Common errors on word choices in translating cultural texts of the fourth year english linguistics students at hung vuong university

HUNG VUONG UNIVERSITY FACULITY OF FOREIGN LANGUAGES VUONG THI KIEU ANH COMMON ERRORS ON WORD CHOICES IN TRANSLATING CULTURAL TEXTS OF THE FOURTH YEAR ENGLISH LINGUISTICS STUDENTS AT HUNG VUONG UNIVERSITY B.A GRADUATION PAPER Field: English Linguistics Phu Tho, 2018 i ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS First and foremost, I would like to express my deepest gratitude to my supervisor, Nguyen Thi To Loan, M.A for her guidance and encouragement GXULQJ P\ VWXG\ ,¶P YHU\ JUDWHIXO IRU EHLQJ DFFHSWHG DV KHU VWXGHQW LQ WKLV subject and I really appreciate all her help and suggestions on various drafts of this graduate paper Without her valuable advice and support, this research could not have been completed on schedule I would also like to express my full appreciation to all teachers at the Foreign Language Faculty of Hung Vuong University who helped me so much in my data collection Besides, I want to use this opportunity to express my deepest thanks to all 45 members of class K12 ± English Linguistics for having cooperated in providing valuable information in the survey as well as doing the test If it KDGQ¶W EHHQ IRU WKHLU KHOS , ZRXOGQ¶W KDYH ILQLVKHG P\ JUDGXDWLRQ SDSHU ZLWK great success Additionally, I would like to express my sincere thanks to my dear friends for their help and warm encouragement throughout my hard times carrying out the study Without them, I could not have overcome such times and concentrated on my study Finally, I am greatly indebted to my family, especially my loving parents for their continuous support during my study Their love and encouragement helped me overcome the difficult times during the study I could not have been able to complete this project without their intense devotion ii ABSTRACT The purpose of the study was to investigate the common errors in word choice in Vietnamese ± English cutural translation committed by fourth - year English majors, Department of Foreign Languages, Hung Vuong University and to propose some specific recommendations for students Together with the attempt to fulfill the graduation paper, the following processes were made: Firstly, the researcher gave theoretical background about translation, translation methods, errors, and some common errors committed by Vietnamese translation when translating from Vietnamese into English Secondly, the researcher presented the methodology of the study together with giving a test and implementing a survey by delivering the questionnaire to students of class K12 ± English Linguistics After that, the researcher carried out the interview to lecturers of Department of Foreign languages in Hung Vuong University Having collected the data from the test results, survey questionnaire and the interview found that students make various lexical errors in Vietnamese ± English translation Some common lexical errors of students when translating and the causes of the errors were also identified Based on the result of the interview, the researcher gives some recommendations for English major students as well as lecturers of English to LPSURYH VWXGHQWV¶ WUDQVODWLRQ skills and help them get better translation performance, especially in cutural translations iii LIST OF TABLES PART I: INTRODUCTION 1.1 Rationale 1.2 Previous researches 1.2.1 In the world 1.2.2 In Vietnam 1.2.3 Gaps of previous researches 1.3 Research purposes 1.4 Research questions 1.5 Settings of the research 1.6 Significanceoftheresearch 1.7 Scope of the research 1.8 Design of the research PART II: DEVELOPMENT CHAPTER 1: LITERATURE REVIEW 1.1 An overview on translation 1.1.1 Definition of Translation 1.1.2 Translation strategies 1.1.3 Factors affecting translation process 19 1.1.4 Translation methods 23 1.2 Translation errors 25 1.2.1 Errors 25 1.2.2 Translation errors 25 1.2.3 Classification of translation errors 26 1.2.4 Common errors in translation 29 1.3 An overview on cultural texts 34 1.3.1 The definition of culture 34 1.3.2 The definition and features of culture texts 36 1.3.3 The relation between translation and culture 39 CHAPTER 2: METHODOLOGY 42 2.1 Participants 42 2.2 Methods of the study 42 2.2.1 Qualitative research methods 42 2.2.2 The quantitative method 42 2.3 2.3.1 Data collection instruments 42 Test 42 iv 2.3.2 Questionnaires 43 2.3.3 Interview 44 2.4 Research procedure 44 CHAPTER 3: