Aims of the study
This research was carried out to serve the following aims:
- To find out the linguistic modifications made in the English translation “Black stars” conducted by Martha Collins and the author Ngô Tự Lập from the Vietnamese original
“Những vì sao đen” poetry collection
- To identify the factors influencing the process of translating which brings about those modifications.
Research questions
This research is carried out to find out the answer to the following research questions:
1 What are the linguistic modifications made in the translation “Black stars” in comparison with the Vietnamese original “Những vì sao đen”?
2 What are the factors influencing those modifications?
The answers will help readers realize some modifications made in the Vietnamese - English translation process of the bilingual poetry collection book “Black stars” and their underlying reasons The study may also help sharpen the translators‘ awareness to put in consideration some outstanding differences between the nature of English and Vietnamese languages in use as well as the socio-cultural distinctive features of the two countries so that they can learn to produce readers-friendly poetry translation in TL with the highest respect to the original meanings and beauty of the work in the SL.
Scope of the study
- Pointing out linguistic and socio-cultural stamps on the language uses in the poetry translation
- The bilingual book of Ngô Tự Lâp‘s “Những vì sao đen” -“Black Stars” poetry collection co-translated by Martha Collins and the author is under investigation
- This study used the qualitative method
Qualitative method investigates the why and how of the changes and adaptation, not just what, where, when Firstly, it was employed in comparing the translated poems with their Vietnamese original version to find out the modifications made on the linguistic facet, evaluating and categorizing them into smaller categories Secondly, the researcher employed qualitative approach to categorize the factors influencing the above-mentioned modifications with intense reasoning and many interviews and mailing with both the author of the original poems and the translators of ―Black stars‖
- Data was collected by means of descriptive analysis and statistic
This research consists of 3 parts: INTRODUCTION, DEVELOPMENT, AND CONCLUSION
This part allows the readers to get the general idea of what the thesis is about It provides the rationale for the study, aims of the study, the research questions, the scope, the method and the organization of the study
This is the focus of the study which is divided into 3 chapters
Chapter I briefly introduces some necessary theoretical points from different backgrounds The author begins by reviewing different views of translation theories with the focus on poetry translation Following that a review of the elements to consider in translation in general and more specifically in poetry translation, among which the focuses are on the linguistic elements, elements of American culture, language use, interrelationship between language and culture and how they interact and affect each other
This part focuses on a detailed depiction of the methodology applied in the research paper, the size and characteristics of the research subject altogether with research instruments, data collection procedure as well as data analysis procedure are put into description and justification
Chapter 3: Data analysis Chapter III is the main part of the study This chapter provides discussion on the modifications made in the selected book in terms of changes in grammar, choice of vocabulary The author is particularly interested in analyzing linguistic and socio-cultural factors which influence the translation process
Part C: Conclusion recapitulates the main ideas and findings of the study; draws out some important implications for Vietnamese-English translators, presents limitations of the study and lastly, suggests some ideas for further research
PART B: DEVELOPMENT CHAPTER 1: LITERATURE REVIEW
Translation has been defined in many ways by different writers in the field, depending on how they view language and translation According to Wills in Choliludin (2007: 3), translation is a procedure which leads from a written source language text (SLT) to an optimally equivalent target language text (TLT) and requires the syntactic, semantic, stylistic and text pragmatic comprehension by the translator of the original text Besides, Nida and Taber (1982: 12) say that translating consists in the reproducing in the receptor language the closest natural equivalent of the source language message, firstly in terms of meaning and secondly in terms of style Both definitions above imply that translation involves two languages- the source language and the target- or receptor language, and that an act of translating is an act of reproducing the meaning of the SLT into that of the TLT
Catford (1965: 20) states that translation may be defined as the replacement of textual material in one language (source language) by equivalent textual material in another language (target language) Similar definition is also mentioned by Larson (1984:
3) He says that translation consists of translating the meaning of the SL into the receptor language This is done by going from the form of the first language to the form of a second language by way of semantic structure It is meaning which is being transferred and must be held constant, only the form changes
Translation work, in its present form, dates back more than a thousand years in Vietnam and in Western countries The ever-lasting practice of translation itself manifests the translatability of languages Vietnamese tradition and culture is founded on untranslatability This may sound like a paradox, if one thinks of the long tradition in the culture, or if you just ponder the very word tradition Tradition, from Latin tradere (‗hand over'), implies a process of communication, transmission, and transference that necessarily allows for the transformation, whether in terms of ―losses‖ or ―gains,‖ usually associated with what we consensually mean by translation To translate is not to say the same thing in another tongue, but to make manifest a different thing
The 20 th century can be considered the very developed period of literary translation and the poetry translation took a lot of attention with many different ideas Translator Hoàng Hưng claims ―Poetry can be no way translated because poetry itself is the art of language, it sticks to the linguistic features of the source language, if we transfer it into another language, the poem is half destroyed‖
"Traduttore - traditore" (Translator – traitor), says the well-known Italian phrase
―Poetry is what gets lost in translation‖, Robert Frost says Translation of poetry was, and still is by some, believed as impossibility for any unfaithful elements would have been taken as failure, be it content or form Poetry itself serves a purpose, be it an illusive matter or not, and aesthetics can be reproduced in another language and culture if accommodation is made It would be highly likely that the target readers would obtain rather similar if not the same aesthetic pleasure reading the translation as would the source readers reading the original poem
In Vietnam, the poetry translation is not a new profession The ancient Viet scholars considered the Chinese poems translating a noble recreation in their free time Why was it a recreation but not a work? Recall Chinese was one of the major languages in those days, especially among highly educated people, the translation was not the need of bringing the works to the readers (or listeners) but more like a recreating a new poem in Viet language
