A study on translation methods of passive voice from english into vietnamese in the thorn birds

The objectives are to identifythe translation method of passive voice applied in The Thorn Birds, to describe howthese methods is used in the specific circumstances in translation versio

This research focuses on analyzing passive voices found in the novel-TheThorn Birds and its Vietnamese translation version The objectives are to identifythe translation method of passive voice applied in The Thorn Birds, to describe howthese methods is used in the specific circumstances in translation version of PhamManh Hung and suggest some solutions for students to enhance the translation skill.This research applies the quantitative method and qualitative descriptive method tocollect data of passive voice in the novel and analyze the method being used Thedata sources include the passive sentences from chapter one to chapter five of TheThorn Birds by COLLEEN McCULLOUGH in 1977 and its translation by PhamManh Hung in 2010 The results of the study show that there are three mainmethods of translating passive voice from English into Vietnamese The passivesentences are translated from English into Vietnamese in the form of the passivesentence, the active sentence and the de-transitive sentence From 53 data of passivevoice in the Thorn Birds, there are 13 English passive sentences (23%) is translatedinto the passive sentence, 17 of the total (32%) is transferred into the activesentences and the rest translated into the de-transitive sentences, accounts for 53%.The survey shows that the most dominant method which is used by the translator istranslating English passive sentence into the de-transitive sentence

I would also like to express my special thanks to other teachers of ForeignLanguage Department for their supportive lectures during four years that haveprovided me with good background to do effectively my Graduation Paper.

Last but not least, my wholehearted thanks are presented to my family, myfriends for their encouragement and assistance in the process of doing this research

Ha Noi, April 2018

TABLE OF CONTENTS

LIST OF TABLES AND FIGURES

CHAPTER 1: OVERVIEW OF THE STUDY

1.1. Rationale

Nowadays, English has become more dominant around the world and isconsidered as the key instrument of globalization In many countries, English isused in many fields such as economy, commerce, medicine, technology, tourism,ect Thus, it is chosen for being taught in almost schools, universities or institutes.However, it is not easy to become master in English because the language barrierscan sometimes cause a lot of trouble for learning English, esspecially in translationaspect As a student at Thuongmai university, I find that it is a big reason whymany students have more difficulties in understanding English documents relating

to their subjects In my graduation paper, I would like to mention to translation ofpassive voices in documents relating to literary works in general and Englishstories or novel in particular Reading foreign books is always useful for everyone

to broaden their knowledges A novel, for instance, is one of the literary workswhich is very popular It is used to express feeling or stories written in a book.Sometimes, the difference of language becomes a big problem for the readers tounderstand the content of a novel Here is the role of translator needed Tranlation isthe useful tool to transfer the messages in those books Nevertheless, Translating anovel or a book is more difficult than translating academic texts In this case,Translators usually have problems in translating figurative languages (metaphors,similes, personifications, etc.) or idiomatic expressions and speacially in transferingpassive voice from English to Vietnames because they should reproduce in thetarget language (TL) the closest natural equivalence of the source language (ST)message Although translation of passive voice still remains more dificulties, therehas not been any official study on this issue before Realizing and thinking highly ofthe importance of this problem, I decided to pick out “A study on translationmethods of passive voice from English into Vietnamese in The Thorn Birds.” as thestudy of my graduation paper Moreover, being interested in translation and readingnovel are also the main reasons which inspire me to carry out this study

1.2 Previous studies

Linguistic typology of the English and Vietnamese languages is different As aresult, there are some ways of rendering English passive voice into Vietnamese.And the question is how to transfer English passive sentences into appropriate andnatural Vietnamese version

That is the reason why some people have conducted studies or reports on thisissue These studies have shown common ways of translating passive voice fromEnglish into other languages Therefore, I would like to refer to these studies asreference materials for my graduation paper

Firstly, this is “a study on modes of translating English passive sentences intoVietnamese” conducted by MA, Bui Thi Dien-Department of Foreign Languages,College of Science- VNU During this study, the researcher uses collecting data andstatistical method of the passive sentences in English data for computer science.According to the surveyed data, one English passive sentence can be translated

into Vietnamese in the form of three following sentences: a passive sentence, an

active sentence and a de- transitive sentence.