RESEARCH FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION 46 3.1 The results from test 46 3.1.1 Error 1: Word collocation 47 3.1.2 Error 2: Misuse of preposition 47 3.1.3 Error 3: Misuse of synonyms 48 3.1.4 Error 4: Misuse of part of speech 49 3.1.5 Error 5: Name of organization 49 3.2 The results from questionnaires 50 3.2.1 7KHVWXGHQWV¶DWWLWXGHWRZDUGVWUDQVODWLRQDQGZRUGFKRLFHLQWUDQVODWLQJFXOWXUH texts 50 3.2.2 7KHVWXGHQWV¶GLIILFXOWLHVDQGFRPPRQHUURUVLQWUDQVODWLQJ9LHWQDPHVH- English texts 51 3.2.4 3.3 6XJJHVWLRQVWRLPSURYHWKHVWXGHQWV¶WUDQVODWLRQ 56 The result from interview 57 3.3.1 The result from question 58 3.3.2 The result from question 58 3.3.3 The result from question 58 3.3.4 The result from question 59 3.4 Discussions 60 3.4.1 Common errors in word choice made by 4th year students 60 3.4.2 The causes of errors made by the students 60 &+$37(55(&200(1'$7,216)25,03529,1*678'(176¶ TRANSLATION PERFORMANCE 62 Build up vocabulary ± improve background knowledge 62 4.1 4.1.1 Using Word Cards 62 4.1.3 Create vocabulary notebook ± enhance vocabulary 65 4.2 More translation practice 66 PART III: CONCLUSION 68 Summary 68 Suggestions 68 Implications 70 Limitations of the study 70 Suggestions for the further study 70 REFERENCES 72 v LIST OF TABLES AND CHARTS Table 2.1: Errors and codes of errors 43 Table 2.2: Contents of the questionnaires 44 7DEOH7KHHUURUVLQWKHVWXGHQWV¶WUDQVODWLRQWHVW 46 7DEOH7KHVWXGHQWV¶DWWLWXGHWRZDUGVWUDQVODWLRQDQGZRUGFKRLFHLQ translating culture texts 50 Table 3.2: Difficulties in types of translation texts 52 Table 3.3: Topics of cultural translation texts that the students easily commit error 52 &KDUW6WXGHQW¶FRPPRQHUURUVLQZRUGFKRLFHLQWUDQVODWLQJFXWXUDOWH[WV from Vietnamese into English 54 Chart 3.2: The causes for errors in word choice by students 55 7DEOH6XJJHVWLRQVWRLPSURYHWKHVWXGHQWV¶WUDQVODWLRQ 56 vi LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS N0 Codes Name of codes E1 Error of word collocation E2 Error of preposition E3 Error of synonyms E4 Error of parts of speech E5 Name of organization SC Source culture SL source language SLC ST source text 10 TC target culture 11 TL target language source language culture PART I: INTRODUCTION 1.1 Rationale In the modern life, English has become the most widely used language all over the world It is considered as the medium of communication in many different fields such as science, technology, aviation, international sport, diplomacy, and so on Therefore, English translations have played a prominent part in globalization, and international integration in recent years Thanks to English translated versions, countries are able to have mutual understanding and a sense of global citizenship in this multilingual world Moreover, English translation makes people understand each other more in the process of diplomatic relations and economic cooperation and other fields in today's era when countries tend to integrate for the whole development As a result, English translation has gradually become an indispensable and pressing tool which set the path for the global success of individuals, organizations, and even businesses in the modern time when society is more developed and competition is relentless Therefore, nowadays when Vietnam becomes one of the members of World Trade Organization, it is necessary for Vietnamese students of English to have expert translation skill in order to meet the demand of integration into the world economy and exchange of culture with other countries Nowadays, social and cultural documents display many linguistic peculiarities, as well as social and cultural aspects of our lives and, thus, we can assert that cultural translation is one of the main ways of communication across cultures Translating these texts, however, is not an easy task, since it certainly poses many problems for the translator One of the problems a translator can face arises from the fact that word choices Some words or phrases denoting objects, facts, phenomena, etc, are so deeply rooted in their source culture (SC) and so specific (and perhaps exclusive or unique) to the culture that produced them that they have no equivalent in the target culture (TC), because they are unknown, or because they are not yet codified in the target language (TL) Word choices in translating is an important thing so it requires translators while translating carefully.However, in reality, Vietnamese-English translation skill is not easy for Vietnamese