Many translators in contemporary and modern Vietnam literature have made and are making outstanding contributions to the literary and poetry exchanges between Vietnam and the West through their diligent and painstaking work Phan Ngọc for instance, has translated several works from Latin, Russian, French and English into Vietnamese, the most important being the Shakespeare, War and peace, Oliver Twist Ngô Tự Lập, the author and co-translator of “Black Stars”, is another example to have introduced
Vietnamese readers many masterpieces in Rusian, English and French such as - "Chiếc bát mang hình thế giới" by Werner Lambersy from French, "Xứ sở của nước và thạch sùng" by
Jean-Michel Maulpoix Foreigners include Arthur Waley, Herbert Giles, Witter Bynner, W.J.B Fletcher, James Legg, Amy Lowell, etc
Translation modification refers to the linguistic changes that are carried in terms of translator‘s objective affecting the whole text These changes include both the semantic and morphological alterations
III.1 Research of Vinay and Darbelnet
Vinay and Darbelnet (1995) propose seven modifications operating on three level of style: Lexis, distribution and message These modifications are: Borrowing, transposition, calque, modulation, literal translation and equivalence
Organization of the study
This research consists of 3 parts: INTRODUCTION, DEVELOPMENT, AND CONCLUSION
This part allows the readers to get the general idea of what the thesis is about It provides the rationale for the study, aims of the study, the research questions, the scope, the method and the organization of the study
This is the focus of the study which is divided into 3 chapters
Chapter I briefly introduces some necessary theoretical points from different backgrounds The author begins by reviewing different views of translation theories with the focus on poetry translation Following that a review of the elements to consider in translation in general and more specifically in poetry translation, among which the focuses are on the linguistic elements, elements of American culture, language use, interrelationship between language and culture and how they interact and affect each other
This part focuses on a detailed depiction of the methodology applied in the research paper, the size and characteristics of the research subject altogether with research instruments, data collection procedure as well as data analysis procedure are put into description and justification
Chapter 3: Data analysis Chapter III is the main part of the study This chapter provides discussion on the modifications made in the selected book in terms of changes in grammar, choice of vocabulary The author is particularly interested in analyzing linguistic and socio-cultural factors which influence the translation process
Part C: Conclusion recapitulates the main ideas and findings of the study; draws out some important implications for Vietnamese-English translators, presents limitations of the study and lastly, suggests some ideas for further research
PART B: DEVELOPMENT CHAPTER 1: LITERATURE REVIEW
Definitions of translation
Translation has been defined in many ways by different writers in the field, depending on how they view language and translation According to Wills in Choliludin (2007: 3), translation is a procedure which leads from a written source language text (SLT) to an optimally equivalent target language text (TLT) and requires the syntactic, semantic, stylistic and text pragmatic comprehension by the translator of the original text Besides, Nida and Taber (1982: 12) say that translating consists in the reproducing in the receptor language the closest natural equivalent of the source language message, firstly in terms of meaning and secondly in terms of style Both definitions above imply that translation involves two languages- the source language and the target- or receptor language, and that an act of translating is an act of reproducing the meaning of the SLT into that of the TLT
Catford (1965: 20) states that translation may be defined as the replacement of textual material in one language (source language) by equivalent textual material in another language (target language) Similar definition is also mentioned by Larson (1984:
3) He says that translation consists of translating the meaning of the SL into the receptor language This is done by going from the form of the first language to the form of a second language by way of semantic structure It is meaning which is being transferred and must be held constant, only the form changes
Translation work, in its present form, dates back more than a thousand years in Vietnam and in Western countries The ever-lasting practice of translation itself manifests the translatability of languages Vietnamese tradition and culture is founded on untranslatability This may sound like a paradox, if one thinks of the long tradition in the culture, or if you just ponder the very word tradition Tradition, from Latin tradere (‗hand over'), implies a process of communication, transmission, and transference that necessarily allows for the transformation, whether in terms of ―losses‖ or ―gains,‖ usually associated with what we consensually mean by translation To translate is not to say the same thing in another tongue, but to make manifest a different thing.
Poetic translation
The 20 th century can be considered the very developed period of literary translation and the poetry translation took a lot of attention with many different ideas Translator Hoàng Hưng claims ―Poetry can be no way translated because poetry itself is the art of language, it sticks to the linguistic features of the source language, if we transfer it into another language, the poem is half destroyed‖
"Traduttore - traditore" (Translator – traitor), says the well-known Italian phrase
―Poetry is what gets lost in translation‖, Robert Frost says Translation of poetry was, and still is by some, believed as impossibility for any unfaithful elements would have been taken as failure, be it content or form Poetry itself serves a purpose, be it an illusive matter or not, and aesthetics can be reproduced in another language and culture if accommodation is made It would be highly likely that the target readers would obtain rather similar if not the same aesthetic pleasure reading the translation as would the source readers reading the original poem
In Vietnam, the poetry translation is not a new profession The ancient Viet scholars considered the Chinese poems translating a noble recreation in their free time Why was it a recreation but not a work? Recall Chinese was one of the major languages in those days, especially among highly educated people, the translation was not the need of bringing the works to the readers (or listeners) but more like a recreating a new poem in Viet language
Many translators in contemporary and modern Vietnam literature have made and are making outstanding contributions to the literary and poetry exchanges between Vietnam and the West through their diligent and painstaking work Phan Ngọc for instance, has translated several works from Latin, Russian, French and English into Vietnamese, the most important being the Shakespeare, War and peace, Oliver Twist Ngô Tự Lập, the author and co-translator of “Black Stars”, is another example to have introduced
Vietnamese readers many masterpieces in Rusian, English and French such as - "Chiếc bát mang hình thế giới" by Werner Lambersy from French, "Xứ sở của nước và thạch sùng" by
Jean-Michel Maulpoix Foreigners include Arthur Waley, Herbert Giles, Witter Bynner, W.J.B Fletcher, James Legg, Amy Lowell, etc.
