<p>This essay deals with some of the difficulties that translation of a technical text may present, more specifically the handling of terminology, proper nouns and titles of cited publications. For this purpose, a text dealing with medical geology, taken from <em>Essentials of Medical Geology</em> (Selinus <em>et al</em>., 2005), was translated and analysed.</p><p>Medical geology is an interdisciplinary science and hence contains terminology from several different scientific areas. The present study includes terminology within the field of medicine and geochemistry in the analysis. The preferred and predominant translation procedure was literal translation (Munday, 2001:57). Many source text terms have synonyms in the target language. With the intention to preserve and transfer the level of technical style into the target text, terms were analysed and classified as belonging to one of three levels of technical style: <em>academic</em>, <em>professional</em> and <em>popular</em> (Newmark, 1988:151). The handling of proper nouns connected to medicine and geology was also included in the analysis. One common procedure is to use a translation which is established in the target language. The present study discusses the strategies used when no such established translation was found. The procedure of using a recognised translation was discussed in connection to the handling of titles of cited publications referred to in the source text.</p>

This essay deals with some of the difficulties that translation of a technical text may present, more specifically the handling of terminology, proper nouns and titles of cited publications. For this purpose, a text dealing with medical geology, taken from Essentials of Medical Geology (Selinus et al., 2005), was translated and analysed. Medical geology is an interdisciplinary science and hence contains terminology from several different scientific areas. The present study includes terminology within the field of medicine and geochemistry in the analysis. The preferred and predominant translation procedure was literal translation (Munday, 2001:57). Many source text terms have synonyms in the target language. With the intention to preserve and transfer the level of technical style into the target text, terms were analysed and classified as belonging to one of three levels of technical style: academic, professional and popular (Newmark, 1988:151). The handling of proper nouns connected to medicine and geology was also included in the analysis. One common procedure is to use a translation which is established in the target language. The present study discusses the strategies used when no such established translation was found. The procedure of using a recognised translation was discussed in connection to the handling of titles of cited publications referred to in the source text.

