Awareness of metaphors brings awareness to how language is structured in a text. This study, based on Lakoff & Johnson’s theory of conceptual metaphors, will discuss the different types of metaphorical concepts found in the source text and target text during the translation of two articles by the author Mohsin Hamid. The quantitative part of the study will present different types of metaphors and how they translate into Swedish. The qualitative part will focus on how the author uses, and constructs his own, structural metaphors as a rhetorical device. Newmark and Schäffner’s translation strategies for metaphors will be considered and applied in combination with two translation theories: Nord’s theory of text functions alongside Venuti’s foreignisation theory. The findings will suggest that an increased awareness of metaphorical concepts can be beneficial for translators and assist them in understanding how the author of the source text has structured the language and thought content in the text.

This translation and commentary thesis presents a theory of literary translation based on the ideas of Gilles Deleuze, informed by and applied to a translation of parts 0, 1 and 2 of the novel A fuego eterno condenados (1994) by Chilean author Roberto Rivera Vicencio. Using an approach based on the iterative development of a theoretical framework and translation, it examines how specific translation problems from the text can contribute to and benefit from a translation theory based on the ideas of Deleuze. Analysing the work of Lawrence Venuti as indicative of a shift by Translation Studies from thinking of translation in terms of equivalence to thinking of it in terms of difference, the thesis builds on Venuti’s research, offering a systematic treatment of Deleuze’s earlier work to theorise translation as the production of simulacra in which the translator creates solutions in the domain of the Actual to a translation problem that exists in the Virtual. It then goes on to examine Deleuze’s later work, written in collaboration with F ́elix Guattari, to develop a conceptual framework based on the concept of the texture of prose derived from the principles of a minor, or nomad, science. This framework is used to address specific problems arising in the translation, deriving a series of practical techniques and considerations that can be used to create this kind of texture in the application of a Deleuzean theory of translation to literary texts.

Student Number: 0111461R Master of Arts in Translation Faculty of Humanities / The Wrath of the Ancestors (Jordan, 1980) is a translation of a classic in Xhosa literature, Ingqumbo Yeminyanya written by the same author. The translation was written for the non-Xhosa speakers to make them aware and understand the culture of amaXhosa. This study then aims at analyzing how aspects of culture have been translated from the source text Ingqumbo Yeminyanya (1940) to the target text The Wrath of the Ancestors (1980). It also investigates the impact of Jordan’s approach on a wider audience. To accomplish this, a descriptive analysis of the strategies used by the translator is carried out. The responses of the selected audiences are also analysed. The analysis reveals that the translator used mainly foreignisation especially in the translation of fixed expressions and idioms, where he used cultural borrowing and calque as strategies. The conclusion drawn from this analysis is that in his attempt to draw his readers closer to the source text, the translator introduced a number of cultural bumps (Leppihalme, 1997), resulting in the target reader struggling to understand some of the cultural aspects in the novel.

Drama translation is an area in the discipline of Translation Studies that has been neglected compared with the translation of other literary texts, especially in the South African context. This dissertation contributes to this neglected area by exploring to what extent and how the principles associated with foreignisation, dynamic equivalence and shift theory can aid in the process of translating a literary text, specifically a dramatic text, from Afrikaans into English. This dissertation also discusses translation challenges specific to the translation of the source text, Deon Opperman’s Kaburu, from Afrikaans into English. The source text, Kaburu, was selected because of the playwright’s interesting use of the Afrikaans language and the numerous culture-specific references in the text. In addition, it was theorised that a larger global audience would be able to relate to the international themes of identity and migration while being exposed to themes pertaining to socio-political issues that are prevalent in contemporary South Africa, such as crime, land disownment, name changes and political programs to redress the injustices of the past. In order to retain the culture-specific nature of the text, the decision was made to produce a foreignised translation of the source text. Numerous examples of challenges encountered during the production of the target text are provided and discussed. The examples and discussions provided demonstrates that the theoretical concepts of equivalence, domestication and foreignisation and shift theory can be useful tools in analysing and producing solutions for dealing with challenging translation in a literary translation between Afrikaans and English. / MA (English), North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, 2014

