Political documents and ways of their translation

Pretty often the definite article demands translation in cases when it comes before numerals.

The two sides also signed a Treaty in the Limitation of Underground Nuclear Tests.

Обидві сторонни підписали договір про обмеження підземних випробувань атомної зброї.

The Southern nations remained quiet between 1948 and 1958 as Latin America's economy grew at an impressive annual rate of 4.3 percent.

З 1948 по 1958 південні країни перебували в відносному спокої, в той час як економіка Латинської Америки розвивалась вражаючими темпами в 4,3 відсотки на рік [8,91].

In the following sentence both articles demands translation.

The influence and authority of the UN Secretariat depends to an extent (though not nearly to the extent that is popularly supposed) on the talents of one individual - the Secretary-General. The job is a peculiar one.

Вплив авторитету секретаря ООН залежить у відомій степені (хоча і не в такій степені, як зазвичай вважають) від якостей однієї людини - Генерального Секретаря. Це надзвичайно своєрідна посада [8,94].

The lexical meaning of the article is strongly expressed when it acts in like a link connecting parts of the sentences or two separate sentences as given in the example above. From the mentioned above cases we can judge that missing article translation may lead to misinterpretation or incorrect and incomplete translation of a sentence [7,250].

The role of verb complexes in English is quite evident therefore we will consider only some peculiar cases of verb transformations during translation.

First of all let us consider the verb construction with the preposition for:

…American military bases on foreign territories which are intended for launching missiles possessed by United States' armed forces.

… американські воєнні бази на територіях інших країн, які призначені для запуску ракет американськими ВВС.

In this case the infinitive construction is translated like adverbial modifier of purpose.

The construction with secondary predicate (so-called Nominative with the Infinitive) is widely used in newspaper style due to its preciseness and because it help to avoid the responsibility for the given information.

The United States Congress is aimed to control all the financial expenses of the Government.

Цілью конгресса Сполучених Штатів є контроль над усіма видатками уряду [1,116].

It is natural that transformation is required while translating sentences with participles of absolute nominative construction.

But often enough grammatical transformations are necessary while rendering conforming forms and constructions for some divergence in their meaning and usage. Such differences of opinions are observed in cases of usage of the category of number. This refers to both countable and uncountable nouns. Countable nouns have single and plural forms in both languages that usually coincide still we observe cases when their usage is different, ex.:

War Atrocity on Peace Conference Eve (news head).

Звірства (інтервентів) напередодні світової конференції. (интервентов) накануне мирной конференции

Concerning uncountable nouns, especially those expressing abstract notions we may have much more difficulties because most of them are paradigmatic. For example: ink - чорнила, money - гроші, and so on [11,266].

Increasingly, Southern Africa is becoming the arena of national liberation struggles.

Південна Африка все більше і більше стає ареною націонльно-визвольної боротьби [8,59].

Sometimes, despite the availability of the plural form in Ukrainian - its usage is impossible owing to difference in combination and usage.

The Nile Valley appears to have been unfit for human habitation during the Stone Ages.

Долина Нілу, очевидно, булла не придатна для життя людини на протязі всього кам'яного віку. [8,59].

Age expression is of a historical nature and is never used in plural.

In cases when plural form is to be preserved for it carries some inherent sense one has to apply countable nouns, ex.:

Strikes broke out in many British industries.

В ряді галузей промисловості Англіх вибухнули забастовки.

Sometimes, owing to some reasons some of constructions has wider usage in one languages comparing with other languages. The best example of this is the passive form - widely used in English mostly due to disappearance of word flexion. As a result, both indirect and predicative object maybe transformed into the objects of passive construction [11, 267]

Stones and bottles were showered upon a Negro demonstration in Milwaukee by white racists.

Білі расисти обрушили град каменів і пляшок на негритянську демонстрацію в Мілуокі (закидали каменями і пляшками) [15,233].

We should notice that the passive-active transformation can not give sufficient result for in passive construction the stress is being made on the object of action and in the active construction the stress is being made on the agent of action. The widespread use of passive construction in English happens often enough because it is explained by unimportance of the doer of that action and it is most often in newspaper style at the same time the most important is to attract attention to the passage. Since the structure and word order of simple sentence is subject + predicate + object the importance of stylistics is bigger then to distinguish the object one chooses the passive construction [16,154].

