23. Transcription. Transliteration

There are two ways of rendering proper names in translation: transcription and transliteration.

Transcription - The representation of the sound of the words in a language using another alphabet or set of symbols created for that purpose. Transcription is not concerned with representing characters: it strives to give a phonetically (or phonologically) accurate representation of the word. This may differ, depending on the language or set of symbols into which the word is being transcribed. Because transcription attempts to recreate the meaning-bearing sounds of the original using the alphabet(s) and spelling conventions of the language into which it is transcribed, multiple spellings of the same word are possible for a single language, and dozens may be encountered if searching across languages.

Transcription is now universally accepted: Mary – Мэри. Phonetic peculiarities, however, sometimes interfere and modify this principle by causing certain departures, e.g. the name of the well-known novelist Iris Murdoch is rendered with the inserted letter (and sound) “p” – Айрис Мэрдок.

Transliteration or representing a SL word by means of the more or less corresponding TL characters, that is, in a graphic way, is no longer regarded as an acceptable method of rendering proper names in translation.Transliteration is not concerned with representing the phonetics of the original: it only strives to accurately represent the characters.

But tradition has preserved it in some cases and therefore this method still survives, e.g. Lincoln is rendered as Линкольн and Wellington as Веллингтон. O’Henry – О’Генри.

Hollywood - Голливуд

Beatles – Битлз

24. Occasional lacuna and the problem of translation

Non-equivalents are SL words which have no corresponding lexical units in the TL vocabulary.

The absence of equivalents may be explained both by extralinguistic and linguistic reasons. Accordingly, non-equivalents may be divided into two groups. The first group consists of words denoting referents unknown in the target language – things, objects, notions, features of national life, customs, habits, etc. the words of this group bear a distinctly national character and are tied up with the history of the people speaking that language, the growth of its culture, its way of life and traditions. The words belonging to this group cover a wide range of denotation, e.g. speaker, parliament, public school, landslide, coroner, teach-in, drive-in, know-how, striptease, brain drain, backbencher, grill-room, as well as titles of politeness, etc.

The second group embraces words which for some linguistic reason have no equivalents in the target language, the so-called linguistic lacuna, e.g. privacy, involvement, glimpse, conservationist, environmentalist, oralist, readership, riser, bedder, vote-getter, statehood, etc.

There are three ways of rendering non-equivalents in translation.

1. By Borrowings

The borrowed words may be either transliterated or transcribed, e.g. ale –эль, roastbeef – ростбиф, sweater – свитер (transliterated borrowings). Parliament – парламент, striptease – стриптиз, speaker – спикер, know-how – ноу-хау, establishment – истэблишмент (transcribed borrowings).

2. By translation loans

House of Commons – Палата Общин, backbencher – заднескамеечник, brain trust – мозговой трест.

3. By Descriptive or Interpreting Translation

Landslide – победа на выборах с огромным перевесом голосов;

a stringer (америк.) – частично занятый корреспондент, труд которого оплачивается из расчета количества слов;

a conservationist (environmentalist) – человек, озабоченный загрязнением или уничтожением окружающей среды.

25. Antonymic translation

Antonymic translation is employed for the sake of achieving faithfulness in conveying content or the necessary expressiveness of sense units. It represents a way of rendering when an affirmative in structure language unit (word, word-combination or sentence) is conveyed via a negative in sense or structure but identical in content language unit, or vice versa: a negative in sense or structure sense unit is translated via an affirmative sense unit. E.g. to have quite a few friends - мати багато (немало) друзів; mind your own business - не втручайся не в свої справи; take it easy - не хвилюйся; not infrequently - часто; я не нездужую нівроку - І feel perfectly well.

The antonymic device is employed in the following cases:

1. when in the target language there is no direct equivalent for the sense unit of the source language. For example, the noun «inferiority» and the adjective «inferior» (like the verb phrase «to be inferior») have no single-word equivalents in Ukrainian. So their lexical meaning can be conveyed either in a descriptive way or with the help of their antonyms «superiority», «superior»: The defeat of the Notts in last season's cup semi-finals was certainly the result of their physical and tactical inferiority... Поразка клубу «Ноттінгем Форест» у торішньому півфінальному матчі на кубок країни була наслідком переваги їхніх супротивників у фізичній і тактичній підготовці.

The meaning of some English word-groups can also be conveyed in Ukrainian antonymically only: Baines was sitting in his shirt-sleeves. Бейнз сидів без піджака. Do you mind this? Ви не заперечуєте?

2. When the sense unit of the source language has two negations of its own which create an affirmation: In those clothes she was by no means non-elegant. У цьому вбранні вона була досить елеґантна.

3. In order to achieve the necessary expressiveness in narration: I don't think it will hurt you. Думаю, вам воно не зашкодить. A shell fell close. Неподалік вибухнув снаряд.

4. In order to avoid the use of the same or identical structures close to each other in a text (stylistic aim and means): She was a woman of character. Вона була жінкою не без характеру. Most of the staff is not away. Більшість співробітників ще на роботі. Savina said nothing. Савіна промовчала.