La tradition lexicographique de langue française opère, en théorie, une séparation stricte entre noms communs et noms propres. Or, dans les faits, cette séparation touche surtout les noms propres de lieux et de personnes. En effet, l'observation des articles du vocabulaire politique révèle un nombre important de noms propres d'une autre nature dans les pages de dictionnaires, comme des noms propres d'institutions, de partis politiques ou d'événements et de périodes historiques. Qui plus est, ces noms propres reçoivent souvent un traitement lexicographique comparable à celui des noms communs. Toutefois, ce traitement n'a pas encore fait l'objet d'une étude approfondie, et on constate une lacune dans la métalexicographie à son sujet.Afin de faire la lumière sur le traitement lexicographique des noms propres du vocabulaire politique, nous avons procédé à une analyse de ces noms propres à travers quatre dictionnaires généraux de langue française (Le Nouveau Petit Robert 2007 (version électronique), Le Petit Larousse Illustré 2007 (version électronique), le Dictionnaire du français Plus – À l'intention des francophones d'Amérique (1988) et le Dictionnaire québécois d'aujourd'hui (1992). Nous avons d'abord mis sur pied une typologie des noms propres du vocabulaire politique susceptibles d'être définis dans les dictionnaires généraux de langue française; puis nous avons relevé ces noms propres dans les dictionnaires à l'étude. Il ressort de ce relevé que le nombre de noms propres du vocabulaire politique dans les dictionnaires est assez élevé pour nécessiter une caractérisation de la pratique lexicographique des entourant. En outre, la description du vocabulaire politique passe par une description des noms propres en plus des mots du lexique commun. Nous nous sommes penchée sur la manière dont sont présentés les noms propres dans les dictionnaires, pour conclure que leur intégration et leur identification n'obéit pas à une méthode systématique. Nous avons réfléchi à la nomenclature des noms propres à inclure dans le dictionnaire de langue à travers l'exemple des noms de partis politiques, dont ceux qui sont représentés dans les instances officielles devraient être décrits dans les dictionnaires généraux. Nous avons ensuite analysé en profondeur les catégories de noms propres les plus représentées dans notre corpus d'articles du vocabulaire politique (les noms propres d'événements et de périodes historiques, les noms de partis politiques, dont les sigles, et les noms propres d'institutions). À la suite de cette analyse, nous proposons une liste d'éléments que le traitement lexicographique devrait inclure afin de permettre une circonscription efficace du référent (en d'autres termes, les traits distinctifs que devrait contenir une définition suffisante pour ces type de noms propres). Un point commun à toutes les catégories concerne la prise en compte de la variation géographique : en contexte francophone particulièrement, le lieu doit être précisé par le traitement lexicographique. L'étude se termine par une analyse de l'arrimage entre noms propres et lexique commun dans les dictionnaires où ils sont intégrés dans même ouvrage (PLI) ou dans une même nomenclature (Dictionnaire Hachette, Dixel). Nous arrivons à la conclusion que ces particularités dictionnairiques ne remplacent pas une réflexion en profondeur sur l'intégration des noms propres du vocabulaire politique dans le dictionnaire de langue. / In theory, French lexicographical tradition separates the description of proper nouns from that of the other words. In reality, this separation concerns mostly proper names of persons and of places. The observation of the articles of the political lexicon reveals an important number of proper nouns of another nature, such as proper nouns of institutions, political parties, or historical events or periods. Not only are these proper nouns present in the general dictionaries, but they are often described in the same manner as the other words.In order to understand this phenomenon, we analyzed the proper nouns of the political vocabulary in four French language dictionaries: (Le Nouveau Petit Robert 2007 (version électronique), Le Petit Larousse Illustré 2007 (version électronique), le Dictionnaire du français Plus – À l'intention des francophones d'Amérique (1988) et le Dictionnaire québécois d'aujourd'hui (1992). We first developed a typology of the proper nouns in the political lexicon that were likely to receive a lexicographical treatment; we then looked for these proper nouns in the chosen dictionaries. What came out of this initial search was that there are enough proper names of the political vocabulary in French language dictionaries to study their lexicographical treatment. We also concluded that the description of the political lexicon should embrace both proper nouns and common words. We then studied the manner in which proper nouns are visually presented in the dictionaries, and concluded that dictionaries do not seem to obey a strict methodology. The word list seems also incomplete, as we concluded about the proper names of political parties - those who are officially represented in official instances are often lacking. We then analyzed in detail three categories of our typology – historical events and periods, political parties and institutions – and for each category, we put forward a list of elements which are necessary to ensure a good definition for this type of vocabulary. A common element for all categories is the necessity to specify the geographical setting (country, state, etc.) of the reality to which the name refers – this is particularly important for the French language, which is spoken in many places around the world. Our thesis ends with a look at new dictionaries that offer a word list combining proper nouns and regular words (Dixel, Dictionnaire Hachette). We conclude that those technical features do not replace a profound analysis and reflexion on the integration of proper nouns in French language dictionaries.