The passive sentence ranks first with 65% and followed by the active sentenceand the de-transitive sentence with 26% and 9% respectively

Translating an English passive sentence into a Vietnamese passive sentence is

the easiest way because we don’t need to transfer the structure of English sentence

In this method, we use some Vietnamese words such as “bị” with negative meaningand “được” with positive meaning

Translating an English passive sentence into a Vietnamese active sentence is

the method which the translators must determine the cause of the action to transferinto the active sentence In case the agent is not mentioned, the translator mustcreate them by repeating the agent in the previous sentence or creating anotherstructure

Translating an English passive sentence into a de-transitive sentence is a

combination between active sentence and passive sentence structure It is anotherchoice for translators if they are not able to translate the passive sentences according

to two ways which are mentioned in above paragraphs because they can avoid the

errors when they don’t understand that the passive sentences have positive meaning

passive voice from English into Vietnamese: translating English passive structure

into a passive sentence; an active sentence and a de - transitive sentence in Vietnamese.

Moreover, the researcher mentions to the concept of translation, translationequivalence and give comments on the methods translation of passive sentencesfrom English into Vietnamese according to the aspect of translation equivalence Ingeneral, the percentage of English passive sentences which are translated intoVietnamese in different types of fields (Administration - Public Affairs, Science andLiterature) are quite different because converting English sentences into Vietnameseones depends on many factors, in which the semantic factor plays a leading role The last one is “a study of passive voice in English and Vietnamese in

practical translation condition” by MA Nguyen Thi Hong Yen This research

chooses the research subject about English passive voice and the translation

methods from English to Vietnamese The researcher applies the quantitative

method and qualitative descriptive method to collect data of passive voice in the novel and analyze the methods being used The data source includes the source text and the target text about passive sentences in other fields to create the common results for almost types of documents The results in this study point out that there are three popular ways in translating passive voice from English into Vietnamese in the form of three types of sentences: the passive sentences, the active sentence and the de-transitive sentences The frequency of using each method is a bit different

with two above studies The passive structure ranks first with 45%, the de-transitive structure ranks second with 33% and is followed by the active structure accounting for 22% The research findings also present the typical differences about the

structure between two languages and the factors affecting to choosing translation methods such as context, grammar, semantics, word order or vocabulary of the sentences In addition, the study conducts the survey on the common errors of the translators and give some suggestions improve the quality of practical translation

1.3 Aims of the study

The study - “A study on translation methods of passive voice from Englishinto Vietnamese in The Thorn Birds.” attempts to:

- Introduce the concept of passive voice, translation, translation equivalenceand the methods to transfer English passive sentences into Vietnamese

- Preliminarily analyze translation methods of passive sentences from Englishinto Vietnamese

- Figure out the advantages, disadvantages of each translation method andpoint out the effective ways in translation

- Suggest some suggestion with the hope to avoid the errors or confusionduring translating passive voice and improve the quality of translation version

I hope this study can provide readers with overall comprehension aboutknowledge relating to passive voices and support them to translate it effectively

1.4 Research Subject

Research subject of study is the translation methods of passive voice fromEnglish into Vietnamese and I rely on the materials of the novel-The Thorn Bird by

Colleen McCULLOUGH

1.5 Scope of the study

Due to limitation of time and the knowledge of translation is very immense, Ican not cover all matters about translation of passive voice, factors affecting ontranslation and all English sentences of passive voice in this novel as well.Therefore, in this paper, only translation of passive voice from English intoVietnamese are presented and analyzed I decide to conduct the study on fivechapters from chapter one to chapter five of The Thorn Bird

1.6 Research methodology

The study is conducted with the combination of the following methods:

As this study is carried out, the quantitative method and some other techniquesare applied With the quantitative method, the novel-The Thorn Bird is used tocollect data about passive sentences in the translation version of Pham Manh Hung

A qualitative descriptive approach to data collection and analysis is used in thisresearch as well The data are taken from novel-The Thorn Birds by COLLEENMcCULLOUGH and its translation by Pham Manh Hung The novel is readthoroughly both the English and Vietnamese version to get the understanding of thecontent as a whole The next step is identifying the data, collecting the data, replacethem on the paper, selecting the data that are going to be analyzed, marking thesentences containing passive voice, and analyzing the methods that used in theprocess of translating passive voice from English into Vietnamese In this presentresearch, I limit the analysis by only analyzing passive voice from chapter one tochapter five The contrastive analysis approach is also employed to find out thedifferences and similarities in structures or style of passive structure betweenEnglish and Vietnamese Specially, to study the English-Vietnamese translation ofpassive voice, the following steps are carried out:

1.6.1 Collecting sample

A sample survey does not cover all of the units of the whole Therefore, Ichoose five chapters in this novel to save time, effort and expense The overallsample is the novel- The Thorn Bird and the translation of Pham Manh Hung

1.6.2 Dealing with data

After selecting the sample, the researcher will conduct the data collection fromthe materials which is chosen

