Hedges, or hedging devices, are strategies that the writer or speaker can use in order to convey probability, impreciseness or vagueness. Hedges can appear in most parts of speech, for example as adjectives, adverbs or modal or lexical verbs. This study investigates the translation of hedging devices in a non-fiction text from English to Swedish. It also discusses the translation strategies used when rendering the hedging devices in the target language. The primary source of this study was a non-fictional academic text on American architectural history. The method consisted of identifying and categorizing the hedging devices of the source text and then identifying the manner in which they were translated. In the quantitative analysis, it was found that the most frequently used translation strategy was retention, i.e. literal translation, but modification and omission were also found. It was also determined that the target text used a slightly higher number of hedging devices, which could suggest a cross-cultural difference between the languages. The qualitative analysis, supported by corpora and parallel texts, found that modification occurred due to cross-cultural differences or translator preferences. Omission mainly occurred when multiple hedging devices appeared in the same sentence and the function of the omitted hedge could be inferred by the surrounding hedges.

This paper examines the translation of hedging devices from English to Swedish in a non-fiction history book, and more specifically, which strategies are used in the translation process and why. To get a clear overview of the different hedging devices that are found in the ST, they are divided into categories, which are then analyzed individually with illustrative examples. The analysis shows that the most frequent hedging categories in the ST, as well as the reference material from the pilot study, are modal verbs, adverbs and adverbials, and quantifying pronouns, and the most frequently used translation strategy is retention. Furthermore, the study indicates that polysemous hedges can sometimes cause problems for the translator. Other factors that affect translation are genre-specific hedging conventions and translator preferences. As previous research in this subject area seems sparse, this paper aims to begin to fill that gap, but also to encourage larger studies that can, even more clearly, determine hedging conventions in the field of history.

This thesis explores the importance of transcreation in the translation of marketing slogans and how experience is pivotal when translating. The overall aim is to offer an insight into how professional and non-professional translators tackle translation problems in the form of rhetorical devices common to marketing language. The thesis analyses translation strategies and text functions in translations collected from participants with varying backgrounds in translation and show that participants with more experience and/or education in translation take more creative freedom in transferring the source slogans’ messages and functions. The study furthermore conducted a questionnaire with a small test group to gauge the target audience response to the collected translations. The result indicates a preference for transcreated translations over literal translations, highlighting the importance of audience awareness when translating slogans. Overall, the thesis provides insight into transcreative translation’s relevance and highlights the complexity of translation. / Denna uppsats undersöker vikten av transkreation i översättningen av reklamslogans, samt hur erfarenhet är avgörande vid översättning. Det övergripande målet är att ge en inblick i hur professionella och icke-professionella översättare hanterar översättningsproblem i form av retoriska medel som är vanligt förekommande i marknadsföringsspråk. Uppsatsen analyserar översättningsstrategier och textfunktion i översättningar som har samlats in från deltagare med olika bakgrund inom översättning och visar att deltagarna med mer erfarenhet och/eller utbildning inom översättning tar sig större kreativ frihet när de överför källsloganernas budskap och funktioner. I studien genomfördes dessutom en enkät med en liten testgrupp för att mäta målpublikens reaktion på de insamlade översättningarna. Resultatet visar att de föredrar transkreativa översättningar framför direktöversättningar, vilket understryker vikten av att vara medveten om målgruppen när man översätter slogans. Sammantaget ger avhandlingen en inblick i den transkreativa översättningens relevans samtidigt som den belyser verksamhetens komplexitet.

Mat, språk och kultur är tätt sammanlänkade, och i matlagningsprogram förekommer en rad olika sorters kulturspecifika referenser. Kulturspecifika referenser definieras som ”any reference to a cultural entity which, due to its distance from the target culture, is characterized by a sufficient degree of opacity for the target reader to constitute a problem” (Mailhac i Ranzato 2015:54) och kan vara sådant t.ex. som måttenheter (pint), märken (Tabasco) och maträtter (surf and turf). Denna undersöknings fokus är översättningen av kulturspecifika referenser i matlagningsprogram, och eftersom merparten av de matlagningsprogram som översätts för svensk tv är på engelska består denna studies material av 21 engelskspråkiga matlagningsprogram och deras svenska översättningar. De matlagningsprogram som undersökts är Det goda livet, Jamie Olivers smarta rätter, David Roccos ljuva matresa – Italien, Kitchen Hero och Hela England bakar. Genom att att konstruera en korpus och analysera de kulturspecifika referenserna har normerna för översättningsstrategier gällande kulturspecifika referenser i matlagningsprogram kartlagts, och jämförts med resultaten från Pedersens välkända undersökning av primetime-TV (2011). Resultaten kategoriserades sedan enligt Pedersens taxonomi. Resultaten visade att normerna för matlagningsprogram liknade dem för primetime-TV, trots att det fanns ett par domänspecifika skillnader. Eftersom språk formar hur vi ser världen är det intressant att se hur kulturspecifika referenser översätts från en kultur till en annan, eftersom det formar hur den kulturen ses och värderas, eller åtminstone dess matkultur. / Food, language and culture are closely linked and cooking shows are peppered with culturally specific references. Culturally specific references are defined as “any reference to a cultural entity which, due to its distance from the target culture, is characterized by a sufficient degree of opacity for the target reader to constitute a problem” (Mailhac in Ranzato 2015:54) and can be things such as measurements (pints), brands (Tabasco), and dishes (surf and turf) to name a few. This study focuses on the translation of culture specific references in cooking shows. Since most of the cooking shows translated into Swedish are in English, the material for this study consists of 21 cooking shows in English and their Swedish translations. This study will look at the shows 3 good things, Save with Jamie, David Rocco’s Dolce Vita, Kitchen Hero and The Great British Bake off. By constructing a corpus and analyzing the culturally specific references, the norms regarding translation strategies for the translation of culturally specific references in cooking shows have been mapped out, and compared to the results of a well known study on primetime TV by Pedersen (2011). These were categorized in accordance with Pedersen’s taxonomy (2011:76). The results showed that the norms were very similar to those of primetime TV, with the exception of some domain-specific norms. Language influences how we see the world. Thus, the way culturally specific references are translated from one culture into another is important because it affects how cultures are viewed and interpreted, at least within the food community.