International Journal of Linguistics and Translation Studies, Apr 16, 2024
This paper sets out to discuss the notions of tense and aspect in a cross-linguistic perspective.... more This paper sets out to discuss the notions of tense and aspect in a cross-linguistic perspective. Indeed, the translation of tenses from English into French and vice-versa reveals interesting phenomena relating to aspect, which is a verbal category, time, pragmatics, and epistemology, i.e. the theory of knowledge. The term pragmatics is used in this paper following the definition given by Sonnenhauser (2008, p.2085) in a paper entitled Aspect interpretation in Russian-a pragmatic account: ''Pragmatics deals with the processes that guide the search for additional information provided by the encyclopedic knowledge associated with the respective lexical items, by background assumptions, etc., and with its combination with the semantically encoded information.'' What this means is that in Russian aspectology, the meaning of aspectual verbs is semantically encoded in the lexicon, but their interpretation requires a pragmatic inference that takes into account the context and encyclopedic knowledge
Studies in linguistics and literature, Apr 8, 2024
The aim of this paper is pedagogical since it seeks to explain the concept of methodology in tran... more The aim of this paper is pedagogical since it seeks to explain the concept of methodology in translation studies and to provide students with research skills. Furthermore, the paper discusses relevant methodological approaches, research procedures, and several types of research undertaken in translation studies. The approach adopted is qualitative. The examples of research approaches mentioned in this paper proceed from the ideas and theories developed by David James (2015),
The aim of this paper is to discuss the concept of minority languages and the time when they star... more The aim of this paper is to discuss the concept of minority languages and the time when they started emerging in translation. Indeed, minority languages became a central issue at the end of the colonial era thanks to a number of institutional policies and political movements aimed at giving a voice to people who did not have a say for a number of reasons. The growing interest in these minority languages opened up a new avenue in terms of cultural exchanges and representation in translation. Nowadays translators have to cope with what some authors have rightly called the cultural turn which exposes them to a multiplicity of international human and social experience evolving across continents. Michael Cronin, Susan Bassnett and other authors have admitted that translators mediate through cultures and languages. Furthermore, the languages of the former colonisers, i.e. English and French, have also been the subject of variations in the sense that new world views, idioms, phrases, proverbs and uses have emerged here and there in both Anglophone and Francophone countries and translators are constantly called upon to give them a "new life in another language and culture". The methodology of the paper is both descriptive and analytical. In this logic, examples of "different" uses of both English and French in linguistic practices overseas will be given and analysed from cultural, temporal, social, philosophical, stylistic, semantic and lexical points of view. As a result, linguistic varieties and transformations have created a new situation whereby the languages of the former colonisers are just like "variables" with many "variants" around the globe. Two dimensions of translation, i.e. intra-lingual and extra-lingual translation, come into play. From another point of view, ethnic minority groups, the youth and immigrants also contribute to broadening the scope of minority languages and linguistic varieties.
International Journal of Linguistics, Literature and Translation, 2020
The aim of this paper is to discuss the impact of the multicultural dimension of English on the t... more The aim of this paper is to discuss the impact of the multicultural dimension of English on the translation of academic diplomas issued at secondary school level in French-speaking countries. Translators have difficulty in finding the equivalents of the diplomas in English (the target language). The methodology of the paper is both descriptive and comparative. On the one hand, the polycentric nature of the English language is described and its implications for translation are underlined. On the other hand, a comparative approach is used in comparing the diplomas from both linguistic communities. The findings of the paper revealed that translating from the source language (French) into English is both a linguistic and, particularly, a cultural transaction. There are three circles of English in the world, making the search for equivalents particularly complex. Translation under these conditions needs to adopt a functional approach by taking into account the realities of the target lan...