1.6.3 Analyzing and comparing

After selecting typical passive sentences, I find out the methods that are used

in each sentence Then, I give comments, advantages and disadvantages of thetranslation methods

1.7 Organization of the study

- My graduation paper is divided into four chapters:

- The first chapter is overview of the study including rationale, previousstudies, aims of the study, research subjects, research methodology and organization

of the study

- The second chapter is about literature review The researcher will presenttheories related to theoretical background It focuses on the concepts of translation,passive voice in English as well as different translation methods used byprofessional translators

- The third chapter shows the research findings of the study including theanalysis, assessment about translation methods used in the novel

- The last chapter presents recommendations and suggestions for the problemswhich researcher found out

CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW

translation basing on the individual views Houbert (1998:1) states that “Translation

is to be understood as the process whereby a message expressed in a specific source language is linguistically transformed in order to be understood by readers of the target language" [7] In Advanced Oxford Dictionary, it is said that “Translation is the process of changing something that is written or spoken into another language”

[8] Hatim & Mason (1990:3), however, focus more on the communicative purpose

of translation rather than the semantic and stylistic features: “Translation is a

communicative process which takes place within a social context” [9] Newmark

(1995:5) simply defines “Translation as the rendering of a written text into another

language in the way the author intended in the text” [10] It means that the

translation should be able to convey message intended by the writer/speaker into

target language While, Willss (1982:3) gives the following definition: “Translation

is a transfer process, which aims at the transformation of a written SL text into an optimally equivalent TL text, and which requires the syntactic, the semantic and the pragmatic understanding and analytical processing of the SL” [11]

In this study, we would like to use the definition of Dubois (1973)

-“Translation is the expression in another language (or target language) of what has

been expressed in another, source language, preserving semantic and stylistic equivalences” [12] Translation, sometimes, is not an easy task to do because there

are many aspects that should be determined in order to maintain the messageconveyed The different grammatical features and culture are two of them

2.2 Equivalence in translation.

2.2.1 Concepts of translation equivalence

The dictionary defines equivalence as being the same, similar orinterchangeable with something else In translation terms, equivalence is a termused to refer to the nature and extent of the relationship between SL and TL texts orsmaller linguistic units

The problem of equivalence is one of the most important issues in the field oftranslating It is a question of finding suitable counterparts in target language forexpressions in the source language

The comparison of texts in different languages inevitably involves somedifferent theory of equivalence According to Vanessa Leonardo (1989)

“Equivalence can be said to be the central issue in translation although itsdefinition, relevance, and applicability within the field of translation theory havecaused heated controversy, and many different theories of the concept ofequivalence have been elaborated within this field in the past fifty years” [13].Vinay and Darbelnet (1985) state that “Equivalence-oriented translation is aprocedure which replicates the same situation as in the original, whilst usingcompletely different wording” [14] In other definition, Wayne Leman (1979) relies

on a question to define the translation equivalence It is “Translation equivalenceexists between forms in a source language and a target language if their meaningmatches In other words, translation equivalence should answer the question “What

do the speakers of this language actually say to express the desired meaning?” [15].According to these concepts, we can find that equivalence consists of the concept ofsameness and similarity; it has the same or a similar effect or meaning intranslation

2.2.2 Types of translation equivalence

There are two types of equivalence defined by Nida and Taber (1982), whichare also called two basic orientations of translation: namely formal equivalence—which is referred to as formal correspondence—and dynamic equivalence

Formal correspondence focuses attention on the message itself, in both formand content, unlike dynamic equivalence which is based upon the principle of

equivalent effect Formal correspondence consists of a TL item which represents theclosest equivalent of a SL word or phrase There are not always formal equivalentsbetween language pairs They suggest that these formal equivalents should be usedwherever possible if the translation aims at achieving formal rather than dynamicequivalence

The other type of translation equivalence is dynamic equivalence It is theprinciple equivalent effect, where the relationship between receptor and messageshould be substantially the same as that which existed between the original receptorand the message The goal of the dynamic equivalence is seeking the closest naturalequivalent to the source message This receptor oriented approach considersadaptations of grammar, of lexicon, and of cultural reference to be essential in order

to achieve naturalness

Equivalence is therefore the ideal method when the translators deal withproverbs, idioms, clichés, nominal or adjectival phrases and the onomatopoeia ofanimal sounds However, according to Jakobson’s theory, ‘translation involves twoequivalent messages in two different codes’ Jakobson goes on to say that from agrammatical point of view languages may differ from one another to a greater orlesser degree, but this does not mean that a translation cannot be possible In otherwords, the translator may face the problem of not finding a translation equivalent.2.3. The importance of translation

