks a specific
term (hyponym)
• More commonly, languages tend to have
general words (superordinates) but lack
specific ones (hyponyms), since each
language makes only those distinctions in
meaning which seem relevant to its
particular environment.
For example
• house – its hyponyms bungalow, cottage,
croft, chalet, lodge, hut, mansion, manor,
villa and hall.
7. Differences in physical or
interpersonal perspective
• Physical perspective may be of more importance
in one language than it is in another. Physical
perspective has to do with where things or
people are in relation to one another or to a
place, as expressed in pairs of words such as
come/go, take/bring, arrive/depart, and so on.
• Perspective may also include the relationship
between participants in the discourse (tenor).
• E.g: added time → ‫‌ش ده‬‫وقتت لف‬
8. Differences in expressive meaning

• There may be a target-language


word which has the same
propositional meaning as the
source-language word, but it may
have a different expressive
meaning. It is usually easier to
add expressive meaning than to
subtract it.
• E.g. homosexuality, Alibaba
Note!
• In other words, if the target-language
equivalent is neutral compared to the
source-language item, the translator can
sometimes add the evaluative element by
means of a modifier or adverb if
necessary, or by building it in somewhere
else in the text.
9. Differences in form

• There is often no equivalent in the


target language for a particular form
in the source text. Certain suffixes
and prefixes which convey
propositional and other types of
meaning in English often have no
direct equivalents in other languages.
For example
• drinkable – Slovak have equivalents
but e. g. Arabic has to paraphrase.

• Preventable, in Slovak, we
paraphrase
10. Differences in frequency and purpose
of using specific forms
• Even when a particular form does have a
ready equivalent in the target language,
there may be a difference in the frequency
with which it is used or the purpose for
which it is used. English, for instance,
uses the continuous –ing form for binding
clauses much more frequently than other
languages which have equivalents for it.
11. The use of loan words in the source
text
• The use of loan words in the source text
poses a special problem in translation.
Quite apart from their respective
propositional meaning, loan words such as
au fait[1], chic[2], and alfresco[3] in
English are often used for their prestige
value, because they can add an air of
sophistication to the text or its subject
matter.” (Baker, 25)
For example
• be careful, English “sympathetic” should
not be confused with the Slovak word
“sympatický”, or “control” with “kontrola”
They do not always map.
• or: bezcenny in Polish, priceless in English
• wild mushrooms – freely growing
mushrooms
• More examples?

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