Translation modifications
Research of Vinay and Darbelnet
Vinay and Darbelnet (1995) propose seven modifications operating on three level of style: Lexis, distribution and message These modifications are: Borrowing, transposition, calque, modulation, literal translation and equivalence
- Borrowing refers to words taken directly from another language Generally, borrowings enter a language through translation work, and just as with false friends (false cognates), the translator should strive to look for the equivalent in the TL that convey the meaning of the SL more advantageous
- Calque is used when a foreign word or phrase is translated and incorporated into another language It is a special type of borrowing, consisting of borrowing an expression from the SL and the translating literally each element( for example, nowadays people use words and phrases like “phần cứng”, “phần mềm”, “hotline”, “live show” etc everyday while they never existed in Vietnamese dictionary years ago)
- Literal translation means the direct transfer of the SL into the TL in a grammatically and idiomatically proper way This modification is used when it is possible to transpose the source language message (SLM) element by element into the TL and obtain a text that is idiomatic
- Transposition replaces words from one grammatical word class with another without changing the meaning of the message For example, a verb is translated with a noun, a noun with an adjective, etc
- Modulation is a shift in point of view, changing the point of view without changing the meaning of the message Vinay and Darbelnet identify different types of modulation, some of which are abstract for concrete, cause for effect, means for result, a part for the whole and geographical change
- Equivalence accounts for the same situation using a completely different phrase It generally refers to the same common accepted and used equivalents of idioms, proverbs, idiomatic expression and lexicalized terms
- Adaptation refers to a shift in cultural environment, for instance, to express the message using a different situation, translators have to adapt a SL situation when it does not exist in the TL or would be considered inappropriate in the target culture.
Research of Nida
Nida (1964) proposes three types of modifications: additions, subtractions and alterations They are used (1) to adjust the form of the message to the characteristics of the structure of the target language, (2) to produce semantically equivalent structure, (3) to generate appropriate stylistic equivalences and (4) to produce an equivalent communication effect
- Additions: A translator makes an addition when he needs to clarify an elliptic expression, to avoid ambiguity in the target language, to change a grammatical category, to amplify implicit elements or to add connectors
- Subtraction refers to the omission of words or phrases if they are not essential to the meaning or impact of the text
- Alterations are changes made because of incompatibilities between thw two languages due to structural differences between the two languages such as changes in word order, grammatical categories and semantic misfits, especially with idiomatic expressions.
Research of Newmark
Newmark (1988) contributes a large number of strategies affecting the micro- units of the text
- Transference: It is the process of transferring a source language word to a target language text It includes transliteration and it is somewhere called transcription
- Naturalization: It adapts the source language word first to the normal pronunciation then the morphology of the target language
- Cultural equivalent: It means replacing a cultural word in the source language with a target language one However, ―they are not accurate‖
- Functional equivalent: It requires the use of a cultural-neutral word
- Descriptive equivalent: in this modification, the meaning of the source language text is explained in several words
- Componential analysis: It means ―comparing an source language word with a target language word which has a similar meaning but is not an obvious one-to-one equivalent, by demonstrating first their common and then their different sense components.‖
- Synonymy: It is a near target language equivalent
- Through-translation: It is the literal translation of common collocations, names of organizations and components of compounds
- Shifts or transposition: It involves a change in the grammar from source language to target language, for instance, change from singular to plural, the change required when a specific source language structure does not exist in the target language, change of an source language verb to a target language word, change of a source language noun group to a target noun and so forth
- Modulation: It occurs when the translator reproduces the message of the original text in the target language text in conformity with the current norms of the target language, since the source language and the target language may appear dissimilar in terms of perspective
- Recognized translation: It occurs when the translators normally uses the official or the generally accepted translation of any institution term
- Compensation: It occurs when loss of meaning in one part of a sentence is compensated in another part
- Paraphrase: in this modification, the meaning of the word is explained Here the explanation is much more detailed than that of descriptive equivalent.
Linguistic and Socio-cultural factors affecting modifications in translation.… 9 1 Linguistic elements
Syntactic factors
Levy argues that the difference is directly reflected in the way people think, in their syntactic organization, and unavoidably comes up in the process of inter-lingual transference
Originating from Old English, which, as a typical synthetic language, was highly inflected, Modern English syntax is still characterized by a degree of inflection English inflections are concerned with gender, number, case, tense, aspect, voice, mood, person, part of speech and degree of comparison In contrast, Vietnamese is a typical analytic language, characterized by non-inflection, frequent use of function words and functional manipulation of word order, through which various syntactic and semantic relations are expressed Thus, whereas an English word can, through inflection, express several grammatical meanings, Vietnamese, as a non-inflected language, has to form such grammatical meanings essentially by lexical means When translating another language into English, inflections often lead to misinterpretation and mistranslation since syntactic norms tend to influence the translator‘s judgment about how to deal with changes in inflection
Interestingly, when translating, the translator has to go through a converse process: first recognizing the grammatical meanings expressed or implied in the lexical expressions, and then reorganizing these relations according to English syntactic norms With the use of inflections, English sentence tend to have strict and compact syntactic structures In addition, there are a wealth of conjunctions, prepositions and a developed system of pro- forms, which can incorporate and interconnect a number of clauses through subordination into a complex long sentence The structure of such a sentence, often likened to a tree, is termed hypotaxis and is characterized by formalized relations in which words, phrases, and clauses are closely connected
Pham Thu Giang (2010) has asserted in her M.A thesis A study on the Vietnamese-
English translation strategies in the series of bilingual handbooks “Vietnamese culture frequently asked questions” published by the Thế Giới Publisher that in translating between English and Vietnamese, the translator has to take the trouble to interpret and then reconstruct the SL structure on the basis of TL syntactic norms When translating Vietnamese into English, many English connective devices will be added and their functions will often replace lexical means
Differences in word order between English and Vietnamese can also be seen in interrogative structures, but these normally present few difficulties because the transfer becomes more or less automatic, as is the case with other structures involving conventional grammatical inversion However, it must be noted that although reordering in translation is often necessary, it is also dangerous in terms of thematic prominence (see 1.5 for more discussion) When part of the sentence meaning, or thematic meaning in Leech‘s term (1983: 19), is dependent on the order, a random change to the order will lead to the loss of that meaning or thematic prominence
Lexical factors
Pham Thu Giang (2010) stated that the marked lexical differences between English and Vietnamese present significant difficulties for translators
The snowballing mode naturally makes many English words polysemous and hence more context-dependent, while the practice of double-syllabling makes Vietnamese words monosemantic and hence much less context-dependent Seen in this light, it is not surprising that a ―familiar‖ English word can express a totally unexpected meaning when used in a particular context An English word can vary in meaning drastically according to context, verbal relation, time, place, participants, topic, mode, media, etc
