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title: Words, Words, Words : The Translator and the
Language Learner Topics in Translation ; 7
author: Anderman, Gunilla M.
publisher: Multilingual Matters
isbn10 | asin: 185359332X
print isbn13: 9781853593321
ebook isbn13: 9780585156217
language: English
subject Second language acquisition, Translating and
interpreting, Vocabulary.
publication date: 1996
lcc: P118.2.W67 1996eb
ddc: 401/.93
subject: Second language acquisition, Translating and
interpreting, Vocabulary.
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Page i
Words, Words, Words
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Page ii
TOPICS IN TRANSLATION
Series Editors: Susan Bassnett (University of Warwick) and André Lefevere (University of Texas, Austin)
Editor for Annotated Texts for Translation: Beverly Adab (Aston University, Birmingham)
Editor for Translation in the Commercial Environment: Geoffrey Samuelsson-Brown (Aardvark
Translation Services Ltd)
Other Books in the Series
Annotated Texts for Translation: French - English
BEVERLY ADAB
Annotated Texts for Translation: English - French
BEVERLY ADAB
Linguistic Auditing
NIGEL REEVES and COLIN WRIGHT
Paragraphs on Translation
PETER NEWMARK
Practical Guide for Translators
GEOFFREY SAMUELSSON-BROWN
The Coming Industry of Teletranslation
MINAKO O'HAGAN
Translation, Power, Subversion
ROMAN ALVAREZ and M. CARMEN-AFRICA VIDAL (eds)
Other Books of Interest
About Translation
PETER NEWMARK
Cultural Functions of Translation
C. SCHAFFNER and H. KELLY-HOLMES (eds)
Please contact us for the latest book information: Multilingual Matters Ltd, Frankfurt Lodge, Clevedon Hall,
Victoria Road, Clevedon, Avon BS21 7SJ, England
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Page iii
TOPICS IN TRANSLATION 7
Series Editors:
Susan Bassnett (University of Warwick) and
André Lefevere (University of Texas, Austin)
Words, Words, Words
The Translator and the Language Learner
Edited by
Gunilla Anderman and Margaret Rogers
Polonius: What do you read, my lord?
Hamlet: Words, words, words
Hamlet Act 2, Scene 2, 1. 195
MULTILINGUAL MATTERS LTD
Clevedon•Philadelphia•Adelaide
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Words, Words, Words
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Words, Words, Words
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Contributors: A Short Profile
Jean Aitchison is Rupert Murdoch Professor of Language Communication, Worcester College, University of
Oxford.
Gunilla Anderman is the Director of the Programme in Translation Studies, University of Surrey and teaches
Translation Theory on the Diploma/MA in Translation.
John Ayto is a freelance lexicographer. He also teaches on the Postgraduate Diploma/MA in Translation at the
University of Surrey.
Dr Paul Meara is the Director of the Centre for Applied Language Studies, University College, Swansea.
Professor Peter Newmark teaches Principles and Methods of Translation on the Postgraduate Diploma/MA in
Translation at the University of Surrey.
Margaret Rogers is the Deputy Director of the Programme in Translation Studies, University of Surrey and
teaches Text Analysis and Terminology on the Diploma/MA in Translation.
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Preface
During the late 1980s and early 1990s a number of linguists engaged in research into different aspects of the
lexicon were the guests of the Programme in Translation Studies in the Department of Linguistic and
International Studies at the University of Surrey. The present volume contains some of the papers which resulted
from this co-operation, together with contributions from colleagues with a particular interest in first and second
language acquisition and/or translation. It was felt that, given the recent interest in different aspects of
vocabulary studies, the papers would provide a potentially fruitful combination, linking ideas from different but,
as it turns out, related fields. It was also felt that whereas translation studies had already tried to draw on the
findings from a number of different disciplines, observations from the fields of first and second language
acquisition had not, so far, been specifically related to translation.