Šio darbo tema – trumpųjų balsių vartojimas bendriniuose ir tikriniuose daiktavardžiuose. Pagrindinis darbo tikslas – apskaičiuoti ir palyginti trumpųjų balsių dažnius bendriniuose ir tikriniuose žodžiuose. Rašant šį darbą buvo norima kuo daugiau sužinoti apie trumpųjų balsių dažnumą: kurie balsiai ir kodėl vartojami dažniau arba rečiau, ar skiriasi trumpųjų balsių dažniai pradiniuose, vidiniuose ir galiniuose tiriamų žodžių skiemenyse, kokie dažnių skirtumai tarp kirčiuotų ir nekirčiuotų trumpųjų balsių. Norint apskaičiuoti trumpųjų balsių dažnius bendriniuose daiktavardžiuose, buvo tiriama 410 dažniausiai vartojamų daiktavardžių (žr. 1 priedą), turinčių bent vieną trumpąjį balsį, paimtų iš elektroninio dažninio žodyno „Bendriniai XX a. spaudos žodžiai“. Norint apskaičiuoti trumpųjų balsių dažnius tikriniuose daiktavardžiuose ir palyginti jį su bendrinių daiktavardžių trumpųjų balsių dažniais, iš elektroninio dažninio žodyno „Tikriniai XX a. spaudos žodžiai“ buvo išrinkta 500 dažniausių tikrinių žodžių (žr. 2 priedą), turinčių bent po vieną trumpąjį balsį. Tiriami tikriniai žodžiai buvo renkami iš žodyno skyriaus, kuriame pateikiamos garamtinės žodžių formos pagal bendrąjį vidutinį dažnį (taip pat, kaip ir bendriniai daiktavardžiai). Jei žodyje randami keli trumpieji balsiai, tai to žodžio dažnis sumuojamas tiek kartų, kiek tame žodyje yra trumpųjų balsių. Visuose darbo skyriuose ir jų poskyriuose pateikiamos trumpųjų balsių dažnių skritulinės diagramos, taip pat... [toliau žr. visą tekstą] / The topic of this work is use of short vowels in common and proper nouns. The main purpose of this work is to calculate and compare the frequencies of short vowels in common and proper nouns. When writing this work, it was tried to know more about the frequency of short vowels: which vowels were used more or less often, if the frequencies of short vowels differ in the first, average and last syllables of the researched words, what differences were between the frequencies of stressed and unstressed short vowels. In order to find the frequencies of short vowels in common words, 410 mostly used nouns were researched (see Appendix 1) which had at least one short vowel and were taken from the electronic frequency dictionary „Common Press Words of the 20 th Century“. In order to find the frequencies of short vowels in proper nouns and compare with the frequencies of short vowels of common nouns, 500 mostly used proper nouns were taken from the electronic frequency dictionary „Proper Press Words of the 20th Century“ (see Appendix 2) which had at least one short vowel. The researched proper nouns were chosen from the chapter of the dictionary where grammatical forms were presented according to their general average frequency (the same as common nouns). If a few short vowels were found in the word, the frequency of this word was summed as many times as there were short vowels in that word. In all the chapters and subchapters of this work, circle diagrams of the frequencies of short... [to full text]

The English translation of the Swedish compound fönsterbräda into windowsill, or the proper noun Danmark into Denmark makes perfect sense. But how about the compound fossilbränslefri as simply fossil fuel or the name Mälaren as Lake?  All four of these translations have been produced with the help of automatic machine translation. The aim of this paper is to present the expanding field of application of machine translation and some issues related to this type of translation. More specifically, the study has looked at Google Translate as one of the most commonly used machine translation systems online, and how it responds to the two linguistic categories that were selected for this small study: compound nouns and proper nouns. Besides analyzing these categories, two different text types were chosen: general information articles from a local authority website (Stockholm City) and patent texts, both of which belong to the expanding field of application of Google Translate. The results of the study show that in terms of compound nouns, neither of the text types proved to be significantly better suited for machine translation than the other and neither had an error rate below 20 %. Most of the errors related to words being erroneously omitted in the English output and words which were incorrectly translated in relation to context. As for proper nouns, the patent texts contained none and subsequently no error analysis could be made, whereas the general information articles included 76 proper nouns (out of a total word count of 810). The most prominent error related to the Swedish version not being maintained in the English output where it should have been, e.g. translating Abrahamsberg as Abraham rock. The errors in both of the linguistic categories had varying impact on the meaning of the texts, some of which distorted the meaning of the word completely, and some which were of minor importance. This factor, along with the fact that the reader of the text influences how the comprehension level of the text is perceived through their language and subject knowledge, makes it difficult to evaluate the full impact of the various errors. It can, however, be said that patent text could pose as a better option for machine translation than general information articles in relation to proper nouns, as this text type is likely to contain no or very few proper nouns.

This study focuses on the translation from English to Swedish of three political articles published in The Economist. The aim was to analyze problems that can occur, and strategies that can be used when translating cultural aspects in the form of proper nouns and political correctness as well as political terminology. The study began by translating the texts mentioned above. The potential areas of special interest in the analysis were also identified. During the translation process, dictionaries, parallel texts and Statsvetenskapligt Lexikon proved particularly helpful along with various Internet searches. Theoretical strategies were also consulted and Vinay and Darbelnet’s (V &amp; D in Munday 2008) theories and procedures proved useful. The strategies discussed by Ingo (1991 and 2007) were also applied to a great extent. The results showed that Vinay and Darbelnet’s procedure of borrowing along with Ingo’s strategy of adaption were most useful for translating proper nouns and political terminology. To use parallel texts as well as Ingo’s strategy of adaption proved to be the best way to deal with political correctness when translating the particular texts used for this study.

