ENGLISH FOR BUSINESS DEPARTMENTTRAN THI HANH BUSINES ENGLISH 58B A STUDY ON TRANSLATING ENGLISH TOURISM TERMINOLOGY INTO VIETNAMESE... Common mistakes made by BE’s students when translat
Rationale
It is undeniable that English is increasingly become global language and communication in the 21st century since we come together to address global challenges and encourage socio-economic development Thus, English is being used in almost materials and documents in every fields of life and one of the most significant fields is Tourism Tourism plays a vital role in socio-economic development Therefore, translating English materials related to Tourism into Vietnamese brings a critical issue for those works in this industry as well as in translation field Nevertheless, in order to accomplish a translation literally which transfers appropriate lexical meaning, translators have to deal with numerous challenges.
During internship experience at Paradise Bay Resort Limited Company (ALMA), one of my responsibilities is translating documents related to Tourism context as requirement As a matter of fact, I realized there is large number of complicated terminologies appeared in Tourism documents However, translating Tourism technical terminology seems to be a tough work in translating process, it requires translators to translate them accurately Therefore, translators must be highly requested to gain both translation skills and Tourism knowledge Knowing that translating English Tourism terminology into Vietnamese mostly is such an obstacle to BE’s students of NEU whose major in Translation, Interpretation Due to a great deal of external and internal reasons, BE’s students who are at the initial the message or contents may be transferred inappropriately or incompletely.
Given this riddle, I choose the topic “A study on translating English Tourism terminology into Vietnamese” as the research topic for my diploma thesis with a view to helping BE’s students of NEU to understand Tourism terms clearly,avoid common mistakes and enhance technical skills mentioned in findings(chapter 3) of this research when translating any Tourism documents fromEnglish to Vietnamese.
Aims and research question of the Study: :ccscecsscesssceseeceseecsseeeeessseeeaeessseesenessaeesnees 1 1 Aims Of the StU|V: .- SH HH HH TH TH HH nh HT TH TH HH 2 2 Research QU€SfẽOINS: - c1 ST HT TH HH nu HH TT HT HH 2 1.3 Scope Of the 1
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First and foremost, I carried out this research topic on translating English- Vietnamese Tourism terms with the aim of identifying some common mistakes in translating English tourism terminologies into Vietnamese made by certain
BE’s students in NEU Contemporarily, the study provides external and internal difficulties which prevent those students from translating Tourism technical terms Thereby, this paper also suggests some practical methods to help them improve their translation techniques, raise awareness of self-practicing and conquer complicated terms in Tourism field and translate them effectively.
Question 1: What are common mistakes in translating English terminologies of Tourism field into Vietnamese?
Question 2: What are causes to those mistakes in translating tourism terminologies from English to Vietnamese?
Question 3: What are some suggestions to improve this situation?
In fact, translating English-Vietnamese technical terms is one of the biggest objections to translators, especially freshmen As I mentioned before, because of significance of Tourism field in socio-economy awareness, along with my limitation of time and knowledge, this research mainly focuses on pointing out some of the most frequent errors in the translation of Tourism terms from English to Vietnamese caused by BE’s students in NEU There are 2 key reasons why those students are selected as my research objectives First, BE’s students get English as a second language and study program hand-in-hand related to Translation and Interpretation Moreover, these undergraduates are still on the first step of training process, which means they are assessed to be lack of technique skills, theories also background of business fields including Tourism.