Divergence are found in some other cases of infinitive usage - infinitive in substantivized constructions (like post-positive attribute) and infinitive expressing following actions, for example:

The president warned of drastic steps to be taken against racialists in the Zambian copper belt.

Президент попередив, що будуть прийняті рішучі міри протии білих расистів в Мідному поясі Замбії. [8,60].

The infinitive functioning as attribute is translated into object clause with the verb in the Future tense.

The Continuative Infinitive is often mistaken for the infinitive of purpose, but in this function it expresses the action following the after the action expressed by predicate and represents the logical development of things [16, 156].

The Soviet Union decided to sign the Treaty with Germany and only did to discover that Germany itself violated it two years later.

Радянський союз вирішив укласти договір з Німеччиною. Але через два роки Німеччина сами його порушила.Советский.

The Continuative infinitive very often is used with the adverb only which stresses it. This emphatic function can be rendered in many ways.

Thus, while translating this sentence we have made use of grammatical transformations and lexical as well.

Those grammatical transformations maybe divided into following types:

substitution

transposition

omission (ellipsis)

supplementation

Substitution is one of the grammatical relations among the parts of the sentences. In substitution, an item (or items) is replaced by another item (or items), ex:

I like politics. And I do.

In this example, do is a substitute for like politics. Items commonly used in substitution in English include do, one, and the same, as in the following examples from Halliday and Hasan:

You think US will start the war against Iraq? - No one does.

We make use of substitution while translating a piece because of several reasons: absence of similar construction in Ukrainian language, unconformity in usage of corresponding forms and constructions and some lexical reasons, which include different word usage and different norms of combinability in English and Ukrainian and the absence of the part of speech with corresponding meaning.

An attempted overthrow in Peru.

Cпроба здійснити переворот в Перу. [8,63].

In Ukrainian we do not have the conforming participle II of the verb намагатися. And this made us change the part of speech; the participle attempted was translated into Ukrainian by the noun cпроба. The expression спроба перевороту does not conform to the norms of Ukrainian language that's why we have to apply additional word здійснити.

The transformation of `active' into `passive' is also when a translator uses substitution.

More light was shed yesterday on the effect of C.S. gas, which was claimed by Pentagon to be virtually harmless to health.

Учора надійши додаткові відомості про небезпечний вплив С.S. газу, який за твердженням Пентагону э так би мовити безпечним для здоров'я[1,29].

The phraseological unit more light was shed was translated by means of lexical transformation and the passive construction was replaced by an active one. The passive construction in the object clause also undergone lexical transformation - verbal construction was substituted by substantive one: за твердженням.

This example can illustrate the fact that lexical and grammatical transformations are closely related with each other [11,271].

Transposition, that's, change of structure of the sentence may be caused by several reasons. But the main of them, as it has been mentioned before is the difference in the structure of the English and Ukrainian languages. The fixed order of words in English bears hierarchic character, first come the primary parts of the sentence; noun, predicate followed by secondary parts. In Ukrainian the word order is not fixed but one can observe the tendency to locate the main information at the end of sentences expressing it be the noun, ex:

Учора у Вашингтоні відбулася пресс-конференція.

The essence of the information is пресс-конференція - which is expressed by the noun located at the end of the sentence. Nevertheless, this word-order is not obligatory, ex:

Прем'єр-міністер виступив учора по телебаченню..

Here we find the main essence at the beginning of sentence.

In English, according to fixed word order, the noun of the sentence stands at the beginning of clause. One of the prominent English linguists, Halliday marks that, usually (but not always) a starting point is intrinsic to English sentences[11,272].

Still in many cases the English sentence happens to be the center of informative message, compare A Press Conference was held in Washington yesterday. Usually it happens when the noun of the sentence is expressed with an indefinite article. Something, semantically new has got to be expressed in the sentence, and the earlier one should be opposed to the new one, which is being expressed. Therefore the indefinite article functions represents this new information, introduces it [11,273].

A smash-and-grab raid on two of the most important nationalized industries is being organized by the Tory Party.

Консерватории збираються навалитися на дві найзначніші національні галузі промисловості. (the metaphor smash-and-grab has not been preserved in translated version)

Nevertheless, similar word order in English and Ukrainian sentences are also evident.