Drama translation is an area in the discipline of Translation Studies that has been neglected compared with the translation of other literary texts, especially in the South African context. This dissertation contributes to this neglected area by exploring to what extent and how the principles associated with foreignisation, dynamic equivalence and shift theory can aid in the process of translating a literary text, specifically a dramatic text, from Afrikaans into English. This dissertation also discusses translation challenges specific to the translation of the source text, Deon Opperman’s Kaburu, from Afrikaans into English. The source text, Kaburu, was selected because of the playwright’s interesting use of the Afrikaans language and the numerous culture-specific references in the text. In addition, it was theorised that a larger global audience would be able to relate to the international themes of identity and migration while being exposed to themes pertaining to socio-political issues that are prevalent in contemporary South Africa, such as crime, land disownment, name changes and political programs to redress the injustices of the past. In order to retain the culture-specific nature of the text, the decision was made to produce a foreignised translation of the source text. Numerous examples of challenges encountered during the production of the target text are provided and discussed. The examples and discussions provided demonstrates that the theoretical concepts of equivalence, domestication and foreignisation and shift theory can be useful tools in analysing and producing solutions for dealing with challenging translation in a literary translation between Afrikaans and English. / MA (English), North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, 2014

Research within translation characterises cultural references as being problematic for translators, meaning they must choose between different translation strategies as to how to transfer these references into the translated text. These strategies are often described in general terms according to how closely oriented they are to the target-culture or source-culture, known as domestication or foreignisation. Translation of literature into English is minimal in world terms and there is seemingly a lack of statistically comparable data concerning the translation of cultural references. This study investigates and compares translation strategies of words denoting cultural references in two translations of the 1998 Swedish Nordic Noir novel Sprängaren by Liza Marklund. The methodology in the study is based on descriptive translation studies, and a categorisation model for types of cultural references is used, as well as an adapted taxonomy model for evaluating translation strategies. Issues addressed are: what types of strategies are used; whether strategies change between translations; how the second translation stands in relation to the retranslation hypothesis and whether any general translation norms are apparent. Results show that a wide variety of translation strategies are used for different types of cultural references, with subtle differences in strategies used in each translation. However, both translations appear to be more domestication-oriented with little overall movement towards to the source culture, as the retranslation hypothesis suggests.

