Features of Semantic and Communicative Translation

 

Features of semantic and communicative translation (Newmark, 1991: 11-13)  11-13)  

Semantic Translation  Translation 

Communicative Translation  Translation 

1.

Reader-cen Reader-centered tered

Author-cent Author-centered ered

2. Pursues author’s thought Pursues author’s intention.  process. Related to speech. Related to though. 3.

Concerned with author

as individual

Adapts and makes the thought and cultural content of original more accessible to reader.

4.

Semantic-a Semantic-and nd syntactic-

oriented. Length of sentences, positions

Effect-oriented. Effect-orien ted. Formal features or original sacrificed more readily.

and integrity of clauses, word position, etc., preserved whenever possible. 5.

Faithful, more literal.

Faithful, freer.

6.

Informative

Effective.

7. Usually more awkward, more detailed, more complex,

Easy reading, more natural, smoother, simpler, clearer, more

but briefer.

direct, more conventional, conforming to particular register of language, but longer.

8.

Personal

Social

9.

Source language biased

Target language biased

10. Over-translate Over-translated: d: more

Under-trans Under-translated: lated: us of ‘hold-all’

 

concentrated and more

terms.

specific than original 11. More powerful

Less powerful

12. Always inferior to the

May be better than original

original because of loss of

because of gain in force and

meaning.

clarity, despite loss in semantic content.

13. Out of time and local

Ephemeral and rooted in its

place ‘eternal’. 

context, ‘existential’. 

14. Wide and universal

‘Tailor-made’ or targeted for one category of readership; does one  job, fulfils one partic particular ular functi function. on.

15. Inaccuracy is always

A certain embroidering, a stylistic

wrong

synonymy, a discreet modulation is condoned, provided the facts are straight and the reader is suitably impressed.

16. The translator has no right The translator has the right to to improve or to correct.

correct and improve the logic and style of the original, clarify ambiguities,, jargons, normalize ambiguities bizarre personal usage.

17. Mistakes in the original

The translator can correct

should (and must) be pointed

mistakes of fact in original.

out only in footnote. 18. Target: a ‘true’ version,

Target: a ‘happy’ version, i.e. a

i.e. an exact statement.

successfull act. successfu

 

19. Unit of translating: tends

Unit of translating: tends to

to words, collocations and

sentences and paragraph.

clauses. 20. Applicable to all writings

Applicable to impersonal texts.

with original expressiven expressiveness. ess. 21. Basically the w works orks of

Basically the work of translating

translating is an art.

is a craft.

22. Usually th the e work o off one

Sometimes the product of a

translator.

translation team.

23. Conforms to the ‘relativist’

Conforms to the ‘universalist’

position of cultural relativity.

position, assuming that exact translation may be possible.

24. Meaning

Message

Communicative and semantic translation may well coincide in particular, where the text conveys a general rather them a culturally bound message and where the matter is as important as the manner. Not ably than in the translation of the most important religious, philosophical, artistic and scientific text assuming second reader as informed and interested as the first. Only communicative and semantic translation fulfill the two main aims of translation, which, the first accuracy, and second in general. A semantic translation is written at the author’s linguistic level, a communicative at the readership semantic translation is used for expressive text, communicative for in formative and vocative text. Semantic and communicative translation treat the following items similarly: stock and dead metaphors, normal collocations, technical terms, slang, colloquialisms, standard notices, phaticisms, ordinary

language. The expressive components of ‘expressive’ texts (usual syntactic structures, collocations, metaphors, words peculiarly used, neologisms) are rendered closely, if not literally, but where they appear in informative and vocative text, they are normalized or toned down (except in striking advent, tenements). Cultural components tend to be transferred intact in expressive texts transferred and explained with culturally neutral terms in informative texts; replaced by cultural equivalents in vocative

texts. Badly and/or inaccurately written passages must remain so in translation if they are ‘expressive’, although the translator should comment on any mistakes of factual or moral mor al truth, if appropriate. Badly

and/or inaccurately written passages should be ‘corrected’ in communicative translation. 

 

So much for the detail, but semantic and communicative translation must also be seen as wholes. Semantic translation is personal and individual, follows the thought processes of the author, tends to over-translate, pursues nuances of meaning, yet aims at concision in order to reproduce pragmatic impact. Communicative translation is social, concentrates on the message and the main force of the text, tends to under-translate, to be sample, clear and brief, and is always written in a natural and resourceful stole. A semantic translation is normally inferior to its original, or iginal, as there is both cognitive a communicative translation is often better than its original. At a pinch, a semantic translation to explain. However, in the communicative translation of vocative texts, equivalent effect is not only desirable, it is essential; it is the criterion by which the effectiveness, and therefore the value, of the translation of notices, instructions, publicity, propaganda, persuasive or eristic writing, and perhaps popular fiction, is to join the Party, to assemble the device-could even be quantified as a percentage rate of the success of the translation. In information texts, equivalent effect is desirable only in respect re spect of their (in theory) insignificant emotional impact; it is not possible if SL and TL culture are remote from each e ach other since normally the cultural items have to be explained by culturally natural or generic terms, the topic content simplified, SL difficulties clarified. Hopefully, the TL reader reads the text with the same degree of interest as the SL reader, although the impact is different. However, the vocative (persuasive) thread in most informative texts has to be rendered r endered with an eye to the readership, i.e., with an equivalent effect purpose. In semantic translation, the first problem is that for serious imaginative literature, there are individual readers rather than a readership. Secondly, whilst the reader is not entirely neglected, the translator is essentially trying to render the effect e ffect the SL text on o n himself (to feel with, to empathize with the author), not on any putative readership. Certainly, the more ‘universal’ the text (consider ‘To be or not to be’), the more a broad equivalent e quivalent effect is possible, since the ideals of the original go beyond any cultural frontiers. The metalingual sound-effects which the translator is trying to reproduce re produce are in fact unlikely to affect the TL reader, with his different system, similarly, but here may be compensation. In any event, the reaction. reaction.[10]  [10] 

All translation a craft requiring a trained skill, continually renewed linguistic and non-linguistic knowledge and a deal of flair and imagination, as well as intelligence and above all common sense. There is no one communicative nor one semantic method of translating a text. There are in fact widely overlapping bond of method.