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In an attempt to carry out successfully this research, it is vitally important when it comes to methods selection Hence, these following methods are carefully applied in my graduation thesis: ° Data collection:
Data sources are collected from survey questionnaire conducted for 60 students in FFL and their 70 English-Vietnamese translation works with a hope to getting the realistic figures There are total seven questions which are designed in diverse formats such as multiple choices, WH-questions, etc Their responses are automatically saved in Google Form. ° Interview:
After delivering survey questionnaire, there was an internal interview among the researcher and 30 students to with a view to getting a closer look into this situation These 30 students had to face eleven direct questions then the responses are jotted down in report, which are used to compare with results of survey and bring out the honest views. ° Observation:
Last but not least, an observation session with the attendance of 20 students in
BE is carried out With the purpose of watching closely their translation, 10Tourism terms (inbound tourism, outbound tourism, homestay, buffet breakfast,full board package, half board package, free & easy package, business class,economy class, Deluxe room) are printed on 20 papers for students to translate without using any applications or dictionary After five minutes, the papers are collected and use as a proof of findings.
Organization of the StUV: cà HH HH TH TH Ho HH HH TH HH HT kt 3
My graduation study is divided into five key chapters: ° Chapter 1: Introduction
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This chapter highlights rationale, aims, research questions, scope, methodology and organization of the study. ° Chapter 2: Theoretical framework
Introducing the literature review used as basis of the research, including theories about overview of translation, overview of terminology and Tourism terms. ° Chapter 3: Findings and Discussion:
After meticulously collecting and analyzing data sources, it will show the findings of the research which are popular mistakes appeared in students’ translation which includes Tourism and Travel terminologies and some main causes of this riddle. ° Chapter 4: Recommendations:
At the purpose of helping BE’s students avoid aforementioned mistakes, this chapter also recommends some practical methods to improve this situation. ° Chapter 5: Conclusion:
This chapter will sum up the main findings of research, recommendation in this study, along with stating out the limitation of the study and suggestions for further researches.
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FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION .c c.eeikô 16 3.1 Perception of BE’s students of terminology and Tourism terminology
Perception of BE’s students of terminology in general: 16 3.1.2 Perception of BE’s students in Tourism terminology: - - - ô=-ô++<++ 17
Since the students of Foreign Language Faculty have already studied various courses about English and Vietnamese linguistic, they greatly show their inclusive view about terminology in general According to data source conducted in survey questionnaire among 60 BE’s students, all of them chose two correct answers when it comes to definition of Terminology These students’ answers are divided into two views Among three given definition, there are two more precise and complete explanation While majority of students (67%) chose the Ist qualified definition which is “the set of technical words or expressions used in a particular subject”, the left selected the longer definition which is “the body of terms used with a particular technical application in a subject of study, profession, etc” (accounts for 33%) The both concepts are literally express accurate definition of Terminology Nevertheless, as reported by the interview in Foreign Language Faculty campus, it is said that the first definition is shorter and easier to understand, meanwhile the 2nd one is likely to be forgotten That is reason why majority of them chose the Ist concept in survey questionnaires.
The percentage of BE students who have qualified definition of terminology
E the 1st qualified definition the 2nd qualified definition S| the wrong definition
Figure 3.1 The percentage of BE students who have qualified definition of terminology
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3.1.2 Perception of BE’s students in Tourism terminology:
The next question of survey refers to the degree of access of students to Tourism terms From the chart, it is clearly that a half of respondents (50%) said that they frequently encounter Tourism terms in documents, books during studying process Besides, 42% of students claimed that they occasionally encounter terms related to Tourism background Meanwhile, there are only 5 people which stood at 8% revealed that they have never read or heard about Tourism terms.
Frequency of Tourism terms observation of
Moving on the next issue, the data collected from questionnaires implied frequency of English-Vietnamese Tourism terms translation made by BE’s students As 45 respondents (75%) stated that they periodically translate English Tourism terms into Vietnamese by themselves while 17% of students often do the same Finally, 8% of attendees which represents for 5 students who never translate Tourism terms into Vietnamese by themselves Once said in the interview, the 5 students honestly admitted they usually utilize dictionary apps or searching google for these terms’ meaning.