The differences in lexical context-dependence between English and Vietnamese doubtlessly present difficulties for translators Common sense dictates that the more polysemous a word is, the more ambiguous, indeterminate, and hence context-dependent its meaning Therefore, when translating from English into Vietnamese, the translator must attach great importance to context and try to make the polysemous words unambiguous with the help of the contextual clues Many mistranslations are the result of neglecting, ignoring or misjudging the context in which a word is used
Another closely related problem is the difference in semantic range between English and Vietnamese Predictably, the semantic range of a ―snowballed‖ English word is much wider than that of a ―double-syllabled‖ Vietnamese word composed of two or more semantically independent morphemes, the interaction of which largely stabilizes the meaning and makes it less context-dependent (cf Liu 1991: 418-420; Tan 1990: 128-139;
Context factors
Meetham & Hudson (1969) indicate that text cannot exist out of context By context what is meant is the entire environment in which the word or sentence is expressed or stated So a translator has to go into the background of the text to understand the text
Thus translator first de-contextualizes the original text and re-contextualizes it for the target text This forms a good contextualized translation While seeking the context of a text there may be two categories of factors that may influence the meaning of the text- linguistic context or the situational context
Linguistic context cites the linguistic factors influencing the meaning of the text
Any word in the text is not present in isolation but interacts with other words in the text and with the whole text at large This interaction among words determines their meaning rather than its isolated meaning For example the use of word ‗press‘ in these sentences is affected by the context A) press my shirt B) I work in a press C) press the button
Context can either be immediate or remote Immediate context refers to the words or sentences that make the context evident then and there through the whole text Remote context pertains to existence of word or sentence somewhere else It may refer to author using the word somewhere else or there may be special reasons to use that word or phrase
Context also refers to the factors of situation and circumstances influencing the meaning of a text These factors are little harder to be recognized than linguistic ones The situational factors may pertain to the facial expressions, gestures and stances at micro level and the social, political and economical milieu and the culture at large Conventions and the whole value system differ from one culture and society to another What is ‗right‘ and what is ‘wrong‘ differs Ideologies may also be a factor to refer to the context
Language therefore should be considered a part of culture and understood in its context Translator must be giving over the top stress to understand the context so as to produce a good contextualized translation.
Stylistic factors
Stylistics applies linguistics to literature in the hope of arriving at analyses which are more broadly based, rigorous and objective, (Hatim & Mason,1990: 133)
Stylistics can be evaluative (i.e judge the literary worth on stylistic criteria), but more commonly attempts to simply analyze and describe the workings of texts which have already been selected as noteworthy on other grounds Stylistic excellence — intelligence, originality, density and variety of verbal devices — play their part in literature, but aesthetics has long recognized that other aspects are equally important: fidelity to experience, emotional shaping, significant content Stylistics may well be popular because it regards literature as simply part of language and therefore (neglecting the aesthetic dimension) without a privileged status, which allows the literary canon to be replaced by one more politically or sociologically acceptable Because form is important in poetry, and stylistics has the largest armoury of analytical weapons Moreover, stylistics need not be reductive and simplistic There is no need to embrace Jacobson's theory that poetry is characterized by the projection of the paradigmatic axis onto the syntagmatic one Nor accepting Bradford's theory of a double spiral: literature has too richly varied a history to be fitted into such a straitjacket Stylistics suggests why certain devices are effective, but does not offer recipes, any more than theories of musical harmony explains away the gifts of individual composers To the Stylistic critic, however, style means simply how something is expressed, which can be studied in all language, aesthetic and non-aesthetic.
Socio-cultural elements
Cultures that are relatively homogeneous tend to see their own way of doing things as ‗naturally', the only way, which just as naturally becomes the ‗best' way when confronted with other ways When such cultures themselves take over elements from outside, they will, once again, naturalize them without too many qualms and too many restrictions In translation, once documents (including literary works) are translated into another language, the translations then take the place of the originals They function as the originals in the culture to the extent that the originals disappear behind the translations The less evaluative the text is, the less need there will be for its structure to be modified in translation Conversely, the more evaluative the text is, the more scope there may be for modification (ibid: 187)
The less culture-bound (treaties, declarations, resolutions, and other similar documents) a text is, the less need there will be for its structure to be modified in translation Conversely, the more culture-bound a text is, the more scope there may be for modification
According to Roman & Morris (2002), four main socio-cultural factors influencing translation are: geographical differences, historical differences, custom differences and perception differences
- Historical elements: Roman & Morris indicates there are numerous examples in translation that exhibit historical elements deeply rooted in the languages Idioms and legends always provide ready support in this respect Once an idiom or fixed expressions has been recognized, we need to decide how to translate it into the target language
Translation from Vietnamese into English exhibits the same problem
- Geographic elements: People of one geographical location is different from that of another, translation of geographical terms is where another problem is encountered
Recognition and familiarity of the geography is of immense help to bring about the readers' association, thus making comprehension easier On the contrary, without a sense of geography, the readers have only their imagination in their power to employ
- Custom elements (tradition elements): Translation cannot be separated from tradition Similar to geographic elements, people born in different places will belong to different traditional areas, therefore, without knowledge of tradition from other country, readers can have difficulty in understanding its language
- Perception elements: translators who were born in different country and culture will perceive a situation or texts differently, thus, this may affect their language and their style of translation.
Related researches
Study of Pham Thu Giang (2010)
In A study on the Vietnamese-English translation strategies in the series of bilingual handbooks “Vietnamese culture frequently asked questions” published by the Thế Giới Publisher, Pham Thu Giang indicates that there are two main changes in most bilingual handbooks: modified literal translation and change in grammar There are four alterations in grammatical changes, including changes in order of word group, changes in grammatical word class, modulation and changes in sentence structure
The contribution of this theory in this research is also for the enrichment of the understanding of linguistic modification in literature translation and its underlying factors resulting in such alterations elaborated by Pham Thu Giang (2010) as a theoretical framework of translation strategy in the process of transferring the meaning from Vietnamese into English
In this study, Pham also suggests that there are at least three strategies employed by the translators, they are: (i) translating without interruption for as long as possible, (ii) correcting surface errors immediately, (iii) leaving the monitoring for qualitative or stylistic errors in the text to the revision stage This global strategy refers to the general plan that must be conducted by the translators The first plan is to complete the translation without any interruption This plan is to provide the initial draft of the translation The second plan refers to the identification and classification of the translation problem for correction This is conducted to do the transition quality to assess the translation equivalence Any factor which spoils the equivalence must be corrected The third plan refers to the editing, revising, and proof-reading for the last draft of the translation in reference with the translation accuracy, acceptability, and readability for the reason of a wider readership.