La traduction est une affaire culturelle. De prime abord, elle se présente comme la recherche d’équivalents lors du passage d’une langue à l’autre. Mais si on se penche sur le travail qu’effectuent les traducteurs, on se rend compte rapidement que traduire exige des opérations bien plus complexes. Ainsi, un texte littéraire rédigé en une langue ne peut pas être traduit vers une autre langue sans que le traducteur ou la traductrice fasse attention au contenu culturel que véhicule la langue. Un même message est communiqué de deux manières différentes par deux peuples issus de cultures distinctes. Ainsi opère un système très complexe qui déborde le champ de la linguistique et s’enracine dans la culture qu’exprime chaque langue. Toutes les actions humaines, la communication, les sentiments, les réactions, la compréhension, l’interprétation (pour en nommer quelques-unes) ont la culture pour fondement.Intitulée « L’épreuve de l’étranger : traductions françaises d’écrivains sri lankais contemporains de langue anglaise », notre thèse a pour mots-clés : « culture », « sri lankais » et « traduction ». Elle a pour point de départ une question formulée en quelques mots simples : comment transmettre en français la culture sri lankaise ? Ces deux cultures sont distantes sur le plan géographique mais aussi pour ce qui concerne leurs pratiques et leurs valeurs. C’est donc une rencontre entre l’Orient et l’Occident que permet la traduction par le truchement de la langue anglaise.Les deux œuvres que nous avons choisies pour notre corpus, Funny Boy de Shyam Selvadurai (1994) et Running in the Family de Michael Ondaatje (1982), sont imprégnées de culture sri lankaise. Nous avons tenté de mettre en évidence systématiquement les stratégies utilisées par les traducteurs pour préserver l’identité de la culture source. La tâche du traducteur n’est pas de dissimuler ou de minimiser les éléments culturels sri lankais mais de les rendre visibles dans ses textes. Par les stratégies qu’il utilise, le traducteur parvient à préserver la culture sri lankaise dans le texte d’arrivée, du moins dans des limites qu’il nous faudra également définir. Lawrence Venuti (2004 : 20) propose un système binaire, la traduction ethnocentrique ou domesticating (naturalisation) et la traduction éthique qui laisse place à l’étrangeté qu’il qualifie de foreignizing (dépaysement). Conserver les traces de l’œuvre originale est considéré comme la chose la plus importante. Nous nous plaçons ainsi entre les stratégies de naturalisation et de dépaysement. Traduire, c’est effectuer un travail qui « est ouverture, dialogue, métissage et décentrement » comme l’écrit Berman (1984 : 16), c’est aussi négocier un autre type de produit final.Dans un premier temps, nous verrons comment opère le dépaysement en tant que stratégie de traduction dans Drôle de garçon (Frédéric Limare et Susan Fox-Limare, 1998) de Shyam Selvadurai et Un air de famille (Marie-Odile Fortier-Masek, 1991) de Michael Ondaatje. Dans un deuxième temps, nous prêterons attention à la stratégie de la naturalisation qui rend la lecture plus fluide, en atténuant les différences trop importantes entre cultures. Dans un troisième temps, nous verrons de quelle manière certaines faits culturels restent intraduits dans les traductions pour diverses raisons que nous identifierons au cours de l’analyse, tout en repérant également les ellipses qui modifient le message d’origine. Notre analyse tentera de démontrer que la traduction est une rencontre entre les cultures : une rencontre qui se fait de manière fructueuse pour enrichir la littérature d’une culture nouvelle en permettant au lecteur un voyage vers une destination lointaine.Mots clés : culture, dépaysement, Funny Boy, Michael Ondaatje, naturalisation, Running in the Family, Shyam Selvadurai, Sri Lanka, traduction / Translation is a cultural matter. At first sight, it may appear as a search for equivalents in the transfer from one language to another. However, in depth translation analysis reveals much more than meets the eye. A literary text written in one language cannot be translated into another language without paying attention to its associated cultural background. It has become a truism today to say that individuals belonging to different cultures do not communicate in the same way; while the linguistic dimension is important, so is the cultural one, since cultural habits are at the root of all human actions.The title of this thesis, “The Trials of the Foreign: French Translations of Contemporary Sri Lankan Writers in English”, combines three key words: “culture”, “Sri Lanka” and “translation”. The broad research question we started out with is: how is it possible to convey Sri Lankan culture in French literary translation? The two countries are distant not only geographically but also in terms of practices and values. Therefore, a true encounter between East and West is at stake here, mediated by the English language, which the authors of the two Sri Lankan novels we study here chose as a medium of expression.In his or her attempt to identify viable equivalents of different cultural realities, the translator is confronted with decisions about whether differences should be mitigated or, on the contrary, preserved, in order to maintain the local colour. When cultural differences are smoothed over in translation and the target text contains very few traces, if any, of the source culture, the reader may have the impression of reading an original. On the other hand, when the source culture is given prominence, the translation has the potential to make the reader travel abroad, and gain new experience.The two literary works which make the object of our research, Michael Ondaatje’s Running in the Family (1982) and Shyam Selvadurai’s Funny Boy (1994), are imbued with Sri Lankan culture and pose significant challenges to translation. We draw on Lawrence Venuti’s (1995/2004) distinction between ethnocentric or domesticating translation (naturalisation) and foreignizing translation (dépaysement), while at the same time recognizing the importance of not taking this dichotomy for granted. And we assume, as Antoine Berman did, that translation is “openness, dialogue, blending and decentring” (1984: 16).We start by outlining a number of theoretical considerations about translation strategy, culture, and translating culture. We then carry out fine-grained analyses of the texts and endeavour to show how foreignization operates in Drôle de garçon (1998), the French translation by Frédéric Limare and Susan Fox-Limare of Selvadurai’s novel Funny Boy, and in Un air de famille (1991), the translation of Ondaatje’s Running in the Family by Marie-Odile Fortier-Masek. In the second part of our analysis, we focus on the strategy of domestication, which makes reading more fluent due to the mitigation of differences between cultures. Finally, we discuss some of the ways in which certain cultural facts remain untranslated, with implications for the integrity of the message, and the target readers’ experience of the text. We conclude that translation is indeed an encounter between cultures: a meeting that is fruitful and has the potential to enrich the literature of a new country, by allowing the reader to embark on a journey to a distant destination.Key words: culture, domestication, foreignization, Funny Boy, Michael Ondaatje, Running in the Family, Shyam Selvadurai, Sri Lanka, translation

