Idioms with a negative connotation in modern English rock songs: translation aspect

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Idioms with a negative connotation in modern English rock songs: translation aspect

Expression of emotions takes one of the leading roles in the field of modern linguistics. The peculiarity of the emotionally-evaluative vocabulary is in its emotional coloring, which superimposed on the lexical meaning of the word, but the nominative function is complicated by the personal attitude of the speaker to this phenomenon. Emotions are verbalized by means of different levels of language. In this article, the lexical level of verbalization of emotions is studied.

The relevance of the topic is determined by the tendency of modern linguistics to the systematic study of various types of texts, including lyrics, in the interaction of their phonetic, lexical and syntactic characteristics. Specific features of the English lyrics have not yet been seen in linguistic works. In addition, in linguistics, there are no special works concerning the difficulties of translating songs.

The objective of the article is to create a comparative analysis of translations of the rock songs with a negative connotation on the material of the English song discourse. Special attention is paid to the translation of idioms.

The tasks of this research:

1) to explore theoretical principles of researching the functions of the negative-colored expressive vocabulary and to provide an interpretation of the basic concepts;

2) to study the translation aspects of the representation of negative emotions in modern English rock songs;

3) to produce a comparative analysis of translations of idioms with a negative connotation in modern English rock songs.

The object of the research is the English lyrics of the rock genre. The subject of the research is the lexical and syntactic features of the translation of idioms in these rock songs.

The following methods are used: analysis (the functions of the negative-colored expressive words were analyzed), comparison (the translations of idioms with a negative connotation were compared), descriptive method (aspects of the representation of negative emotions in modern English rock songs were described) and semantic-stylistic analysis of translation research (the semantic stylistic devices and their features were researched) were involved.

Emotions are a phenomenon of social and psychological order, which takes an important place in human life and in its language. As a result of emotional research, they were classified and subordinated to the system, which has found its place among a large number of languages. Different approaches apply to the consideration and analysis of this phenomenon, such as philological, sociological, cultural, psychological, and others [6].

A significant number of philosophers and psychologists studied emotions, namely: Anokhin P.K., Vygotsky L.S., Woodworth R., Druzhinin V.Y., Izard K.E., Kalita A.A., Krasavsky N.A., Leontiev A.N., Prikhodko A.I., Simonov P.V., Shakhovskii V.I. [1, 39, 15, 16, 19].

Linguist Druzhinin highlights the following basic emotions: interest, happiness, surprise, anger, sadness, fear, shame. They are divided into positive (interest, happiness, surprise) and negative (anger, sadness, fear, shame) [5, p. 63]. All other emotional processes are considered modifications of the above-mentioned basic emotions.

Many words not only name the concept but also reflect the attitude of the speaker to them. The emotional color of a word can express both a positive and a negative assessment of this concept. Therefore, emotional vocabulary is called emotional-colored words. This is achieved by adding to the nominal meaning of the word special stylistic shades and expressions. For example, the word «beautiful» can be replaced by close words, but complicated by the expressions: «pretty», «gorgeous», «magnificent», «handsome», «and lovely» [17].

The peculiarity of the emotionally-colored vocabulary is that emotional coloring is superimposed on the lexical meaning of the word, but not limited to it; the nominative function is complicated by the personal attitude of the speaker to this phenomenon. Reflection of feelings requires special expressive colors.

At the lexical level, this linguistic category is embodied by attaching to the nominative meaning of the word a special stylistic shade. The expressive color in the word is lined up with its emotional and appraisal value. Thus the word acquires a certain meaning.

Denotation and connotation are two methods for describing the meaning of words. The denotative meaning is a general logical notion, a literary definition that contains a word. This value can be found in dictionaries. It is publicly acquired and secured by a language sign. However, each speaker adds his own associations to the meaning of the word through the gained experience. The connotation is lexical information, adjacent to the meaning of the word, a wide range of positive and negative associations. It is reflected in a specific context and reflects a variety of socially conceived meanings, cultural implications, and emotional values. For example, the word «Hollywood» has a denotative meaning «the area in the city of Los Angeles, known throughout the world as the center of the American movie industry», while the connotative meaning of «Hollywood» includes such associations as «luxury, celebrities, glamor» [18].

Incompatibilities in the structure of different languages lead to difficulties with the preservation and transfer of meanings of words while translation into another language. The word, as a lexical unit, is a part of the lexical system of language. The semantic structure of the word is unique in each particular language and therefore may not coincide in lexical systems of a foreign language and target language. Linguist Latyshev L.K. described these transformations as «deviations from the vocabulary correspondences» [2].