Study of Lubis (2009)
This research was conducted for two main purposes The first purpose was to explore the translation problem in translating the Text of Mangupa, a Universitas Sumatera Utara Mandailingness cultural text into English The second purpose is to maintain and introduce the highly valuable traditional ceremony which is only known by the Mandailingness to other societies The research design is categorized to a descriptive qualitative type The object of the study is a written text of Mangupa consisting of 22 paragraphs and 37 verses The research method used in this research is meaning-based translation method The findings of the research indicate that there are more differences than similarities in linguistic structures such as affixation, compounding, reduplication, clipping, system of pronoun, structure of phrase etc They also indicate that Mandailingnese society and English society differ greatly in some cultural aspects such as religion, belief, family, marriage, types of society, etc.
Study of Johnson (2006)
The research is to examine some particular problems in Indonesian language for translators, whether translating from Indonesian to English or English to Indonesian The method used in this research is a type of multifaceted approach It is used to enable the translation to be viewed in much the same way as the kinds of demands it places on the translator who needs constantly to be aware of the author-reader, source-target culture, syntax, semantics, semiotics, even geography and politics The method uses metaphor and illustration to describe theoretical process of translation which is justified in the same way that imagery is justified in the same way that imagery is justified in literature The method also uses artificial distinction which is often made between interpretation and translation, so translation acquires flexibility and a deeper ethical structure The method also uses a symbolic approach which may be used by the translator by involving the perception of modules within text, identified with symbols that can facilitate the process of translation
The data used in this research is a set of corpus showing the history of Indonesian words which can readily affect their meanings and the history of English words which may affect the choice of the terms The research proves difficult to demonstrate any particular effect of the history or layer of the meaning or the choice of terminology in translation It seems that once the Indonesian term has been understood, the translation that will emerge will not particularly be bound by reference to the history of English terminology It is concluded that the research hypotheses may be reduced to an observation that the derivation of the Indonesian term is important in fully understanding the scope of meaning of the terms.
Study of Burgos (2007)
The focus of this research is on the significance of the dynamic equivalence in the translation of the Mexican cultural text The research objective includes: 1 To emphasize the important of the dynamic equivalence when facing cultural problem; 2 To identify the characteristics of the Mexican culture based on two text related to a period of time on the history of Mexico and Gastronomy on the common element that are exclusively grounded on them, that are almost impossible to translate; 3 To determine the effectiveness of the dynamic equivalence for avoiding cultural problem in the translation process Theoretical framework used in this study is “Translation is the ability to mediate between culture, to explain one to another, mixed loyalties, the push and the pull of the source and target culture (Robinson, 1997: 222); Culture is the way of life and its manifestation that are peculiar to a community that uses a particular language as its means of expression (Newmark, 1988: 94); Culture is knowledge in which a person learns by direct instruction or watching (Hudson, 1996); The relationship between language and culture is that the structure of language determines the way in which the speakers of the language view the world Different speakers will experience the world differently at the same level in which the languages they speak differ structurally.
Study of Gou (2007)
The focus of this research is the translation of explicitation from Chinese into English The problem of the study is that some types of explicitation should be adopted in
Chinese-English translation in order to meet the need of the readers, the language and the function of the TL Theoretical framework used in this research includes the concept which states that explicitation or explicitness means to make something implied explicit and clear, or to explain something; explicitation is a phenomenon in which the TL states the ST information in a more explicit form of the original (Shuttleworth & Cowie, 1997: 55);
Explicitation is one of the universal translation, which research has been done on it (Baker,
1998) The method used in this research is the comparison between the Chinese chapter titles of Hong Lou Meng and their three English versions Hong Lou Meng is one of the masterpieces of Chinese ―Zhang Hui‖ novels which are a special form in ancient Chinese literature Chapter title have vivid, colorful, rhythmic feature and artistic value, so special attention is paid to the choice of words and sentence pattern The original and the three translations are taken from the corpus made by Yanshan University, China The data of the research are the paratactic Chinese into hypotactic English The findings show that translator use explicitation in the translation of paratactic Chinese into hypotactic English to explain meaning to the target reader (Shuttleworth & Cowie, 1997: 55) There are three types of explicitation within the text, they are: 1 Explicitation of implied subject; 2
Explicitation of cohesion and coherence; 3 Explicitation of grammatical meaning The reason why explicitation is done in the translation is to meet the need of the target reader; and to show the unity of the form and meaning of the ST; to reach the goal of the translation
All the theories and studies mentioned above will form a steady background from which the author will investigate thoroughly translating modifications and the factors affecting the translating process of the Vietnamese poetry ―Những vì sao đen” by Ngô Tự Lập into the English version ―Black Stars” by Martha Collins and himself However, all the above theories just mention the most common factors supposed to be applied to all pairs of languages in the world Moreover, most of the researches found focus on the translation from English to other languages in certain books or in certain academic or technological field in stead of poetic area In this paper, the author expects to dig deep into the case of Vietnamese-English translation in Black Stars poetic collection The research also focuses on two modifying groups including linguistic and socio-cultural factors which are supposed to be the most outstanding influencing factors in this poetic translation.
