The sentential level Different grammatical arrangements create different assumptions in the listener or reader as regards the communicative purpose of an utterance For example Gogtgtgtgt Command ID: 502879
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Slide1
Sentential issues in translationSlide2
The sentential level
Different grammatical arrangements create different assumptions in the listener or reader as regards the communicative purpose of an utterance
.Slide3
For example
Go>>>> Command
No Way>>>> an expression of refusal or disbeliefSlide4
Textual Variables on
the
sentential level:
From
the point of view of Arabic/ English translation, there are three major non-syntactic features of the sentence:
1. Prosodic features such as intonation and stress
2. Theme and
rheme
3. foregrounding and
backgroundingSlide5
1. Prosodic features.
In spoken
texts,
a number of different sentences, marked for different purposes, can be created purely through intonation and stress—even though they comprise the same wordsSlide6
Stress can similarly be used in English to express different shades of meaning. English is able to stress words fairly freely in speech
Examples:
I
know that man…. The neutral or the unmarked
I
know that man
I
know
that man
I know
that
man
I know that
man
Slide7
Arabic, though it uses
stress
in the same way, does not exhibit the same freedom to shift stress within the sentence as English. Arabic can shift word order fairly freely.
أكل الرجل السمكSlide8
A lot of the features of the spoken sentential level disappear in written texts because the sentential level in written language is relatively impoverished.
Written English, of course, has punctuation marks.
a. My cousin
who lives in Bristol
visited us last week.
b. My cousin,
who lives in Bristol
, visited us last week.Slide9
In (a) the relative clause
who lives in Bristol
identifies which out of a number of possible cousins is intended. This is known as a
“defining
or restrictive
clause”.
In the second sentence, by contrast, the relative clause
who lives in Bristol
merely provides further information about a cousin who is already assumed to be identified. This is known as a
“describing
or non restrictive relative
clause”.Slide10
Punctuation in Arabic is even less systematic than punctuation in English. Traditionally, Arabic had no punctuation whatsoever, and one still occasionally comes across modern books without punctuation. However, modern books of classical Arabic texts often have
punctuations
added. Slide11
Arabic sentences are often much longer than typical English ones, forcing the Arabic /English translator to find appropriate ways of adding sentences breaks in the TT.Slide12
2. Theme and
rheme
Ayatollah Khomeini was the son of a cleric.
He
was born in 1903 in the small town of
Khomein
in Isfahan province
.
The information given by 'he' in the second sentence is predictable. It refers to some one already mentioned before in the context (Given information) so its is
the theme
.Slide13
was born in 1903 in the small town of
Khomein
in Isfahan province
, by contrast, is unpredictable;
the information here is New
, so it is the
rheme
.
The above example
illustrates
a general tendency, which is of Arabic as well as English, for theme to precede
rheme
. This can be regarded as a 'natural
order‘ in
that it mirrors the order of things in the real world; when we are trying to work out something new, we start with what is known and proceed from there to what is not known
.