A meeting of firemen's and employers' representatives scheduled for today has been postponed.

Назначена на сьогодны зустріч представників пожежників та підприємців була відкладена [14,96].

Transposition is required when the English sentence contains a large group of nouns with indefinite article and then it is natural that they, being the center of informative message are placed at the end of the sentence. Besides, a short, compared with the noun predicate can not bear the emphatic sense of a large group of nouns.

It is very frequent when grammatical and lexical transformations demand supplementation or omission of some words or elements. Therefore omission and supplementation are frequently combined with other types of grammatical transformations and more frequently with substitution of parts of speech. Supplementation of parts of speech are characterized by several factors: difference in structures of the sentences and that short English sentences demand spread translation in the Ukrainian language. Absence of some corresponding word or lexical-semantic variant in both languages is also one of the reasons of applying additional words in translation [11,273].

The American troops were thought to be heading toward Saigon, but no one seemed to be aware of fierce resistance of the nation.

Вважали, що американські війська направляться на Сайгон, але виявилось, що ніхто не знав про жорстокий супротив місцевого населення[8,67].

The construction Nominative + Infinitive with two omitted elements (which was) was given in object clause plus introductory sentences… який, як вважали раніше рухається… Thus, the difference in the structure of sentences demanded supplementation in the given translation [16,124].

Ellipsis involves the omission of an item. In other words, in ellipsis an item is replaced by nothing. This is a case of leaving something unsaid which is nevertheless understood. It doesn't include every instance when the hearer or reader has to supply missing information, but only those cases where grammatical structure itself points to an item or items that can fill the slot in question. Here are some examples of ellipsis:

The United States donated two millions dollars and Britain one and a half millions pounds. (omitted item: donated in second clause).

Here are four strategies. Choose any of them. (omitted item strategy) [12,68].

Use of synonymy pairs is characterized to all styles of written speech of English language. Preserving such synonymy pair is accepted as pleonasm and it is absolutely superfluous even when translating official documents that demand preciseness. For example:

The Treaty was declared null and void.

Договір був оголошений недійсним.

The battle was fierce while it lasted.

Бій був жорстоким [14,118].

Time complex object in this case functions as a clichй and doesn't have corresponding equivalent in Ukrainian.[11,274].

Translation of diplomatic papers not only requires sufficient knowledge of terms, phrases and expressions, but also depends on the clear comprehension of the structure of a sentence and some specific grammar and syntactical patterns, which are characteristic of this style.

Coming across an unknown term in the text, a translator can consult a dictionary. Coming across such a phenomenon as the Nominative Absolute Construction, for instance, a translator can find it time-consuming to search for an equivalent conveying its meaning, unless he or she already knows the corresponding pattern [7,253]

This Manual is intended for students who are already aware of the basics and peculiarities of the grammar and syntax of the English language. That is why it offers below only some instructions in translation of certain English constructions, which can cause special difficulties while translating [Appendixes A-D].

So we can see that in the majority cases of translation some piece of political literature we have make necessary changes. It should be reminded that it is not always an English sentence completely corresponds to the Ukrainian one. Very frequently the structure of a Ukrainian sentence absolutely differs from the one English. It has different word order, parts of the sentences and pretty often differs even the order of sentences. In some instances, parts of speech expressed in English are translated into Ukrainian by the help of different parts of speech. You should remember that the compressed way of expression in the English can not be followed in Russian and we therefore have to «decompress» them so that to make the easy to perceive and understand, we have to add some words or expressions or even sentences in whole. Nevertheless, some differences in usage of some specific features make us leave some elements unsaid while translating the whole. And all these cases are explained by grammatical transformations we have just investigated.

2.3 Stylistic Difficulties of Transformation of the Political Text

In the previous chapters we carefully considered the grammatical and lexical transformations that occur while translating political literature from English into Ukrainian. And we have figured out that most of these reasons are rooted in national and cultural settings of both languages [9,17].

Practically, stylistic devices in almost all languages are similar still though their functions in speech vary. Identical stylistic devices are used differently in languages; they perform different functions and have different value in stylistic system of their language what actually explains their necessity when transformations in translation occur. The stylistic changes are as necessary as grammatical or lexical ones. While applying some grammatical or lexical transformation in translation the translator is guided by principle of rendering grammatical of lexical meaning. When rendering stylistic meaning of the source text a translator should be guided by the same principle - to recreate in translation the same impression that might be left by the original text [9,31].