This term paper concerns the translation of three sports texts from English to Swedish. The main aim of the paper was to show which procedures that were used when translating sports terminology and proper nouns. A secondary aim was to look at challenges involved in the translation process, namely, adapting the translations to a new target audience and making sure the target text is up-to-date.                   The method used in the term paper included a couple of steps. The first one was to select primary sources. The material chosen for this study was three articles about the world’s best football or rugby players. Once the translation was accomplished, the second step was to choose examples from the target text on which the analyses could be based. At this stage, it was mostly the hard-to-translate terms and proper nouns, which were chosen. Finally, the mentioned challenges were analysed and the outcome was presented in a qualitative study. To support the analyses various secondary sources were used. The study showed that Ingo’s strategies were applicable while translating proper nouns. Also Ingo’s other guidelines regarding additions and omissions turned out to be useful. On the other hand, Vinay &amp; Darbelnet’s models were helpful when handling sports terminology.

This study looks at English place names in Swedish texts with a focus on which translation strategies are more common today, whether there is a progress from a diachronic perspective from translation to transference, and whether the prominence of each place name affects the chosen translation strategy. The thesis includes a corpusbased study of 299 place names collected from four sources, which were researched in the online newspaper archive found on the website of the National Library of Sweden. A chapter from Rowan Moore’s book Slow Burn City was translated and its use of place names analysed in light of the corpus results. The results showed that transference is the most used strategy today while part-translations and additions are also frequently used. The prominence of a place has been shown to be a determining factor in the chosen translation strategy, with more well-known places being transferred in English than lesser known places. The results varied between the different categories of place names (institutions and facilities, objects and works of art and geographical places) regarding the most frequent strategies in the past with some categories showing a progress from translation to transference, others with even use of translation and transference in the past and finally two categories where English was more common in the past than today.

[pt] Este trabalho tem o objetivo de mostrar que a função básica dos nomes próprios é a função de código e não a função referencial. Embora a função referencial seja uma das funções mais importantes dos nomes próprios, ela é dependente da função de código, ou seja, um nome próprio só pode ser um designador porque em primeiro lugar é um código. Como um código se distingue pelo fato de fornecer informação para um sistema de decodificação, nomes próprios também devem ser considerados informativos. Eles fornecem informação para nossos sistemas mentais de processamento de linguagem. Vê-se assim que a função de código dos nomes próprios só pode ser explicada dentro de uma perspectiva internalista, ou seja, dentro de uma perspectiva que leve em conta os fatores mentais envolvidos no uso de nomes próprios. A análise de nomes próprios feita neste trabalho esclarece quais são esses fatores e é isso que a torna internalista. Tal análise também dá suporte a um certo tipo de descritivismo, segundo o qual o conteúdo descritivo de um nome próprio é o conjunto de informações associadas ao nome quando ele é usado em dada ocasião. / [en] The purpose of this monograph is to show that the basic function of proper names is a coding function and not a referential function. Although the referential function is one of the most important functions of proper names, it is dependent on the coding function, i.e., a proper name can only be a designator because it is a code in the first place. Since a code is distinguished by the fact that it provides information to a decodification system, proper names must be considered informative too. They provide information to our language processing mental systems. So it is possible to see that the coding function of proper names can only be explained from an internalist perspective, that is to say, from a perspective that takes into account the mental factors involved in the use of proper names. The analysis of proper names in this work makes clear what these factors are, and it is this that makes it an internalist analysis. This analysis also supports a certain kind of descriptivism, according to which the descriptive content of a proper name is the information set associated to the name when it is used on a given occasion.

The thesis describes the usage of definite article with proper nouns in current Spanish language. Proper nouns distribution and their dependence of the definite article according to the grammar books and textbooks is explained in the first part. The proper nouns are divided into geographical and personal nouns and these two groups are classified into charts according to the usage of the definite article. The second part deals with the selective geographical nouns and their usage of definite article in Spanish speaking countries according to the corpus CREA. The achieved results are analysed in the last part.