The aim of this paper is to discuss the concept of minority languages and the time when they star... more The aim of this paper is to discuss the concept of minority languages and the time when they started emerging in translation. Indeed, minority languages became a central issue at the end of the colonial era thanks to a number of institutional policies and political movements aimed at giving a voice to people who did not have a say for a number of reasons. The growing interest in these minority languages opened up a new avenue in terms of cultural exchanges and representation in translation. Nowadays translators have to cope with what some authors have rightly called the cultural turn which exposes them to a multiplicity of international human and social experience evolving across continents. Michael Cronin, Susan Bassnett and other authors have admitted that translators mediate through cultures and languages. Furthermore, the languages of the former colonisers, i.e. English and French, have also been the subject of variations in the sense that new world views, idioms, phrases, proverbs and uses have emerged here and there in both Anglophone and Francophone countries and translators are constantly called upon to give them a "new life in another language and culture". The methodology of the paper is both descriptive and analytical. In this logic, examples of "different" uses of both English and French in linguistic practices overseas will be given and analysed from cultural, temporal, social, philosophical, stylistic, semantic and lexical points of view. As a result, linguistic varieties and transformations have created a new situation whereby the languages of the former colonisers are just like "variables" with many "variants" around the globe. Two dimensions of translation, i.e. intra-lingual and extra-lingual translation, come into play. From another point of view, ethnic minority groups, the youth and immigrants also contribute to broadening the scope of minority languages and linguistic varieties.
This study builds on the interpersonal meaning strand of the Systemic Functional Linguistics to h... more This study builds on the interpersonal meaning strand of the Systemic Functional Linguistics to highlight the suasive power of human language. In itemizing Lamang‘s electioneering campaign speech via such toolkits as mood, modality and personal pronouns, this paper employs a qualitative technique. It finds that the avalanche of mood types used by Lamang is made up of declarative clauses, which are echoed to convey information and convince the audience with positive facts. As to modal verbal operators, they are used to evince the speaker‘s adamant determination, and his unflinching commitment to move the whole country forward out of the dark ages and also build up his authority and selfishness. The prominent application of personal pronouns namely: ―we‖ and ―you‖ – ―we‖ patterns, is meant to create an intimate dialogic style which can shorten the distance between the speaker and the audience, weaken the power and maintain a reliant and equal relationship between them. This greatly he...
Le mouvement syndical, en Afrique, fut initie par des ouvriers qui luttaient pour de meilleures c... more Le mouvement syndical, en Afrique, fut initie par des ouvriers qui luttaient pour de meilleures conditions de travail et de vie. Au debut, leurs luttes etaient dirigees contre les entreprises capitalistes europeennes qui exploitaient les richesses naturelles des territoires occupes et qui imposaient des conditions de travail difficiles aux peuples colonises. Le travail force, le portage et l’impot de capitation etaient quelques-unes des caracteristiques des pratiques des entreprises europeennes. Malgre les legislations adoptees dans les metropoles europeennes a partir de 1922 pour reglementer la mise au travail force des Africains, les ouvriers participaient aux cotes des partis politiques africains a la lutte pour la decolonisation et l’independance des pays africains apres la deuxieme Guerre mondiale. Cependant, les relations entre les partis politiques et les organisations syndicales ont, par la suite, change, car les partis ont reussi a infeoder le mouvement syndical dans la plu...
Summary – This paper analyses the notion of aspect in the translation of a brief economic report ... more Summary – This paper analyses the notion of aspect in the translation of a brief economic report publicised by a labour organisation called ITUC-Africa. Indeed, aspect plays an important role in translation. For example, it dictates the choice of tense(s) in the target language. In other words,the choice of a tense in a target language depends on the aspect described by the verb in the source language. Several examples are given to illustrate this finding. The paper also notes that aspect is not simply a grammatical notion because in Slavic languages like Russian, it is marked by mere prefixes. In addition, aspect involves not only the verb but also the action described by it. Action plays an important role in the study of aspect. Aspect structures the action described by the verb in phases. Indeed, the paper gives several examples of phases including the inceptive phase, the progressive phase, the phase of completion, the durative phase. Furthermore, aspect is presented as a categ...