A translator should not try to preserve the stylistic device given in the sentence, but reproduce its function in the target language.

We should not forget that almost all stylistic devices are multi functional. It is like when polysemantic words in English and Ukrainian languages do not coincide in their lexical-semantic variants and the same is when differ the function of identical stylistic device. Thus when comparing stylistic devices we can easily identify complete correspondence, partial correspondence and even sometimes absence of correspondence and their functions [17,167].

To illustration it we can compare alliteration in the English and Ukrainean languages. The function of alliteration coincides in both languages - in this function alliteration is one of the basic devices of poetic speech. However the usage of alliteration for pleasant sounding in prose is more characteristic for the English language, than for Ukrainian. The second function of alliteration is logical. Alliteration emphasizes close relationship between components of the statement. Especially brightly alliteration shows the unity of an epithet with an attributed word[9,32].

The third function of alliteration in English language - to attract attention of the reader - is widely used in the names of literary works, newspaper headings and often in articles.

The use of alliteration is a convincing acknowledgement that various functions of stylistic devices in different languages do not always coincide in usage[9,33].

We have already discussed functional translation of stylistic devices. But it is extremely important to distinguish in the translated text original and imagined alliterations so that to avoid unnecessary emphasizing and to keep stylistic equivalence which presents necessary component of adequate translation. there is a constant danger to smooth and de-color the original text or, on the contrary, to make translation brighter and stylistically colored. But sometimes a translator consciously applies some « «smoothing» or neutralization in other words [17, 164].

Repetition as you know is a more widespread stylistic device in the English language, than in Ukrainian.

In some cases repetition as the stylistic device should be necessarily kept in translation, but for the difference in combinability and various semantic structures of polysemantic words or words of wide meaning in English and Ukrainian languages the translator has to change and replace some of elements.

The repetition is widely used with stylistic purposes in newspaper publicity. In these cases the translator is compelled to apply stylistic changes, make substitution or omission [9,35].

A policy of see no stagnation, hear no stagnation, speak no stagnation has had too long a run for our money.

Надто довго ми розплачеємося за політику повного ігнорування і замовчування застою в нашій економіці [4,87].

The triple repetition of no stagnation has been omitted in translation, though is partially compensated by the use of synonymic pair at a word (stagnation), but neutralization is evident in translation. The neutralization happened when translating the phraseological unit to have (too long) a run for our money [9,35].

Among stylistic devices used in political literature rather frequent there are synonymic and alliterated pairs. The use of such pairs is traditional for all styles of the English language including business style as well. When translating official documents such pairs are frequently by one word. For example, the just and equitable treatment of all nations from UN Charter is given in Ukrainian as справедливе відношення до всіх націй, for in Ukrainian there is no absolute synonym for the word just [13,166].

Metaphor is used in all emotionally - colored styles of speech. However in style of fiction the metaphor always carries original character, whereas in political texts the original metaphor is used rather seldom and basically - copied metaphors. Nevertheless in advanced clauses of the English and American political literature, the purpose of which is to assure, to make people believe and to impress the reader, that is to force him to agree with the point of view given in the article, one can often see rather bright and colorful metaphors.

Sometimes the difficulty of translation of metaphor consists in translating some word combination or a phraseological unit, which does not have figurative equivalent in Ukrainian [9,72].

We have already discussed the necessity of neutralization of means of expressiveness when translating English or American politics. Let us consider the problem of extended metaphor. The extended metaphor represents a chain of the logically connected figurative components. Sometimes such components of the extended metaphors pass through the whole clause. The below-mentioned example is taken from clause of the American observer James Reston.

The latest official explanation of the President's Indochina policy is that «he is backing out of the saloon with both guns firing», but there is a catch to this.

He insists that the guys in the white hats keep control of the saloon before he leaves town. He wants a non-communist bartender, and a non-communist sheriff, and a secure non-communist town before he rides away into the sunset of November, 1972 [4,71].

In the final paragraph of the article the elements of one metaphor are partially repeated: but all this is a little more complicated than «backing out of the saloon».