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Frequency of translating English Tourism terms by BE students
In a nutshell, the majority of BE’s students have taken an overarching approach about Tourism terms The minority represents those are freshmen and still on early step of training process Since the 3rd and last year students of faculty have a chance in Translation and Interpreting courses which boosts them into translating process, they contribute an objective view to further findings in this research.
3.2 Common mistakes when translating English Tourism terms into Vietnamese perceived by BE’s students:
The survey is continued with the issue of common errors perceived by BE’s students when translating English Tourism terms into Vietnamese As a result, 33.3% of respondents (20 students) rated “Less coherent” as the most frequent mistakes recognized in English- Vietnamese Tourism terms translation Meanwhile, “Word-for-word” mistake when translating Tourism terms are considered as the runner-up since it makes up for 26.7% of choices. The two next popular semantic errors are “Misusing words in Vietnamese” (20%) which is followed by “Less accurate” mistakes with 10 votes (16.7%). Finally, there is the only student selecting “Different sense” as one of the errors he caused during translating Tourism terms.
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Word-for-word mistake (too literal)
Table 3.1 Most frequent mistakes made by BE’s students when translating English Tourism terms into Vietnamese
Contemporarily, another data source was collected for this matter Among 70 English-Vietnamese translations containing Tourism terms,50 out of 70 translations have semantic errors Being consistent with the results collected from survey questionnaires, the outcome shows that there are also five mistakes synthesized mistakes in 50 translations From the below chart, “Less coherent” mistake still leads the race when stood at 29% Secondly, “Word-for- word” mistake accounts for 25% Following this error are “Less accurate” (22%) and “Misusing words in Vietnamese” (20%) On the other hand, “Different
Tran Thi Hanh - 11161642 — Business English 58B sense” is still on the list due to the fact that 2 students did not understand the
Figure 3.4 Common mistakes made by BE’s students when translating English Tourism terms into Vietnamese in 50 translations
With a view to getting profound look in these above mistakes, an internal interview and observation session are carried out in FFL campus This effort aims at finding out an honest and detailed answer of students in each mistake.
As the results presented earlier, less coherent is the most frequent mistakes which students generate in their translation papers in terms of Tourism terms. Coherent means clearly and simple to comprehend For some excuses, there are 8 out of 20 English Tourism terms considered as less coherent and confusing to readers when they are translated into Vietnamese As proof, during the observation on 30 students translated 20 available English Tourism terms, some of them translated “homestay” as “nha trọ dat khi di du lịch” or “nhà thuê ở chung khi du lich”, “Full board package” as “du lich day du theo tour” or
“Trekking tour” as “ tour dé đi phượt mạo hiểm” All of these cases do not match
Tran Thi Hanh - 11161642 — Business English 58B with Vietnamese literal expression Hence, these informal words/phrases become obscure for readers.
3.2.2 Word-for-word mistake (too literal)
In fact, word-for-word mistake is considered as one of the most common mistakes that newcomers catch in general There are 6 people in interview reported that they usually utilize word-for-word translation methods since they do not literally understand Tourism texts Or if they actually understand these terms, they are not able to come up with any equivalent words/phrases right away To give an illustration cited from the observation, some students translated
“Free & Easy package tour” as “Tour rẻ và dé dang”, “Soft drink” as “đồ uống mềm” and “Half board package” as” Tour bán dich vụ” Obviously, this has brought inaccuracy in content and lack of nature in expression Like other foreign language, English grammatical structures are different from Vietnamese, hence if translator overuses word-by-word method there will be many errors in translation and the accuracy is extremely low.
Through the observation, 4 out of 20 English Tourism terms translated into Vietnamese do not cover full semantic meaning of SL In details, students just converted partly the meaning which may not reach readers’ understanding To give an illustration, in some students’ translation paper “Inbound tourism” and
“Outbound tourism” are translated into “Du lich dén” and “Du lich di” This is not wrong expression but lack of preciseness because of the fact that “Inbound tourism” means “Du lịch trong nước” and “Outbound tourism” means “Du lịch quốc tế” Another example is “Trekking tour” converted into “tour mạo hiểm” but it correct explanation in Vietnamese is “gói du lich khám phá, mao hiểm ở những vùng thường chỉ dành cho người ban xứ.”