The study of vocabulary may, of course, be approached from many different angles. In the present volume, the
reader interested in learning about vocabulary is invited to share some of the recent research findings about
words in a number of different areashow we learn them, store them, retrieve them in our first and second
languages, how they are included in dictionaries and, finally, how we translate them. It is intended for those
interested in reading around the subject of vocabulary, such as language teachers, students on advanced language
courses, teachers of translation, postgraduate students on academic translation programmes, translators and, in
addition, anyone interested in words, words, words...
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1
The Translator and the Language LearnerLinguistics Revisited
Gunilla Anderman And Margaret Rogers
Translation Studies and Linguistics
In considering the nature of translation studies as a relatively new discipline, it would seem only natural to view
its emergence in the broader context of developments in the study of language. It is hardly surprising, therefore,
to find that in the 1950s-1960s, at the time when Noam Chomsky put forward his ideas about a theory-based
approach to the description of natural language, attempts were also made to develop a similar framework for the
study of translation. In the United States, the writings of Eugene Nida reflected, as might be expected, the
approach of American linguists at the time. Nida adapted Chomsky's grammatical model, then known as
Transformational Generative Grammar, and analysed complex constructions into 'kernel' sentences in order to
facilitate translation (cf. for example Nida, 1964; Nida & Taber, 1969). However, Chomsky's theoretical model
of grammar was not the only one to gain currency. In the UK, Michael Halliday put forward his proposal for a
Scale and Category Grammar, which in turn provided the impetus for Catford to develop an alternative approach
to translation as outlined in A Linguistic Theory of Translation (1965). Just as Chomsky provided us with a
blueprint for a linguistic theory to be used for the description of natural language, so Nida and Catford attempted
to present us with linguistic theories to account for the process of translation. And although practising translators
may not have found them of immediate use, taking issue with some of the proposals, they remain, nevertheless,
systematic attempts to capture and formulate in linguistic terms the differences between source language (SL)
and target language (TL) and the problems which are likely to confront the translator in moving from one
language to the other.
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Page 2
It is interesting to note that the move towards applying linguistic theory to translation had been foreshadowed in
the 1950s in foreign language teaching and learning by Robert Lado's attempt to put language teaching, language
testing and language-learning experiments on a scientific basis (Lado, 1957). The 'science' of his approach was a
structuralist comparison of the learner's L1 and the target L2, generally known as the contrastive analysis
hypothesis (CAH), which could, it was initially claimed, lead to a rationalisation of teaching through a
prediction of areas of difficulty and learner error. By the 1970s, however, the CAH had ceded its position to
more developmentally-based approaches to L2 acquisition, since the predictions made proved to be unreliable.
These early attempts to formulate a theory of language teaching and translation were ambitious in nature, which
is perhaps why they were not entirely successful. But linguistics may be useful to the language teacher as well
as to the translator in a different way, as a source of explanation for specific problems. In applied linguistics, this
took the form of attempting to explain learners' errors rather than predict them (Wardhaugh, 1974). And in the
case of translation, there are in fact many subdivisions of linguistics which could be of immediate interest to the
translator. One obvious area is sociolinguistics, a branch of linguistics which provides us with information about
the relation of language to social situation. When, for instance, the translator faces the task of having to translate
a source text (ST) written in dialect, it might be helpful to gain a closer awareness of the relationship between
dialect and social structure in the TL culture. It may be the case that certain dialects are more closely linked to
social class than others, as perhaps most famously immortalised by Bernard Shaw in Pygmalion. In some cases
the availability of a particular dialect in the TL may even provide new-found opportunities for representing
sociolects in the ST, normally difficult to capture in translation. This appears, for instance, to be the case when
the works of American writers such as Tennessee Williams and Edward Albee are translated into Québécois,
where a proletarisation of language in the target text (TT) makes possible a close match with the original, not
easily obtainable in translation into standard French (Brisset, 1989).
Problems related to dialects are, however, not the only difficulties facing the translator at the level of the text. It
is frequently necessary to consider questions relating to text linguistics, including the analysis of thematic
structure, coherence and cohesion, and pragmatics (cf. Hatim & Mason, 1990; Bell, 1991; Baker, 1992). Recent
interest in pragmatics, in particular cross-cultural pragmatics, has also pointed to the relevance of speech acts
such as apologies, requests, compliments etc., all expressed in accordance
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