The significance of translation in our daily life is completely undeniable Notonly does translation pave the way forward for global interaction, but allows nations

to enhance co-operation relationships in many fields

Despite the fact that English has a far and wide reach today, the impact oflocal culture and language remains as strong as ever With the growth of Internetand communications technology, it is relatively easier to reach audiences that arethousands of miles away purely on the back of effective translation This hasresulted in a need for translation in diverse fields such as education, masscommunication, science and technology, literature, tourism, religion, trade andbusiness, etc

Quality language translation aims to bridge the communication gap by helpingcompanies reach a multivariate global audience by talking in a language theirclients can understand and relate to That's the reason why people always take muchconsideration about quality translation and its importance in this era ofglobalization Some of the places where translation plays an important role include:

Growth of Multinational Companies

Translation is really important for companies and businesses which operate inmultiple countries and often need to share and receive information from differentglobal offices and branches across the world In such cases, the shared informationneeds to be translated into a locally preferred language so that everyone canunderstand the messages from documents and text of foreign languages Translation

is also useful when companies need to tie up with local businesses, or makegovernmental proposals

Cultural Interchange

Music, literature, films, and various other art forms spread all over the worldbecause of the way they are effectively translated to reflect local languages.Translated and subtitled films today generate more revenue than ever for the globalfilm industry It's not only the film industry which has benefited from translation butalso translated music and literature allows artists to earn more royalties andinternational fame as an added bonus

A Nation's External Affairs

Today, international diplomacy is the most important aspect of a nation'sexternal affairs In a global summit or new economic deal, diplomats and worldleaders always present their ideas and thoughts in a language they are comfortable

in It is very important that these ideas are translated in an expressive, condoning, and accurate manner The errors of translation can lead to big problemsbetween diplomatic relations of two or more nations Therefore, Translators arealways serious in translating any documents relating to politics

non-Boost in Tourism

Translation can effectively help to solve problems in tourism The translatedtourism materials not only help tourists feel welcome in an unknown country, but

also boost the country's popularity as a tourist friendly destination, thereby leading

to significant tourism-related revenues

Source text: It is a big lion!

Target text: Nó là một lớn sư tử!

2.4.2. Literal translation

The SL grammatical construction is converted to the nearest TL equivalentsbut the lexical words are again translated singly, out of context As a pre-translationprocess, this indicates the problems to be solved For example:

Source text: This program is sponsored by Wall.

Target text: Chương trình này do Wall tài trợ.

2.4.3. Faithful translation

A faithful translation is used when translators want to reproduce the precisecontextual meaning of the SL within the restriction of the TL grammaticalstructures It converts cultural words but reserves the degree of grammatical andlexical “abnormality” in the translation It attempts to be completely faithful to theintentions and text-realization of the SL writer For example:

Source text: We could see the Mekong River winding its way through the

“meaning” where appropriate so that no assonance, word-play or repetition jars infinished version For example:

Source text: The third world is vulnerable owing to its extreme specialization.

The export earnings of many developing countries are based on just two or three main products.

Target text: Thế giới thứ ba dễ dàng bị tổn thất vì sự chuyên môn hóa quá

mức Ở nhiều nước đang phát triển, thu nhập từ xuất khẩu chủ yếu dựa vào hai hay

ba sản phẩm chủ lực mà thôi.

2.4.5. Adaptation translation

This seems to be the freest form of translation It is used mainly for plays andpoetry in which the themes, characters and plots are usually preserved, the SLculture converted to the TL culture and text rewritten by an established dramatist orpoet has produced many poor adaptations but other adaptation has “rescued” periodplays For example:

Source text: It would rather the victorious brightness

In an only moment the centenary twinkle

Target text: Thà một phút huy hoàng rồi chợt tắt

Còn hơn buồn le lói suốt trăm năm.

2.4.6. Free translation

This reproduces the matter without the manner, or the content without theform of the original Usually it is a paraphrase much longer than the original, a so-called “intralingua translation”, often prolix and pretentious and not translation atall For example:

Source text: That guy is as poor as a church mouse.

Target text: Anh ta nghèo rớt mồng tơi.

2.4.7. Idiomatic translation

Idiomatic translation reproduces the “message” of the original but tends todistort nuances of meaning by preferring colloquialisms and the idiom where these

do not exists in the original For example:

Source text: She is pulling my leg.

Target text: Cô ấy đang lừa dối tôi.

2.4.8. Communicative translation

Communicative translation attempts to reader the exact contextual meaning ofthe original in such a way that both content and language are readily acceptable andcomprehensible to the readership For example:

Source text: Good morning!