students to master, so learners can't avoid mistakes in their translating practice Perhaps, because of some influence on the differences about cultures or their own limited language ability, etc, Vietnamese students of English in general still have mistakes on grammar, word choices and so on in translating, and special in translating cultural texts from Vietnamese into English Students in K12 English Linguistics are no exception They made a lot of mistakes/errors in choosing vocabulary when translating texts For those reasons, I decided WRFKRRVHWKHVWXG\³Common errors on word choices in translating cultural texts of the fourth year English linguistics VWXGHQWV DW +XQJ 9XRQJ 8QLYHUVLW\´ with the aim of identifying common Vietnamese±English translation errors made by these students and thereby, proposing suggestions to improve the current practice 1.2 Previous researches 1.2.1 In the world Translation is a complex process where fragile balance is achieved between the equivalence of the text translated and the linguistic means chosen In reality, translation from one language into another language is a complex work In the translation processing, translators may make mistakes so there are many researchers studying on these problems They can be seen in the following studies: Mossop, B (1989) in his study about ³Objective and cultural norm of WUDQVODWLRQ´ GHVFULEHVWUDQVODWLRQHUURUVDV³DJLYHQUHQGHULQJZLOOEHGHHPHGWR be no translation if it fails to conform to the concept of translation predominant LQWKHWDUJHWFXOWXUH´+HLGHQWLILHVWUDQVlation errors in terms of cultural norm and formal equivalence It means that the definition of translation error by Mossop includes the achievement of formal equivalence but excludes other critical factors such as smoothness, readability, and consistency in translational product A more thorough notion of error is proposed by Pym A (1992) in the studyabout ³Translation and text transfer: An Essay on the principles of intercultural communication´ This scholar supposes that translation errors may be attributed to lack of comprehension, misuse of time, inappropriateness to readership, language, pragmatics, culture, over-translation, under-translation, discursive or semantic inadequacy Krzysztof, H (1992), in his resarch about ³Translation: A Cognitive Communicative Approach´divides translation errors into four main types: errors of syntagmatic surface translation, errors of mistaken interpretation, realization errors and meta-translation errors The first type includes equivalents, false friends, calques and unjustified borrowings The second type covers misreading syntagms and wrong interpretation of verb frame, misinterpret scenes and scripts and misreading the text modality The third type covers TL errors, wrong HYDOXDWLRQ RI UHFLSLHQWV¶ NQRZOHdge and insufficient of knowledge of subjectmatter The final type comprises translation technique, additions, omissions, two versions, too many or too few footnotes, a wrong translation strategy, FRUUHFWLRQVDQGFKDQJLQJWKHWH[W¶VLQWHUWH[WXDOLW\1HYHUtheless, this approach is complicated and troublesome for researchers to figure out translations errors of professional translators in general and undergraduates in particular Wang Baorong (2009) in his research about ³Translating publicity texts in the light of the skopos theory: Problems and suggestions´ arrives at a mutual conclusion that translation errors should be classified into three main types including pragmatic translation errors, cultural translation errors and linguistic translation errors Pragmatic translation errors are caused by practical issues such as a lack of receiver orientation and background knowledge Cultural translation errors are related to equivalent problems and methods to deal with cultural words Linguistic errors occur due to the lack of the proficiency of the translator ... lot of mistakes /errors in choosing vocabulary when translating texts For those reasons, I decided WRFKRRVHWKHVWXG? ?Common errors on word choices in translating cultural texts of the fourth year. .. analysis of common errors on verb tenses and word choices in Vietnamese -English translation made by the secondyear English majors at Dong Thap University? ? aimed to find out the common errors on verb... aviation, international sport, diplomacy, and so on Therefore, English translations have played a prominent part in globalization, and international integration in recent years Thanks to English