METHODOLOGY
Data corpus
The author of the original poems, Ngô Tự Lập and the American writer Martha Collins worked together to bring us a valuable bilingual book First published in the United States, the book was the collection of some previously published poems as well as new ones It was organized in chronologic order of Ngô Tự Lập‘s memories: from a young man reflecting on the village childhood in the war, a mature traveler absorbing and reflecting on the contemporary global life, to a seasoned “Men with big eyes” who had seen a great deal, and who can help us see, as we travel a “Road on the Earth” Firstly, the book was valuable for the highly valued poems themselves which reflect beautiful flows of thoughts and feelings, and new concepts of space and time, light and darkness It also introduces the American readers a wide range of stories about memories of war, ―utilize traditional imagery that reflects Vietnamese culture and landscape, in a style that is quite evocative and sometimes gently surreal‖; the lands where he had once traveled, lived or studied
Thirdly, translators, especially translators in the field of literature, or poetry more specifically, benefit a great deal from the book because the translating process always involves a lot of border-crossing which was successfully overcome in the translating process of the book with the close cooperation between the author and an American writer
The translating process was described by Martha Collins as ―usually, Lap would create a rough English version of a poem, while I would use my limited Vietnamese and several Vietnamese-English dictionaries to create a word-for-word ―trot‖, at the same time listening to both the order and the rhythm of the Vietnamese words Informed by this process, I would work with his version until I had a draft that satisfied me, which I would then send to him, usually with questions-and so forth, until we both were happy.‖ This, on one side should tell how much effort was made by the translators to keep the English translation of the poems closest to their original; on the other side also reflects how difficult the border crossing was, and that the modification, or changes are essential to bring the poems to the readers in American society and culture
In order to conduct this study, the researcher has investigated both Vietnamese and English versions of the poems in the book The research subjects in this study have been chosen under the procedure of information-oriented sampling, as opposed to random sampling Through the 42 poems of the book which were divided into 3 sections: The Universe and I, Night Flight, Road on the Earth, the researcher has remarked over 120 differences between the English translation and the Vietnamese original version which were then studied under 2 main categories of influencing factors This size of the samples could somehow be considered eligible enough for the researcher to carry out a reliable study.
Research methods
To conduct the study, the researcher has employed qualitative method The method has offered the researcher valid data and a proper framework for analysis
Qualitative research is a method of inquiry employed in many different academic disciplines, traditionally in the social sciences, but also in market research and further contexts Qualitative researcher aims to gather an in-depth understanding of human behavior and the reasons that govern such behavior The qualitative method investigates the why and how of the linguistic and socio-cultural factors‘ influences on the translation, not just what, where, when
In this research, the qualitative method was employed through out all the research process - first in comparing the translated poems with their Vietnamese original version to find out the modifications made on the linguistic facet A descriptive listing of noteworthy and typical examples of modifications in the book was carried out These data were then evaluated and categorized into smaller categories basing on linguistic norms of both the SL and TL for later analysis During the data analysis process, the researcher once again employed qualitative approach to categorize the factors influencing the above-mentioned modifications with intense reasoning and many interviews and mailing with both the author of the original poems and the translators of “Black stars”
The data collection procedure has been divided into two successive phases
This phase has concentrated mainly on reading 42 poems of Ngô Tự Lập‘s “Black
Stars” which were doubled in number because the book is bilingual On the left page is
Vietnamese original version of each poem, and the page on the right is the translation in English To be more specific, the researcher has spent a lot of time reading, comparing then paying special attention to the phenomena where there are remarkable differences between the 2 versions
After reading carefully, the researcher has taken notes all the phenomena in consideration, consulted both the author and the translator about some vague phenomena, then built the framework to categorize them into main 2 separate domains Simultaneously, prominent examples of each domain have been noted down to exemplify the researcher‘s later analysis
First, the researcher has studied every translated poem in comparison with the original Vietnamese version to investigate the modifications were made These modifications were seen on linguistic surface and then divided into smaller categories The researcher then analyzed the data and studied the reasons that influenced on the translators‘ decision to make those modifications in translating process These reasons were found to consist of 2 main groups of factors: linguistic or socio-cultural problems
The data analysis procedure is illustrated in the tables of analytical framework below
Changes in grammatical word classes
Topic-Comment structure in Vietnamese sentences
Grammatical word class changes The tense of the predicate
The use of functional words in English
Keeping the original words untranslated
Subtracting words from the original
DATA ANALYSIS
Modifications in ―Black stars‖ translation
According to Robert Frost, ―Poetry is what gets lost in translation‖ This statement could be true because there is no one-to-one equivalent when comparing two languages, and if we only expect the complete faithfulness from a translation, we obviously have to sacrifice poetry beauty, and vice versa “Black stars” translators, however, did not seem to share this point of view They worked together to find out the best way to bring about good poetry works in target language and simultaneously maintain the poems‘ original meanings which the poet aims to convey Obviously, modification is undeniable in translating this poems collection Through investigation, the researcher remarked two main modification groups found in this translation: syntactic modifications and lexical modifications
I.1 Syntactic modifications I.1.1 Changes in grammatical word classes
In ―Black Stars” translation, some literal translations of certain words do not accord with natural usage in the target language or the translator just wants to produce a smoother flow of words, she needs to make changes in word class A grammatical item is replaced with another grammatical item, for example, a noun may be translated with an adjective, a verb with a noun, an adverb with an adjective, and a noun with an adverb and so on The following examples illustrate the transposition of a noun with a verb, a verb with a preposition, an adjective with a verb and a verb with an adjective respectively
Ta vẫn nghe tiếng rên rỉ của người
I still hear you moan In this example, the noun phrase tiếng rên rỉ in the
SL is translated into the verb moan in TL Example 2:
Khoét rộn g bờ vai để trần
The verb phrase khoét rộng is replaced by a preposition Into
(Gọi mùa - Calling the season, p16-
Con mắt mù lòa My eyes cannot see The adjective mù lòa is explained by a negative predicate consisting of a modal verb and a verb cannot see
Ta ngửa lòng bàn tay mà đi
The verb ngửa is expressed by an adjective open
In Black Star translation, the translator sometimes merged several sentences, usually two, to create a complete sentence or split one sentence into two others without changing the meaning