3.2.4 Using inappropriate words in Vietnamese:
In general, one of the most common mistakes made by new translators is using contextual vocabulary In some case, there are certain words that do not have synonyms that can not be converted into other languages By way of illustration,
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“homestay” in some papers is translated into “nha cho thuê” or “studio suIte” is translated into “phòng ngủ kiểu studio” or “phòng ngủ rộng”.
3.3 Some reasons of common mistakes caused by BE’s students in translating E-V Tourism terms:
As being students with highly evaluated English background, BE’s students still have trouble with Tourism terms It is understandable when they are just in the initial of training process and there are numerous both external and internal reasons preventing them from dealing well with these terminologies A question was given out in interview in order to figuring out what reasons cause this situation in respondents’ view The result shows that 12 out of 30 students reported that lack of Tourism knowledge is the main cause of this issue Besides, nearly one-third of total choices (8 people) are in favor of “No equivalent Vietnamese words” opinion Lack of Vietnamese language/literal style was selected by 6 students equalling 20% Last but not least, there are 4 students who admitted that they are lack of translation skills when translating these sophisticated terms.
Reasons cause mistakes in E-V Tourism term translation
Lack of Vietnamese language/literal style 6 (2096)
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When being asked in interview, these undergraduates expressed very firm and honest point of views The majority of them claimed that they are quite lack of tourism background since their major is not specialized in Tourism Hence, they are not familiar with Tourism terms and able to translate them into equivalent Vietnamese words/phrases.
Recommendations for raising students’ awareness of Tourism terms
As being aforementioned in Chapter 1, Tourism plays a vital role in socio- economic development, it is essential to translate carefully terminologies which densely appear in Tourism documents, advertisements, websites, etc For this reason, it is necessary for students to raise awareness of Tourism knowledge in general and Tourism terms in particular by themselves Through the above findings, the lack of Tourism knowledge contributes significantly in preventing them from successful translation Since FFL does not concentrate on Tourism major, students are recommended to research and learn about overview of Tourism then take terms into account through both Internet and paper materials, documents One of highly recommended books about basis of Tourism is
“Tourism principles, practices, and philosophies” by M.W Robert (1972). Alternatively, “Oxford English for Careers: Tourism” which is published by the famous Oxford publisher, suitable for all students and those who have worked in this industry for many years The course is designed to teach English for tourism professionals with tourism management concepts and issues Another suggestion is “A dictionary of travel and tourism terminology” by Allan Beaver (2002), which provides a large number of terms classified into types in order to help students acquire deeper understanding and the use of English Tourism terms In conclusion, these suggestions aims at resolve the problem of lack of Tourism knowledge in general and lack of Tourism terms identification in particular.
4.2 Recommendations for improving English- Vietnamese Tourism terms translation:
4.2.1 Recommendation for lack of translation skills and Vietnamese vocabulary/literal style:
Regardless of this reality, the fact remains that BE’s students still struggle against translation due to the uncertainty about translation methods As report from internal interview, 7 out of 30 students admitted that they do not truly understand either translation theory or translation skills They directly jump into looking up
Tran Thi Hanh - 11161642 — Business English 58B dictionary then translate terms word-by-word This ritual keeps repeating whenever they have trouble with meaning of terms, which make them involuntarily dependent on the dictionary, translation apps without practicing. This section one more time highlight the importance of eight translation methods developed by Newmark (1981) including word-for-word translation, literal translation, faithful translation, semantic translation, communicative translation, idiomatic translation, free translation and adaptation There is no basic theory can be realized without putting it into practice Practice will increase students’ awareness of vocabulary and context as well as the way of translation them smoothly into Vietnamese Especially, for those who are the third- students and last year students, self-practicing is indeed a must to enhance their skills as they have to cope with Translation and Interpretation 1,2,3.