The globalisation process, which has brought about drastic changes in the global economy, has aff... more The globalisation process, which has brought about drastic changes in the global economy, has affected contemporary translation in many ways. As Michael Cronin (2003) puts it in Translation and Globalisation,-if contemporary reality is inescapably multicultural and multinational, then it makes sense to look at a discipline which has mediation between cultures and languages as a central concern to assist us in understanding globalisation.‖ It is in this context that this paper aims to show that due to globalisation, translation is influenced by the rise of e-commerce and localisation as well as by automation, the rise of supra-national organisations, time constraints and the centrality of specific languages. The methodology of the paper is mostly descriptive. Indeed, the historical conditions that gave rise to globalisation are recalled briefly, and the link between translation and globalisation is described along the lines drawn by several authors including Denis Thouard, Michael Oustinoff and Joanna Nowicki, Louis-Jean Calvet and Michel Rochard. The major finding of the paper is that the way translation is done in the ICT era is different from the way it used to be done with pen and paper. Machine translation is quite successful in some institutions but in most cases, it is poor and needs to be revised. Major organisations use translation memories to save money and time. Translation remains a major medium for the spread of knowledge. The centrality of a few languages in the global system of translation is putting peripheral languages at risk.
International Journal of Linguistics, Literature and Translation, 2020
The aim of this paper is to make an inventory of the problems that translators encounter when the... more The aim of this paper is to make an inventory of the problems that translators encounter when they translate the documents issued by a specific African human rights court. More specifically translating at the ACHPR requires the knowledge of legal language and familiarity with a particular type of legal texts as well as competence in human rights conventions and charters and general translation skills. In an attempt to address these issues, this paper adopts a threefold approach, namely a historical approach recalling some legal systems and traditions upheld by courts, a theoretical approach throwing light on some key concepts and a lexical approach that makes it possible to extract legal terms from texts issued by the court and match them with their equivalents in the target language. The result of this research work is that legal translation is a specialised area due to the legal terms and systems involved in it. Unlike other specialised areas where the link between the signifier a...
The aim of this paper is to shed light on the contribution of semantic categories to translation.... more The aim of this paper is to shed light on the contribution of semantic categories to translation. To this end, the paper uses both a theoretical and a descriptive approach. Indeed, the theories relating to the terms category and semantic categories are presented. Then, the functions of semantic categories are described in translated sentences. Finally, the paper has found that the kernels of English sentences together with the transformations that can be derived from every clause or phrase are key aspects of sentence comprehension and stylistic differences. Equally important is the finding that translation becomes easier and more technical when the functions of semantic categories are applied in sentence construction.
Translation is the transfer of meaning from a source language to a target language. This transfer... more Translation is the transfer of meaning from a source language to a target language. This transfer is done through sentences. Sentence meaning is conveyed through words, tenses, aspects and modals. This paper focuses on tenses, aspects and modals as elements of sentence semantics. The choice of these elements in the target language is complex most of the time because there is no perfect fit between them in two languages. Résumé-La traduction est le transfert de sens d'une langue source à une langue cible. Ce transfert se fait à travers des phrases. Le sens d'une phrase est véhiculé par les mots, le temps, l'aspect et la modalité. Cet article met l'accent sur le temps, l'aspect et la modalité en tant qu'éléments constitutifs de la sémantique de la phrase. Le choix de ces éléments dans la langue cible est complexe la plupart du temps parce qu'il n'y a pas de correspondance parfaite entre eux dans deux langues différentes.
English Language Teaching and Linguistics Studies, 2020
The aim of this paper is to discuss four aspects of translation and interpreting teaching, namely... more The aim of this paper is to discuss four aspects of translation and interpreting teaching, namely the pedagogical approach (i.e., objectivism vs. constructivism), translation ability and interpreter performance as well as translation and interpreting theory and practical classroom activities. The methodology is mostly descriptive and constructive in the sense that the paper “constructs” translation ability and interpreter performance and describes relevant teaching approaches to be adopted. One of the findings of the paper is that translation and interpreting teaching should either validate or change traditional pedagogical methods by new and more effective ones. Another finding of the paper is that translation and interpreting teaching should indicate clear-cut learning objectives, design adequate curricular materials and shed light on professional ethics and policies.