Sentence merge is a good choice to avoid producing choppy sentences which are not recommended in English written language Besides, the translator combines sentences in his or her effort to achieve conciseness strongly recommended in the target language In Black Star translation, Collin created this modification several times, one of the most typical example is demonstrated as follows:
Như hơi ấm thoảng mùi mồ hôi
Thầm ngợi ca nụ cười thủy chung mệt mỏi
Like heat suffused with the odor of sweat
Darkness quietly honors my faithful smile
There are three poetic sentences in the original text, however, the first sentence and the third one are combined in the translation to make the poem smoother
Though now and then I dive
There are three poetic sentences in both the xanh kia
- That blue sky p44-45) cũ kỹ
Ta lao xuống mặt đường lầm bụi
Over my handlebars And fall on the muddy road original and translation
However, the first sentence and some parts of the third one are combined in the translation
Cho đến khi Dòng Loiret Chẳng còn khác những dòng sông khác
Is no different from other rivers
The 2 verses in original version are combined in the translation
In Black Stars translation, division of one sentence into two is necessary mostly when the equivalent sentence may be too long Noticeably, when the translator needs to explain some cultural terms unfamiliar to the target audience, which obviously lengthens the original sentence, he or she has to split the source language sentence into two
The division actually offers the translator opportunities to clarify and improve the expressive power of the message in the target language This type of modification is illustrated in the example below:
Ta ngửa lòng bàn tay mà đi
The verse in original version is divided into two sentences in the translation
This modification has led reader‘s attention to the action stumble along of main subject in the sentence
The most problematic and time-consuming aspect of poetic translation is achieving an accurate lexical rendering The marked differences between English and Vietnamese in this aspect present significant difficulties for translators of “Black Stars” poetry collection
As a result, Martha Collins and Ngô Tự Lập have created various modifications to deal with this issue These changes are word addition, word subtraction and different meaning word generation
One of the typical characteristics of poetry is vagueness, especially Vietnamese poetry as the Vietnamese language gives poets many good opportunities to ―play‖ with words and let the readers interact in interpreting the poems This, however, causes even more difficulties to poetry translation Therefore, instead of transferring only the linguistic surface content, translators sometimes choose to make meanings clearer for the target language‘s readers by adding more words into the translation Through the investigation in the poetry of “Black Stars”, we acquired linguistic signals which are transferred and added as below:
(Thế giới và tôi - The Universe and I, p.8-9) Đó là thế giới và tôi Hai miền hoang tưởng
The Universe and I Two illusory lands Were both born in
Both is an addition which is used to emphasize the appearance of two metaphors the Univer and
Ngước lên mắt mờ bụi đỏ
Thời gian Hay kỉ niệm núi đồi
Now I raise my eyes Dim with the red dust of time
Or is it the dust of remembered mountains?
The addition the dust is used in two continuous verses to emphasize the ongoing characteristic of time as dust of time is a popular collocation in English
Subtraction is another popular modification in interpreting process of “Black Stars” collection Subtraction means omitting words from the original, which plays an important role in creating aesthetics, communicative effectiveness and natural translation
The basic feature of literature is diversity, therefore, in order to keep its aesthetics, polysemy and nature, subtraction in translation is sometimes necessary despite disobeying target language‘s syntax
(Vườn anh đào– Cherry garden – P.18-19)
Mẹ đang trải nong quây cót đốt diêm sinh
My mother is still burning sulfur
In both examples, words in original version, including trải nong quây cót and
Bờ sông Rhein chập chờn chân lính gái
The steps of woman soldiers chập chờn are omitted in the translation as there is no equivalent in English
However, the subtraction does not affect to the semantics of the novel significantly as the whole meaning is kept understandable to readers
Creating brand-new word whose meaning is different from the original appears several times in “Black Star” translation It is the most challenging task because it requires the translator thorough understanding of original semantics and syntax of 2 different languages (source language and target language) as well as the contexts of the poems
However, this modification also creates uniqueness to this poetry translation Some examples are illustrated as follows:
Tôi chơi với con ốc sên trong chiếc hầm chữ A ngập nước
In a bomb shelter flooded with rain
Hầm chữ A is translated into a bomb shelter in the translation because of many reasons under socio- cultural influence which will be analyzed in the following parts
Tôi thích thú ăn một que kem toàn nước đá
I ate some cheap ice cream
The situation is similar with the example above
In “Black Stars” translation, many words are kept unchanged when interpreted into English version instead of being explained or generalized Typical examples are shown below
Khi những chiếc thó đẫm mồ hôi phập xuống
When sweat thó blades cut
In both examples, the translator decided to keep the original words
(Đàn bà những năm 60(II)- Women from 1960s (II)-p.11-12) Đường trung du thơ thẩn tìm về
As I‘ve wandered back on the trung du road untranslated, there are factors influencing this situation, which will be analyzed in the next parts
Reduplication appears many times in Ngô Tự Lập poetry, which causes difficulties for translators, even when one of them was himself Mostly, the substitution in translation weakens or strengthens the onomatopoeia and iconicity of duplicative words
However, there are still some nearly absolute equivalents used to describe the reduplicative To be more specific, some examples are analyzed as follows:
Thời gian vẫn còn đó
The reduplicative long lanh means twinkle, shining with a gleam that varies repeatedly between bright and faint It emphasizes the unstable characteristics of time In this example, long lanh is omitted from the verse, which makes the sentence lose the iconicity of the original
(Vườn anh đào -Cherry garden, P.18-19)
Và đã chạy miên man trên lá rụng mùa cũ
I have run and run through the leaves of that distant time
Reduplicative miên man describes an unconscious status of subject Tôi (I) in the verse I seems to care about nothing except running to lá rụng mùa cũ
- the leaves of that distant time In the translation, run and run also means running nonstop and being unaware of everything The translator was successful of interpreting this verse because the interpretation not only effectively transmits the semantics of the source text but also creatively build up an equivalent reduplicative run and run , which makes the target text more attractive and meaningful to Western readers
Metaphors are used very often in literary and poetry because poems are meant to communicate complex images and feelings to the readers and metaphors often state the comparisons most emotively In the original ―Những vì sao đen”, Ngô Tự Lập uses metaphor as an implicit, implied or hidden comparison between two things that are unrelated but share some common characteristics There are some examples:
Triệu triệu bầu vú bị chặt đứt khỏi thân mình đau đớn Rơi như những trái dừa xanh xuống đất mềm
Những trái dừa xanh cả dưới mồ vẫn còn căng mẩy
Millions of breasts cut from the suffering bodies
Fallen to earth like young coconuts Full with milk even in the grave
Những trái dừa xanh in example 1 is a metaphor, which refers to millions of breasts, however những trái dừa xanh in the third line was not translated in the translation, this makes it lose its function as a metaphor
(Những vì sao đen - Black stars, P.36-37)
Triệu triệu vì sao trên báng súng, tay cày
On guns and plows, millions of diligent stars
Vì sao was translated into stars while it eventually refers to hands of brave and hard working Vietnamese people The translation only reflect the explicit meanings of the original, it does not express the hidden semantics of the source text.