With a view to solving this matter, here are some suggested materials namely
“Textbook on Translation” by Peter Newmark(1981), “Phương Pháp Dich Anh
— Viét?(English- Vietnamese translation methods) published by Tran Chi Thien (1998) In details, the latter books are highly recommended for students when it provides readers the knowledge of British or American as well as Vietnamese literal style Another books should be taken into account is “Sổ tay luyện dich
Anh-Viét, Viét-Anh” with original name: “To be a good translator” by T Windy (2002) The books includes 2 main parts focusing on some experience in translating English - Vietnamese through analysis of examples, as well as providing readers with some difficult words from English to Vietnamese translation.
Afterwards, students had better to actively send their translation works more often to lecturers in order to getting lecturers’ comments and corrections Hence, students can recognize their mistakes and learn from experience in the next times As consequence, they will be gradually less dependent on dictionary apps and Internet Obviously, it is inevitable when relying on dictionary to finding out the correct semantic meaning of Tourism terms Nevertheless, no matter what extent is, students should choose reliable and official dictionary apps such as Oxford dict, Tflat dict or Cambridge dictionary and carefully look up Tourism terms to avoid less accurate or using inappropriate words in Vietnamese Additionally, Google translate is not indeed proposed for using to compare the literal meaning in English and Vietnamese due to its incorrectness.
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4.3 Recommendation for No Vietnamese equivalent words:
Since English and Vietnamese have distinctive grammatical structures, some certain English Tourism terms do not have equivalent words/phrases in Vietnamese In order to eliminate this mistakes, there are practical methods for BE’s students: Free translation (Paraphrasing) and translating with translation with attached annotation. ° Free translation (Paraphrasing):
As being aforementioned in Chapter 2, among eight translation methods developed by Peter Newmark, Free translation, in other words is Paraphrasing, is considered as the second freest form of translation Free translation reproduces the matter without the manner, or the content without the form of the original Therefore, the product of translation becomes comprehensible for viewers, especially for those who lack of Tourism background Indeed, this practical method is likely to help student breakthrough non-equivalence challenge in translation and transfer the literal message of Tourism documents without translating terminologies totally accurate Unfortunately, only three of interviewees took free translation into account when having difficult in English tourism terms It is essential for students to employ this method in their translation works As a case in point, “Full board package” can be converted into
“Tour tron gói”, “Half board package” can be translated into “Tour bao gồm 2 bữa ăn” and “Set breakfast” as “bữa sang đơn giản” In spite of the fact that all of three products can not cover the full primary meaning of term, but they can transfer the closest meaning to readers without making them misleading Once students suitable apply this method, their translation would be evaluated more natural and comprehensive. ° Direct translation with attached annotation:
In case of not finding out any appropriate equivalent words, translator can keep the original form of Tourism terms in translation However, it must be attached with annotation in order to make the content transparent and clear In this circumstance, translators are required to clearly understand semantic meaning of terms then complement a translation with added explanation of terms’ meaning
Tran Thi Hanh - 11161642 — Business English 58B in round brackets To illustrate, for “homestay”, it is recommended that translators maintain the lexical form with Vietnamese semantic meaning put between two round brackets (that is “loại hình chỗ ở mà du khách sẽ ở cùng nha dân, sinh hoạt cùng người dân bản xứ”) The second example is the term
“Superlor room”, with the same way above, the original word 1s kept and attached with explanation in Vietnamese “Loại phòng ở khách san cao hơn phòng tiêu chuẩn với tiện nghi tương đương nhưng diện tích lớn hơn hoặc hướng nhìn đẹp hon.” With a hope to restrict the degree of semantic errors in English- Vietnamese translation text, this method should be correctly applied and the description of Tourism term must be carefully searched and quoted in translation.