International Journal of Linguistics and Translation Studies, Apr 16, 2024
This paper sets out to discuss the notions of tense and aspect in a cross-linguistic perspective.... more This paper sets out to discuss the notions of tense and aspect in a cross-linguistic perspective. Indeed, the translation of tenses from English into French and vice-versa reveals interesting phenomena relating to aspect, which is a verbal category, time, pragmatics, and epistemology, i.e. the theory of knowledge. The term pragmatics is used in this paper following the definition given by Sonnenhauser (2008, p.2085) in a paper entitled Aspect interpretation in Russian-a pragmatic account: ''Pragmatics deals with the processes that guide the search for additional information provided by the encyclopedic knowledge associated with the respective lexical items, by background assumptions, etc., and with its combination with the semantically encoded information.'' What this means is that in Russian aspectology, the meaning of aspectual verbs is semantically encoded in the lexicon, but their interpretation requires a pragmatic inference that takes into account the context and encyclopedic knowledge
Studies in linguistics and literature, Apr 8, 2024
The aim of this paper is pedagogical since it seeks to explain the concept of methodology in tran... more The aim of this paper is pedagogical since it seeks to explain the concept of methodology in translation studies and to provide students with research skills. Furthermore, the paper discusses relevant methodological approaches, research procedures, and several types of research undertaken in translation studies. The approach adopted is qualitative. The examples of research approaches mentioned in this paper proceed from the ideas and theories developed by David James (2015),
The aim of this paper is to discuss the concept of minority languages and the time when they star... more The aim of this paper is to discuss the concept of minority languages and the time when they started emerging in translation. Indeed, minority languages became a central issue at the end of the colonial era thanks to a number of institutional policies and political movements aimed at giving a voice to people who did not have a say for a number of reasons. The growing interest in these minority languages opened up a new avenue in terms of cultural exchanges and representation in translation. Nowadays translators have to cope with what some authors have rightly called the cultural turn which exposes them to a multiplicity of international human and social experience evolving across continents. Michael Cronin, Susan Bassnett and other authors have admitted that translators mediate through cultures and languages. Furthermore, the languages of the former colonisers, i.e. English and French, have also been the subject of variations in the sense that new world views, idioms, phrases, proverbs and uses have emerged here and there in both Anglophone and Francophone countries and translators are constantly called upon to give them a "new life in another language and culture". The methodology of the paper is both descriptive and analytical. In this logic, examples of "different" uses of both English and French in linguistic practices overseas will be given and analysed from cultural, temporal, social, philosophical, stylistic, semantic and lexical points of view. As a result, linguistic varieties and transformations have created a new situation whereby the languages of the former colonisers are just like "variables" with many "variants" around the globe. Two dimensions of translation, i.e. intra-lingual and extra-lingual translation, come into play. From another point of view, ethnic minority groups, the youth and immigrants also contribute to broadening the scope of minority languages and linguistic varieties.
International Journal of Linguistics, Literature and Translation, 2020
The aim of this paper is to discuss the impact of the multicultural dimension of English on the t... more The aim of this paper is to discuss the impact of the multicultural dimension of English on the translation of academic diplomas issued at secondary school level in French-speaking countries. Translators have difficulty in finding the equivalents of the diplomas in English (the target language). The methodology of the paper is both descriptive and comparative. On the one hand, the polycentric nature of the English language is described and its implications for translation are underlined. On the other hand, a comparative approach is used in comparing the diplomas from both linguistic communities. The findings of the paper revealed that translating from the source language (French) into English is both a linguistic and, particularly, a cultural transaction. There are three circles of English in the world, making the search for equivalents particularly complex. Translation under these conditions needs to adopt a functional approach by taking into account the realities of the target lan...
