Monday, January 18, 2010

Abu- Dīb 's Translation of Orientalism:

Abstract

Despite the flourishing movement of translation in the Arab world throughout the 20th century, few studies, if any, were produced, as hoc, on criticism and evaluation of such translations.

Among these translations, the translation of Edward W. Said's Orientalism deserves special attention: it was translated into 36 languages including Arabic. The Arabic translation by the famous poet, critic and translator, Kamal Abu-Dib, was reprinted many times after its first edition in 1981. yet, concern was shown regarding some problems in the translation of this excellent work by some readers and translators.

Drawing on the progress, achieved in the last few decades, in linguistics studies, especially in text-linguistics and related studies in translation, this study aims to ascertain salient problems in the Arabic translation of Orientalism, on the graphical, lexical, syntactic, semantic and pragmatic levels, and to suggest solutions where possible.

The study will also investigate the consistency of the methodology adopted by the translator, evaluated the translation, and give recommendations that may benefit new Arabic editions of the book and Arabic translation, in general.


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Managing and Emotiveness in the Production and Translation of Ideology: A Case Study of the Israeli Incursion into Gaza ( 2006)

Abstract

This study is aimed at exploring the implications and applications of two text-linguistic notions: ''managing'' and ''emotiveness with special reference to the production and translation of sensitive news texts. It shows how Israeli media writers use various manipulative strategies in reporting the Israeli incursion into the Gaza Strip in 2006. Additionally, and more significantly, the study explores the ways translators approach sensitive news reports loaded with ideological content and news media norms to redraw the ideological map impinged in translated media discourse.

For the purpose of analysis, three main news articles along with many sample texts are extracted from two Israeli newspapers, namely: Haaretz and the Jerusalem Post (2006). The data is analyzed in accordance with discourse analysis approaches (de Beaugrande and Dressler 1981, Brwon and Yule 1983, Basil Hatim 1990, 1997). As far as translation is of interest, the researcher has designed three content-based questionnaires of each fifteen copies were distributed as translation assignments to Palestinian students enrolled in the MA Program of Applied Linguistics and Translation at An-Najah National University in Nablus. The questionnaires contain three news articles in the English version (from Haaretz & The Jerusalem Post, 2006). In two of the articles, the commission is to translate the text for Al-Quds paper. The purpose is to test which parts of the text are most nervous and to describe the translation strategies employed. The first text was left non-contextualised to determine whether translators abide by or depart from the linguistic features of the ST.

The thesis consists of five chapters: chapter one includes the introduction, methodology, organization of the study and review of related literature. Chapter two, negotiating text type in translation, focuses on the translation of hybrid texts and compares the translation with the original. Chapter three presents thematic structures and their effects on translation. It discusses the various norms of staging discourse, such as information structure, headline, passive vs. active, markedness and source quoting. It also compares the staging norms Al-Quds paper employs with translated target samples. Chapter four examines the ideological components that mark sensitive texts. It investigates the translation strategies employed in turning texts of sensitive nature into the TT. It also compares emotive sensitive lexis in the TT with those that appear in Al-Quds paper.

T

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The Translatability of Cognitive Synonyms in Shakespeare's Macbeth: A Comparative/ Contrastive Study

The Translatability of Cognitive Synonyms in

Shakespeare's Macbeth:

A Comparative/ Contrastive Study

By

Mahmoud Khaleel Mahmoud Ishrateh

Supervisor

Dr. Odeh Odeh

Abstract

This study investigates the notion of cognitive synonyms in literary works in English-Arabic translation. In order to highlight the problem under discussion, the study explores the translation of some cognitive lexical items in their original context of use. The researcher takes these cognitive synonyms from Shakespeare's Macbeth as a case study. This comparative/ contrastive study focuses on how cognitive synonyms are translated by four translators of Shakespeare's play: Jabra Ibrahim Jabra, Khalil Mutran, Farid Abu-Hadid and Hussein Ameen.

The present study argues that cognitive synonyms are harder to translate than any other lexical items due to some subtle differences that exist between cognitive synonyms. Shakespeare sometimes associates fine-grained semantic connotations with words. Synonyms are used to convey certain implications. Differences in meaning or use among pairs of synonyms are claimed to be context-dependent. The context is the only criterion for selecting appropriate words. There are many occasions when one word is appropriate in a sentence, but its synonyms will be odd. <

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Markedness Theory as it Relates to Word Order in Translation between English and Arabic

This study deals with the problem of markedness in translation between English and Arabic. The two languages differ in word order and in the relative degree of freedom in word order because Arabic is an inflectional language. Such differences create problems to translators between the two languages. A sequence in one language may not have the same meaning of a sequence in the other language although both sequences have identical word order. The Arabic sentence المعلمُ مسحَ اللوحً does not mean “The teacher cleaned the board,” although both sentences have identical word order. The English translation does not account for the marked meaning signalled in the Arabic sentence by bringing the agent to front position before the verb.

The problem of accounting for markedness in translation is approached at the sentence level between Classical Arabic and Modern Standard English. The unmarked (canonical) word order and the marked word order in Arabic are approached and justified in terms of the theory of the strength of the activity of agency in Arabic. This study also includes ways of signalling emphasis and markedness in Arabic. A distinction is made between information structure and syntactic structure of English in terms of the Hallidayan approach and the functional sentence perspective of the Prague School. Marked word order in English is approached in terms of the degree a component has on the scale of communicative dynamism. A distinction between correct and incorrect word orders in English is made in terms of phrase structure rules.

This study includes recommendations for researchers to study other factors that affect word order in English and Arabic.

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