developments in equivalence The notion of equivalence remained as a key issue in translation throughout the 1970s and beyond For instance Chesterman 1989 notes that equivalence is obviously ID: 575423
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Slide1
Later developments in equivalence
The notion of
equivalence remained as
a key issue in translation
throughout the
1970s and beyond.
For
instance,
Chesterman
(
1989) notes
that 'equivalence is obviously
a central
concept in translation theory' while
Bassnett
(1991) devotes a
section to
'problems of equivalence' in the chapter entitled 'central issues' of
translation studies
. Slide2
Mona Baker, in In Other Words, structures
her chapters around different kinds of equivalence - at the levels of
the word
, phrase, grammar, text, pragmatics, etc.
,
but with
the proviso
that equivalence 'is influenced by a variety of linguistic and
cultural factors
and is therefore always relative
'Slide3
Equivalence and criticismKenny (1997) summarizes criticism that has targeted the 'circularity' of the definitions of equivalence: 'equivalence is supposed to define translation, and translation, in turn, defines equivalence‘.
As might be imagined, scholars working in non-linguistic translation studies have been especially critical of the notion of equivalence.
Slide4
Fore example, Bassnett summarizes the major problem as she sees it:
Translation
involves far more than replacement of lexical and grammatical
items between
languages . . . Once the translator moves away from close
linguistic equivalence
, the problems of determining the exact nature of the level of
equivalence aimed for begin to emerge.
(
Bassnett
1980/91:
25)Slide5
tertium comparationis
T
he
biggest bone of contention in the comparison of an ST and
a TT
is the so-called
tertium
comparationis
,
an invariant against which two
text segments
can be measured to gauge
variation.Slide6
The problem of the inevitable subjectivity that the invariant entails has been tackled by many scholars from a
range of theoretical backgrounds. In chapter 4, we discuss taxonomic
linguistic approaches
that have attempted to produce a comprehensive
model of translation shift analysis.Slide7
Chapter 7 considers modern descriptive translation studies; its leading proponent, Gideon
Toury
, has moved away
from a
prescriptive definition of equivalence and, accepting as given that a
TT is
'equivalent' to its ST,
instead
seeks to identify the web of
relations between
the two.
Slide8
Yet a prescriptive discussion of equivalence continues. For example, translator
training courses
inevitably
have this focus:
errors by
the trainee translators are often corrected prescriptively according to
a notion
of equivalence held by the trainer. For this reason, equivalence is
an issue that will remain central to the practice of translation, even
if translation
studies and translation theory has, for the time being at least,
marginalized
it
.