The images of this extended metaphor are taken from so-called «western» - of film about cowboys in «wild» West. In this case all elements of the developed (unwrapped) metaphor, perhaps, can be kept in translation.

However there are cases, when the preservation of all figurative components of the developed (unwrapped) metaphor is impossible, as well as preservation of both components of synonymic pair, for it would break the stylistic norms of Ukrainian [9, 84].

Being purely linguistic and stylistic device - metonymy is used more and more in political documents, perhaps, even more than metaphor. Metonymy translation presents one of numerous problems for the use of metonymy significantly differs in English and Ukrainian languages. Due to this fact the translator is often forced to go back to the primary meaning of a word, that is to the meaning that was firstly created by metonymy.

It is a widespread case of metonymy usage - substitution of concrete notion by an abstract one, which can not always be preserved [9,85].

«It (the flood) has hurl us a great deal,» the Pakistan Prime Minister told correspondents last week as he toured the destruction in the flooded provinces. («Newsweek»)

«Повінь нанесла нам нищівного удару», - сказав кореспондентам прем'єр міністер Пакистану, минулого тижня під час поїздки по постраждалих регіонах [8,95]

Concerning the translation of comparison as a stylistic device, the difficulties arise only if the words of English and Ukrainian languages are various in the semantic structure.

It was discussed above the importance of articles in translation and now I should mention once again that they can serve in stylistic purposes [13,192].

An expressiveness gets the definite article, before a indefinite pronoun one.

… this is the one way we can achieve success in elections.

…це єдиний спосіб досягнути перемоги на виборах.

There is another kind of stylistic transformation - actualization - which involves transition of something simple into something unusual, strange. It reveals potential expressiveness put in the lexical morphologic and syntactic means of a language [9,94].

During my prediploma practice I set a task to investigate the importance of the involvement of the political documents analyzing in the process of study in school. The main aims of the research are:

1) to distinguish the connection of the involvement of the political documents

analyzing with the social needs of pupils at present and in the future;

2) to clarify the lexical and grammatical difficulties which can appear in the

process of translation of the political document;

3) to study the problem of the style and it's effect on the adequate translation.

For this purpose I have conducted a lesson in the group 11b dedicated to the translation of the political document.

The procedure of the lesson fragment:

I. Introduction.

Teacher present new theme and tells pupils about the importance of the political knowledge in life of each person and it's importance on the level of the state and on the international and global levels.

II. Presentation of new material.

Teacher explains the main features of the language political documents are written in, warn about difficulties which appear in the process of their translation, present the translation of some political terminology.

III. Reading.

Pupils get the cards with the abstract from the UNO Charter about humans rights. The card contains also the translation of the document. Pupils read the sentence than its translation and analyze it together with the teacher.

IV. Activity.

Teacher gives to the pupils the cards with the task on the multiple choice. Pupils have to choose the word in proper style and fill in the gab.

V. Writing.

Pupils get the task to translate a small abstract from political documents in written. They do the task individually and then teacher check it up.

The last task of the lesson was conducted for checking pupil's comprehension of new material and the mastered skills. The research showed that pupils were not in general ready to work on the document. Main difficulties caused the grammatical and lexical difference of the source and target language. At the same time it became evident that most pupils were able to distinguish the style difference of the words. Some pupils showed quite satisfactory results. The research also showed pupils awareness of their necessity to be able to work with political document, their social competence.

Now from everything that has been discussed above we can infer that the usage of some of stylistic devices in English is peculiar - and bears specific national character, therefore their direct translation in many instances is impossible. Moreover, the impression left by some of stylistic device maybe different in both languages, compare soft panic and тиха паніка. It can be explained not only by national features of stylistic means and devices of some of the language but by the their multi functioning character also - that do not always coincide - as it was shown on the matter of alliteration. This is the main criteria causing the necessity of stylistic transformations that involve substitution and changes. Therefore it is not important to classify the device itself but the point is to be able to realize their ongoing effect and to identify the purpose of their application in the translation they worked on.

Conclusions

In the given course paper I have investigated various translation methods of political literature from English into Ukrainian. I tried to give a detailed study of the features of translation of Political documents.

Moreover, we've studied the translation methods of Political literature and political terms at a deeper level, the types and ways of translation of Political literature; we've also considered the function of political material in the process of study at school .