In the case of detecting such a deviation in the translation of any word or phrase from English into Ukrainian, this lexical unit is replaced in the target language by another lexical unit, which transmits a slightly different meaning in comparison with the word in the source language. It is a lexical transformation. There are seven most common varieties of lexical transformations: concretization; generalization; compensation; lexical addition; reception lexical omission; reception of semantic development; antonymic translation.

The task of any translation - accurately conveys the content of the source language by means of another language, preserving its stylistic and expressive features. The translation should convey not only what is expressed in the source text, but also how it is expressed in it. The general theory of translation is based on the notion of equivalence and adequacy - concepts focused on the structural ideology of language. It consists of analyzing and comparing two languages - the source language and the target language [20].

The distinction between such concepts as adequacy and equivalence corresponds to their original meaning - the translation is equivalent when the source text and the target text are equivalent; the adequate translation is available in those cases where the translation solution is sufficiently consistent with the communicative situation of the translation. Both categories are normative and evaluative. The object of equivalence is a translation as a result, and the object of adequacy is a translation as a process. The content of the first category is the ratio of texts, and the content of the second - the correspondence of the situation of translation [20].

Despite the fact that modern rock songs are characterized by simplicity of structure, they have a powerful impact on the audience. The role of the song text is to specify the emotional-sensory component, the disclosure of the details of history, which was modeled by the author, including his own opinion, judgment, and evaluation.

The English rock song was formed in the 1960s, which became famous for its countercultural tendencies, which became the source of negativism, pessimism, aggressiveness and spirit of protest in songs of the «rock» genre. In those years the texts of English song discourse became more profound, with social themes such as loneliness, protest against war, individual self-knowledge, conflict of generations and others. Knowledge of the origins of modern English rock songs facilitates understanding of the thematic features of the texts of these songs and the vocabulary characteristic of them, saturated with emotionality and negative connotation.

The nomination of negative emotions in English-speaking rock songs takes place through stylistic, lexical-semantic and syntactic techniques. In this way, the emotional state of the author or character of the song is researched in emotionally-marked contexts. Often a negative evaluation in songs is transmitted through idioms.

The idioms are phraseological metaphorical units based on the transference of meaning. They are the most expressive means of the stylistic nomination. The role of the idiom is to describe more clearly and expressively a particular situation or image that expresses the author's position.

While translating an idiom, it is necessary to convey their meaning and found a similar expression in the target translation without losing the stylistic function. If the identical image is absent in the desired language, the translator should look for an «approximate match» and, with its help, try to convey the desired artistic effect.

A comparative analysis of translation of the rock songs will help to understand the mechanisms of adequate translation with the preservation of emotional color.

A Song of Canadian rock band Nickelback «Someday» has a powerful emotional context. The author talks about unfortunate love and unfulfilled promises. In the first lines there is an idiom «to turn the tables»:

«How the hell did we wind up like this Why weren't we able To see the signs that we missed And try to turn the table» (10).

The first translator interpreted it as:

«Як же, чорт забирай, вийшло так,

Що ми помітить не змогли,

Що щось не так,

І постаратись все налагодити?» (10).

The idiom «to turn the tables» in the Cambridge Dictionary has an explanation: «to change a situation so that you now have an advantage over someone who previously had an advantage over you» [21], but the translator interpreted the meaning and accordingly translated this phraseology in the way, which differs from the source text. If we consider separately the final version of the idiom translation, which sounds like «налагодити все» then it seems that there is no negative connotation here, but the context of the song is decisive, which refers to useless attempts to change something and a negative result is expected in any case. Accordingly, the idiom has an emotional negative connotation.

Let's analyze another translation that is different from the first one:

«Якого дідька все вийшло так?

Ми не змогли

Все спромогтися повернути Що помічати не хотіли» (10).

The translator used the reverse order of words, which in this case is not relevant and distorts the whole meaning, which the author wanted to convey. This translation does not include the nomination of the emotional state of the character of the song. After all, through the translator's interpretation, the idiom «to turn the tables» («все повернути»), which should be key and stand out among other lexical units, loses its negative connotation, especially along with the first line in which there is an expressive colored word.

Let's look at translations of the famous song «Another One Bites the Dust» by the legendary British band Queen. In the title there is the idiom «bite the dust», which means «to be killed, to die; be defeated or fail». From the context of the song it is clear that the author meant the very first meaning of this idiom:

«Are you ready, hey, are you ready for this Are you hangin' on the edge of your seat Out of the doorway the bullets rip To the sound of the beat - yeah Another one bites the dust And another one gone and another one gone Another one bites the dust, eh Hey, I'm gonna get you too» (11).

A large number of translations of this song exist, but we will present some of them. For example: «Так ти готовий, гей, ти готовий до цього?

Ну що, ти весь в очікуванні?

Прямо за дверима вибухають пулі І чутно гуркіт - так.