Abstract Research on the translation of children’s literature in South Africa is currently in its nascent stages. This study aims to provide a comprehensive descriptive overview of current practices in the translation of children’s literature in South Africa, particularly against the backdrop of the educational context. It espouses a broadly causal view of translation, but also encompasses a comparative and process model (see Chesterman, 2000). Translation is used to a significant degree in the production of children’s books in South Africa. However, it is not clear exactly to what degree translation is utilised, nor is there any information available about how translation contributes to the production of children’s books in South Africa. This study addresses these questions. Based on survey research among publishers, and the analysis of publishing data, it finds that there are significant differences between the ways in which translation is used in the production of children’s books in the various languages in South Africa. Specifically, translation is used much more extensively in the African languages than in Afrikaans and English, with a correspondingly lower incidence of original production in the African languages. Furthermore, the educational discourse has a profound effect on the uses of translation in the production of children’s books in South Africa. However, the educational discourse has a greater determining effect on the production of books for children in the African languages than in Afrikaans and English. Theoretical discourse surrounding domestication and foreignisation is particularly problematic in the South African context, and findings from a survey among translators indicate that translators from different language groups have different opinions about whether children’s books should be translated using domesticating or foreignising approaches. The above findings broadly deal with the contextual dimension. They are concerned with how social, ideological and material factors and discourses affect the ways in which translation is used in the production of children’s books in South Africa. At this point the matter of translation theory is introduced. It is questioned to what degree contemporary context-oriented translation theory manages to provide a satisfactory explanation of the South African situation. It is argued that polysystem theory and Toury’s (1995) concept of translation norms provides some explanation of the translational dynamics evident in the production of children’s books in the different languages in South Africa. However, some aspects of the South African situation do not neatly “fit” into polysystem theory, and some parts of the theory therefore have to be mediated or reconsidered, particularly utilising postcolonial and more ideologically sensitive perspectives, to satisfactorily account for the South African situation. This reconsideration leads to a conception of the relationship between translation and its context that is less binary and determinist, with a greater emphasis on hybridity and fluidity. This contextual dimension of the study spills over into the textual dimension. All of the above contextual and process-oriented factors finally find their precipitation in actual translations. By means of close analysis of a sample of 42 (21 translations and their source texts) English and Afrikaans children’s books intended for leisure reading and for educational reading, this part of the study investigates the norms evident in the selection of children’s books for translation, as well as the operational norms evident from the translations. The key questions here are why particular texts are selected for translation, and how cultural markers in these texts are handled in translation. The analysis demonstrates that the selection of books for translation (preliminary translation norms) is dependent on contextual as well as textual factors, with ideology and function playing particularly important roles. These roles differ for different types of books, books of different origins, and books in different language pairs. In terms of the operational norms, translators’ opinions about domestication and foreignisation do not necessarily correspond to translation practices. Rather than an exclusive, binary adherence to domesticating and foreignising approaches, analyses of the operational norms evident in translated children’s books demonstrate a hybridised mix of domesticating and foreignising strategies, which vary according to the type of book, the origin of the book, and the language pair involved in the translation process.

The Inferno from La Commedia, by Dante Alighieri has been translated into Japanese about a dozen times in the past 110 years. In this comparative analysis, seven of those are analysed and compared with regards to how cultural terms were translated and to what degree the different translators tried to make a word-by word translation for certain selected passages. Nine such passages, with a total of 93 lines were chosen. About 60 words were analysed per translator and the main goal was to determine whether if they have a tendency towards foreignisation or domestication. A Natural Language Processing analysis was also conducted to assess the similarity of translations in terms of word usage. Besides the oldest translation, which is quite different when it comes to both word usage and grammar and is therefore considered an outlier, two main groups emerge. One that tends to translate more word-by-word than the other, which is freer. All in the first group imitate the Italian pronunciation of cultural terms using katakana, while most in the latter prefer the current Japanese term. In between these groups appears one translator, which is more consequently following the change of words in a similar way like Dante did when referring to Virgilio, while others tend to use the same word several times.

Denna uppsats utgörs av en kommenterad svensk översättning av den japanska novellen Wasureenu hitobito (1898) av Kunikida Doppo (1871–1908) genom en osedvanligt källtextnära översättningsprincip. I medföljande översättningskommentar redogörs för metoderna som använts för att återge vissa kulturella och stilistiska egenheter från källtexten både i den svenska måltexten och i en tidigare engelsk av Jay Rubin, samtidigt som graden av förfrämligande och domesticering i respektive översättning uppskattas. Resultaten visar tydligt på en högre grad av förfrämligande metoder i den svenska måltexten och av domesticerande metoder i den engelska. I den avslutande diskussionen om den svenska måltextens förmodade läsbarhet uppskattas att denna i viss mån har påverkats negativt som en direkt följd av den osedvanliga källtextnärheten. / This paper consists of a commented Swedish translation of the Japanese short story Wasureenu hitobito (1898) by Kunikida Doppo (1871–1908) using a translation principle unusually close to the source text. In the accompanying commentary, the methods used in conveying certain cultural and stylistic features from the source text, both in the Swedish target text and in an earlier English one by Jay Rubin, are presented, while the level of foreignisation and domestication in the respective target text is evaluated. The results clearly show a higher degree of foreignising methods in the Swedish target text, and of domesticating methods in the English one. In the final discussion concerning the assumed readability of the Swedish target text, it is estimated that this has been affected somewhat negatively as a direct consequence of the unusual closeness to the source text.