Factors influencing translation
Levy (1967: 58) (as quoted in Wilss, 2001: 124) thinks that the translator frequently finds himself in a conflict-and-decision-marked situation during the translation process, a situation which becomes all the more difficult to master, the more complex the textual segment to be translated is in terms of syntax, semantics and stylistics As a result, these three factors are main linguistic components that create modification in poetic translation
English and Vietnamese belong to different language families and systems This difference directly reflects the way people think, in their syntactic organization, and unavoidably comes up in the process of inter-lingual transference
Modern English syntax is characterized by a degree of inflection In contrast, Vietnamese is a typical analytic language, characterized by non-inflection, frequent use of function words and functional manipulation of word order, through which various syntactic and semantic relations are expressed
With the use of inflections, English sentence tend to have strict and compact syntactic structures In addition, there are a wealth of conjunctions, prepositions and a developed system of pro-forms, which can incorporate and interconnect a number of clauses through subordination into a complex long sentence The structure of such a sentence, often likened to a tree, is termed hypo taxis and is characterized by formalized relations in which words, phrases, and clauses are closely connected Devoid of inflections, Vietnamese tends to use syntactic order and lexical means to express grammatical meanings The meaning of a sentence unfolds word by word or clause by clause, in a coordinated shape that has few of the overt connections seen in English This diffusive mode of construction, often likened to a stream or length of chain, is termed parataxis and features covert connectivity, whereby words, phrases and clauses are organized according to natural temporal-spatial and logical sequence There are far fewer connective devices than in English, and hence the word order in a Vietnamese sentence is not so flexible as in English
Accordingly, in translating ―Những vì sao đen” into “Black Star” poetry collection between Vietnamese and English, the translator has to take the trouble to interpret and then reconstruct the source language structure on the basis of target language syntactic norms
When translating Vietnamese into English, many English connective devices are added and the words ordered by lexical means or accomplished through meaningful ordering is replaced by a deep structure Syntactic differences created translating modification in several aspects illustrated below
II.1.1.1 Topic-Comment structure in Vietnamese sentences
The translators usually have to modify sentence structures in target language when those in source language are different from the standard subject-predicate sentence style of English The most noticeable ones are those containing words such as thì, là, mà which divide the sentence into two main parts These types of sentences are exhaustively discussed when the new concept duos "Theme-Rheme" analyzed by Lưu Vân Lăng (1970) and Trần Ngọc Thêm (1985), and later "Topic-Comment" structure introduced by Cao Xuân Hạo (1991) emerged to replace the old subject-predicative duos to describe basic grammatical structures of Vietnamese sentences Words such as thì, là, mà mark the linear between topic and comment
Compared with the basic sentence type of English with subject-verb structure, topic-comment sentences may lack subjects and the topic of the sentence can be occupied by an adverb, an object or simply a word semantically relating to the comment discussed in the topic In these cases, the translators must change the order of the clauses or the word groups to conform to the acceptable grammatical structure in English
Ta ngửa lòng bàn tay mà đi With open hands
The verse Ta ngửa lòng bàn tay mà đi belongs to topic-comment structure in which the second main part mà đi lacks a subject If it were translated word-by-word into the English version, this might cause misunderstanding to Western readers Therefore, in the translation, interpreter Martha Collins, after consulting the author Ngô Tự Lập, has chosen to add a subject I to make the verse more logical and understandable to the target readers
Moreover, the ellipsis of subject is often found in Vietnamese In Vietnamese poetry, we make an effort to use fewer words to express deep meaning So the ellipsis of subject is very familiar to Vietnamese speakers However, subject is a very important component in English for English is a kind of Subject—Predicate language So choosing a good subject is very important in translating Vietnamese poetry Here is the example that a new subject was added in the translation to fit with the English grammar
(Trời cao xanh kia- That blue sky, P44-
Không phải là nỗi đau There is no pain
Similarly, the Vietnamese version does not contain any subject, hence, in order to make it suitable with the target language, There is is added in the verse to make the translation fitted with the English grammar
(Giấc mơ khác – Other dreams, P32-
Nụ cười lừa dối mà không hay
The smile deceived, though I didn’t know it
In example 3, translator put a pronoun I so that the second part of the topic- comment structure is clarified in the target language
The original Nụ cười lừa dối mà không hay lacks a subject, which makes readers unable to indicate the one ―didn’t know it” is a polysemy However, in the target text, I is added and indicate the person who didn’t know it to fit the English syntactic structure
The above modifications even though do not change the meaning of the source text dramatically, they weaken the artistic creation of Ngô Tự Lập in the original ―Những vì sao đen” As most topic-comment structures bring polysemy to the sentence, this effect is lost when a subject is added
At the phonological level, there is no correspondence between English and Vietnamese ―Những vì sao đen” is a free style poetic collection; therefore, it is easier for the translators as they are not stuck in a rigid phonological syntax in poetry However, in order to create a new phonology in TL version, some modifications of sentence structure are created, the most frequent uses are sentence merged and sentence split
(Trời cao xanh kia- That blue sky, P44-
Không phải là nỗi đau
Dù sợi nước đá còn lại mãi, cả khi chiếc gai đã nhổ
Though a thread of ice is left When the thorn is pulled out
In stead of keeping a long sentence with 13 words in the original Dù sợi nước đá còn lại mãi, cả khi chiếc gai đã nhổ, Collins chopped it into two shorter one in order to fit with the morphology of the rest verses in the translation which contain only less than 7 words in a sentence: Though a thread of ice is left/ When the thorn is pulled out This change in sentence structure brings a new morphology to the target text, which makes it more interesting to target readers
Tôi chơi với con ốc sên trong chiếc hầm chữ A ngập nước
Còn những người đàn bà lặng lẽ ra đi
In a bomb shelter flooded with rain
The woman disappeared without a sound