Ще один впав намертво,

І ще одного нема, ще одного нема,

Ще один впав замертво, ех Ей, тебе я також дістану» (12).

The representation of the negative connotation in this translation is followed quite clearly because the song itself has a powerful effect on the recipient. Nervous expectation, rush of bullets and death - everything is integrated into one image, and the idiom «bite the dust», which the translator decided to represent in his work as «впав намертво» is a peculiar frame of the song, because it is its title and is available in a large number of repetitions. Due to this, there is a significant emotional excitement of the author and negative emotions are observed in the emotionally-marked context.

Another version of the translation of the song «Another One Bites the Dust» differs from the previous translation of the idiom, which we study:

«Ти готовий, ти готовий до цього?

Тобі не сидиться на місці?

А за дверима розриваються снаряди

Потрапляючи в ритм звуку

Ще один впав обличчям в бруд

І ще один пішов від нас, ще одним менше

Ще один впав обличчям в бруд

Ей, я буду наступним» (12).

In this translation, the idiom «bite the dust» is also a dominant semantic element. The difference lies in the shades of meaning. If the first translation we can clearly see the connection with the theme of the inevitable death («впав намертво»), but in this version of the translation «впав обличчям в бруд» sounds less fatal and even if we pull it out of context, it comes an association with a person, which was just defeated.

The main purpose of the translator is to make the translation sound as if it was written by the original author if he wrote in the target language. Especially when it comes to the text with emotionally-colored words and lexical elements with a connotation of emotional tone. During the study, it was discovered that the author of the first translation managed to convey the author's message better and retain the meaning of this composition. This example of comparative analysis shows the importance of conveying meaning, based on the context of the song.

The next song is called «We Are the Champions» by Queen. The author was intended to show the image of a man who managed to withstand a difficult struggle. It is easy to see that this song text has a powerful pragmatic potential. An important task for a translator is to preserve this communicative effect by selecting the necessary linguistic means when creating the translation.

The source text in which there is an idiom with a negative connotation:

«I've done my sentence But committed no crime And bad mistakes I've made a few I've had my share of sand Kicked in my face But I've come through

And I need to go on and on and on and on» (13).

The idiom «kick sand in face» means «humiliate, offend someone». It originates from bodybuilding commercials. The translation of this passage is following:

«Я відсидів термін За злочин, якого не скоював.

Я рідко робив Грубі помилки.

На мою долю Випало чимало бід,

Але я все витримав,

І тепер мені потрібно йти вперед, тільки вперед» (13).

The recipient needs the essence of the text, without loss of meaning, key moments and ideas. So, the target text should be as close as possible to the source text in order to enable the recipient to analyze the text itself and draw his own conclusions.

The translator partially changed the word order, using such a lexical substitution as a specification («But I've come through - Але я все витримав»), and the idiom «kick sand in face» was translated as «На мою долю випало чимало бід». In this case, these translation transformations are relevant and do not distort the author's emotional appeal.

For comparison, let's take a look to another translation that is significantly different from the previous because of transformations and the emotional connotation:

«Я винуватим себе Ніколи не вважав.

Може, не так Я чинив

І стільки років плентався у хвості,

Але час мій настав!

І тепер вперед,

Вперед, вперед, вперед…» (14).

Considering the theme of the song, the communicative task of this composition can be formulated as follows: life is a struggle and it is necessary to contend to the very end.

The author of the second translation did not catch the key aspects of the song and the emotional color was loosed because of the omission of the elements from the source text. In the first version, the translation was more precise and equivalent, which is important in this case. Instead of «І тепер мені потрібно йти вперед», the author of the second translation decided that it is necessary to simplify this line to the one single word «Вперед». Instead, the first translator transmitted this information to the key, retaining the lexical structure of the source text. The translation of the idioms «kick sand in face» sounds like «І стільки років плентався у хвості». Perhaps this is not the worst version of the translation, but it is not appropriate in this context.

English rock songs are full of emotionally-colored vocabulary. Thus, the author transfers a message to the audience, reveals the emotions of the lyrical hero of the song and causes the recipient's reaction. Most of these lexical units have a negative connotation, which is often verbalized with such lexical means as an idiom. Analyzing the translations of idioms from English to Ukrainian, it was found that it was necessary to convey their meaning, finding a similar expression in the target language without losing the stylistic function. In the case of absence of an identical image in the desired language, the translator should look for an «approximate match», which will provide the desired effect. The mistake of some translators was that they chose not that shade of meaning or used transformations, such as the reverse order of words and lexical omissions. During the study, it was found that the best ones were those translations in which the translator was able to convey the author's message and retain the meaning of the song composition, which was presented in the context and finds the cognitive component with the same emotional tone as in the source text.

References

translation idiom emotion lexical

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