The aim of this work was to introduce the translation approach to political documents so that to make it easy to perceive for those willing to keep up their educational and scientific carrier in the science of translation, it was purposed to broaden their view on translation studies and peculiar features while translating political literature.

In this work we've completed the following tasks:

1) reviewed all the sources of political documents;

2) distinguished the methods of translation of political documents;

3) have been carefully studied the grammatical, lexical, stylistic and

phraseological difficulties of translation of political material were

discussed.

Any political document should by analyzed only in discourse, taking into consideration the circumstances of its creation and functioning. That is the reason why the role of the authority of the text and its adressness and also authors objectives, which appear in the used communicative strategies and tactics [4.39]. A very essential element of the discourse is the correlation of this text with the variety of other texts oriented on the description of the same events.

Political texts like any other scientific kind of texts have languages items characteristic, that require the translator to be precise and sharp. Most political documents are characterized by the passion of expression, polemic style and the specific feature is in blending the elements of scientific speech from one side with different emotionally colored means of expression from another side.

The translation process of political material from one language into another is inevitable without necessary grammatical transformations. Very often these grammatical changes are mixed so that they have lexical-grammatical character.

While reviewing the grammatical changes we considered the following transformations: substitution, omission, transposition and supplementation.

Substitution is one of the grammatical relations among the parts of the sentences. In substitution, an item (or items) is replaced by another item (or items),

Omission, as you know is when an item is replaced by nothing. This is a case of leaving something unsaid which is nevertheless understood.

Transposition is required when the English sentence contains a large group of nouns with indefinite article and then it is natural that they, being the center of informative message are placed at the end of the sentence. Besides, a short, compared with the noun predicate can not bear the emphatic sense of a large group of nouns.

Supplementation happens to be very frequent when translating texts on International politics because we do not always have corresponding words for some English or American notions like:

Thus, we have come to conclusion that the above mentioned changes are necessary while processing a translation of Political literature from English into Ukrainian.

While discussing the lexical problems of translation we considered lexical-semantic features of both languages and investigated such cases as difference in word volume, word combinability, generally accepted tradition of word usage, we have also considered contextual meaning of words in the process of translation. In addition we investigated the emotional coloring that plays an important role while processing a translation of political literature. We have studied the translation of international words and unexpected usage of word combinability that makes the translation task harder.

List of References

1. Comparative Politics, Washington State University, 1996.-59-116p.

2. Charter of the United nations.-1945.-9-41p.

3. Сhudinov, A.P. The metaphorical mosaic of the political communitaion, Ekaterinburg, - 2003, p. 73-103p.

4. Course of translation of social-political lexis - M: The International

affairs - 1997.-39-143p.

5. Exercise book on translation of humanitarian texts, Malchevskaya, Saint Petersburg 1980.-44-112p.

6. Fathy, A. Osman. Senior interpreter/translator, IMF, Washington, DC

7. Galperin, I.R. Stylistics.1981- 312-318p.

8. Gutner, M.D. Handbook on on translation of socio-political literature texts, M. Higher school. 1982.-60-95p.

9. Higher, M. Seminars in Style. Shool publishing house. - 1971.-35-216p.

10. Improve your translation skills. Lviv, Commercial Academy, - 91-118p.

11. In other words - a course book on translation. Mona Baker, London and New York, 1992.-58-273p.

12. Korunets I.V. The Theory and Practice of Translation, Vinnytsia «Nova knyha», -2001.-68-166.

13. Miram, V.V., Danienko,. Basic translation, Nika center, - 2002.-59-176p.

14. Oxford handbook. Commercial correspondence, Oxford University press, - 2003.-96-178p.

15. Oxford handbook. Legal correspondence, Oxford University press, - 2006.-233-241p.

16. The Craft of Translation, John Biguenet & Rainer Schulte, The University of Chicago Press.-22-156p.

17. Translation difficulties, T.R. Levitskaya & A.M. Fitterman, «International Relations» Publishing house, Moscow 1976.-86-176p.

18. Translation and linguistics, Schweitzer A.D.-1996.-55-66p.

19. Whitehall, H. Structural essencials of English. N.Y., 1956, p.64

20. http://en.wikipedia.org

Размещено на Allbest.ru