The aim of this paper is to discuss the concept of minority languages and the time when they star... more The aim of this paper is to discuss the concept of minority languages and the time when they started emerging in translation. Indeed, minority languages became a central issue at the end of the colonial era thanks to a number of institutional policies and political movements aimed at giving a voice to people who did not have a say for a number of reasons. The growing interest in these minority languages opened up a new avenue in terms of cultural exchanges and representation in translation. Nowadays translators have to cope with what some authors have rightly called the cultural turn which exposes them to a multiplicity of international human and social experience evolving across continents. Michael Cronin, Susan Bassnett and other authors have admitted that translators mediate through cultures and languages. Furthermore, the languages of the former colonisers, i.e. English and French, have also been the subject of variations in the sense that new world views, idioms, phrases, proverbs and uses have emerged here and there in both Anglophone and Francophone countries and translators are constantly called upon to give them a "new life in another language and culture". The methodology of the paper is both descriptive and analytical. In this logic, examples of "different" uses of both English and French in linguistic practices overseas will be given and analysed from cultural, temporal, social, philosophical, stylistic, semantic and lexical points of view. As a result, linguistic varieties and transformations have created a new situation whereby the languages of the former colonisers are just like "variables" with many "variants" around the globe. Two dimensions of translation, i.e. intra-lingual and extra-lingual translation, come into play. From another point of view, ethnic minority groups, the youth and immigrants also contribute to broadening the scope of minority languages and linguistic varieties.
This study builds on the interpersonal meaning strand of the Systemic Functional Linguistics to h... more This study builds on the interpersonal meaning strand of the Systemic Functional Linguistics to highlight the suasive power of human language. In itemizing Lamang‘s electioneering campaign speech via such toolkits as mood, modality and personal pronouns, this paper employs a qualitative technique. It finds that the avalanche of mood types used by Lamang is made up of declarative clauses, which are echoed to convey information and convince the audience with positive facts. As to modal verbal operators, they are used to evince the speaker‘s adamant determination, and his unflinching commitment to move the whole country forward out of the dark ages and also build up his authority and selfishness. The prominent application of personal pronouns namely: ―we‖ and ―you‖ – ―we‖ patterns, is meant to create an intimate dialogic style which can shorten the distance between the speaker and the audience, weaken the power and maintain a reliant and equal relationship between them. This greatly he...
Le mouvement syndical, en Afrique, fut initie par des ouvriers qui luttaient pour de meilleures c... more Le mouvement syndical, en Afrique, fut initie par des ouvriers qui luttaient pour de meilleures conditions de travail et de vie. Au debut, leurs luttes etaient dirigees contre les entreprises capitalistes europeennes qui exploitaient les richesses naturelles des territoires occupes et qui imposaient des conditions de travail difficiles aux peuples colonises. Le travail force, le portage et l’impot de capitation etaient quelques-unes des caracteristiques des pratiques des entreprises europeennes. Malgre les legislations adoptees dans les metropoles europeennes a partir de 1922 pour reglementer la mise au travail force des Africains, les ouvriers participaient aux cotes des partis politiques africains a la lutte pour la decolonisation et l’independance des pays africains apres la deuxieme Guerre mondiale. Cependant, les relations entre les partis politiques et les organisations syndicales ont, par la suite, change, car les partis ont reussi a infeoder le mouvement syndical dans la plu...
Summary – This paper analyses the notion of aspect in the translation of a brief economic report ... more Summary – This paper analyses the notion of aspect in the translation of a brief economic report publicised by a labour organisation called ITUC-Africa. Indeed, aspect plays an important role in translation. For example, it dictates the choice of tense(s) in the target language. In other words,the choice of a tense in a target language depends on the aspect described by the verb in the source language. Several examples are given to illustrate this finding. The paper also notes that aspect is not simply a grammatical notion because in Slavic languages like Russian, it is marked by mere prefixes. In addition, aspect involves not only the verb but also the action described by it. Action plays an important role in the study of aspect. Aspect structures the action described by the verb in phases. Indeed, the paper gives several examples of phases including the inceptive phase, the progressive phase, the phase of completion, the durative phase. Furthermore, aspect is presented as a categ...