Target text: Bác đi đâu đấy ạ!

2.4.9. Other translation

Beside the above common the types of translation, some of the followingtypes are sometime used during translation process They include: servicetranslation, plum prose translation, information translation, cognitive translation,academic translation

2.5. Passive Voice

2.5.1. Definition of voice

According to the opinion of Crystal (2002),“Voice is a grammatical category

of verbs that is related to what thing or person is acting and what thing or person isbeing acted upon” [13] Moreover, in grammar, the voice (also called diathesis) of averb describes the relationship between the action that the verb expresses and theparticipants identified by its arguments (subject, object, etc.) When the subject isthe agent or doer of the action, the verb is in the active voice When the subject isthe patient, target or undergo-er of the action, it is said to be in the passive voice.”2.5.2. Definition of passive voice

Some people have proposed the different definition of passive voice.According to Wikipedia, “Passive voice is a grammatical voice common in manylanguages In a clause with passive voice, the grammatical subject expresses thetheme or patient of the main verb – that is, the person or thing that undergoes theaction or has its state changed This contrasts with active voice, in which the subjecthas the agent role”[14] In other definition of English Passive Voice (2009), it isstated that “The passive voice is a grammatical construction (a voice) in which thesubject of a sentence or clause denotes the recipient of the action rather than theperformer” [15] The passive voice is thus extremely useful in academic writingbecause it allows writers to highlight the most important participants or eventswithin sentences by placing them at the beginning of the sentence

2.5.3. Passive voice in English

The passive voice is commonly formed by combining a form of the "to be

verb" with the past participle (P.P) of the main verb BE + P.P We call this type as

“Be passive”.

The passive voice is more commonly used in English than it is in otherlanguages As well as being used in everyday English, the passive is usedextensively in official documents and scientific papers

Ex: The ball was struck by the boy.

Gold has been found by the explorers.

Passive voice is normally formed with “to be + a past participle” InVietnamese, translate passive sentence is “bị” (negative meaning) or “được”(positive meaning)

Ex: Chris was shot yesterday.

Chris đã bị bắn ngày hôm qua.

I was nominated to be the manager.

Tôi đã được đề cử làm giám đốc.

We can use the passive voice in any tense by changing the form of "to be"

Ex: My bike was stolen (past tense)

My bike is being stolen (present tense)

When we want to include the one who performed the action in a passivesentence, we use the phrase “by” after the verb

Ex: Danny will be picked up by his mother.

Sometimes, the verb “to get” is substituted for "to be"

Ex: My cat got run over last night.

2.5.4. Passive voice in Vietnamese

Vietnamese passive formation is mainly based on the lexical meaning or

grammatical status of such word as “bị/ được/phải/do”.

Ex: Nó bị đánh (He was beaten) In this sentence, “bị” is followed by a

transitive verb-“đánh”

In contrast, merely transitive verbs can involve in the English passiveconstructions Furthermore, whereas the morphemes of the English passive carry

the neutral implication, “bị” and “được” in Vietnamese language convey thenegative and positive meaning Vietnamese passive formation is mainly based on

the lexical meaning or grammatical status of such word as “bị/ được/phải”.

However, in some cases, the passive meaning is understood mainly on the semanticmeaning of the whole sentence

For example:

- Thuyền đẩy ra xa.

- Cầu đã xây xong.

These sentences are grammatical correct In term of semantic, these soundsillogic because "thuyền/ cầu" is an object and it can not carry out the action itself Inunderstanding these sentences, the reader/ hearer need to be conscious that there arepassive meanings

In both English and Vietnamese, passive voice is used to focus on the fact, theaction or result of an action Therefore, in passive sentence, the doers are oftenomitted Despite of being mentioned, it plays a very rigid role

Passive voice has an important role in English, especially in academic workswhere the actions taken place without mentioning the doer, Vietnamese, vice versa,prefer active form Hence, sometimes when translating from English intoVietnamese, if the translators keep the original structure, the Vietnamese versionwill not very idiomatic and natural We can take here several examples from thepassage

English sentence: A recommendation for approval or rejection is made to the

Australian and New Zealand Food Standards Council.

- should not be translated word by word: “Một khuyến nghị được làm…”

Vietnamese sentence: Người ta cho rằng ANZFSC đưa ra khuyến nghị hoặc

chấp nhận hoặc bác bỏ

In reality, there is still another quite interesting thing of usingbị/được/phải/chịu, especially in spoken languages in the Northern Vietnam

For example:

- Body của chị hơi bị được đấy!

- Em của tôi hơi bị xinh đấy!