The globalisation process, which has brought about drastic changes in the global economy, has aff... more The globalisation process, which has brought about drastic changes in the global economy, has affected contemporary translation in many ways. As Michael Cronin (2003) puts it in Translation and Globalisation,-if contemporary reality is inescapably multicultural and multinational, then it makes sense to look at a discipline which has mediation between cultures and languages as a central concern to assist us in understanding globalisation.‖ It is in this context that this paper aims to show that due to globalisation, translation is influenced by the rise of e-commerce and localisation as well as by automation, the rise of supra-national organisations, time constraints and the centrality of specific languages. The methodology of the paper is mostly descriptive. Indeed, the historical conditions that gave rise to globalisation are recalled briefly, and the link between translation and globalisation is described along the lines drawn by several authors including Denis Thouard, Michael Oustinoff and Joanna Nowicki, Louis-Jean Calvet and Michel Rochard. The major finding of the paper is that the way translation is done in the ICT era is different from the way it used to be done with pen and paper. Machine translation is quite successful in some institutions but in most cases, it is poor and needs to be revised. Major organisations use translation memories to save money and time. Translation remains a major medium for the spread of knowledge. The centrality of a few languages in the global system of translation is putting peripheral languages at risk.
International Journal of Linguistics, Literature and Translation, 2020
The aim of this paper is to make an inventory of the problems that translators encounter when the... more The aim of this paper is to make an inventory of the problems that translators encounter when they translate the documents issued by a specific African human rights court. More specifically translating at the ACHPR requires the knowledge of legal language and familiarity with a particular type of legal texts as well as competence in human rights conventions and charters and general translation skills. In an attempt to address these issues, this paper adopts a threefold approach, namely a historical approach recalling some legal systems and traditions upheld by courts, a theoretical approach throwing light on some key concepts and a lexical approach that makes it possible to extract legal terms from texts issued by the court and match them with their equivalents in the target language. The result of this research work is that legal translation is a specialised area due to the legal terms and systems involved in it. Unlike other specialised areas where the link between the signifier a...
The aim of this paper is to shed light on the contribution of semantic categories to translation.... more The aim of this paper is to shed light on the contribution of semantic categories to translation. To this end, the paper uses both a theoretical and a descriptive approach. Indeed, the theories relating to the terms category and semantic categories are presented. Then, the functions of semantic categories are described in translated sentences. Finally, the paper has found that the kernels of English sentences together with the transformations that can be derived from every clause or phrase are key aspects of sentence comprehension and stylistic differences. Equally important is the finding that translation becomes easier and more technical when the functions of semantic categories are applied in sentence construction.
Translation is the transfer of meaning from a source language to a target language. This transfer... more Translation is the transfer of meaning from a source language to a target language. This transfer is done through sentences. Sentence meaning is conveyed through words, tenses, aspects and modals. This paper focuses on tenses, aspects and modals as elements of sentence semantics. The choice of these elements in the target language is complex most of the time because there is no perfect fit between them in two languages. Résumé-La traduction est le transfert de sens d'une langue source à une langue cible. Ce transfert se fait à travers des phrases. Le sens d'une phrase est véhiculé par les mots, le temps, l'aspect et la modalité. Cet article met l'accent sur le temps, l'aspect et la modalité en tant qu'éléments constitutifs de la sémantique de la phrase. Le choix de ces éléments dans la langue cible est complexe la plupart du temps parce qu'il n'y a pas de correspondance parfaite entre eux dans deux langues différentes.
English Language Teaching and Linguistics Studies, 2020
The aim of this paper is to discuss four aspects of translation and interpreting teaching, namely... more The aim of this paper is to discuss four aspects of translation and interpreting teaching, namely the pedagogical approach (i.e., objectivism vs. constructivism), translation ability and interpreter performance as well as translation and interpreting theory and practical classroom activities. The methodology is mostly descriptive and constructive in the sense that the paper “constructs” translation ability and interpreter performance and describes relevant teaching approaches to be adopted. One of the findings of the paper is that translation and interpreting teaching should either validate or change traditional pedagogical methods by new and more effective ones. Another finding of the paper is that translation and interpreting teaching should indicate clear-cut learning objectives, design adequate curricular materials and shed light on professional ethics and policies.
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