Translation as a means of intercultural studies

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Lecture

Translation as a means of intercultural studies

Content

1. The problem of relations between language, culture and speaker

2. What is a culture?

3. Culture and activities

Key words: language, culture and speaker, daily behavior, concept of intercultural communication, definition of intercultural communication, culture, social identity, special language variants

1. The problem of relations between language, culture and speaker

The problem of relations between language, culture and speaker is one of the fundamental problems in modern linguistics. This problem is defined by many researchers as «anthropological». Language is a reflection of an ethnic group's culture, a means of transmitting cultural values through generations and the major tool of cognition. As language sets the parameters of human perception of the world and stereotypes of daily behavior, any linguistic research in the field of language semantics deals with the interrelations of the concepts of language, culture, and personality.

Along with that, the globalization of cultures actualizes the concept of intercultural communication. In many areas, such as linguistics, literary criticism, culture studies, sociology, psychology, new researches are devoted to the problem of intercultural communication. The political and social situation in the modern world generates the problem of adequate communication, but speaking about adequacy is possible only under condition of full mutual understanding of the representatives of different cultures speaking in different languages. In S. Ter-Minasova's opinion, communication is a dialogue act, connection between two and more individuals which is, first of all, based on mutual understanding [1].

M. Bergelson gives the following definition of intercultural communication: «intercultural communication is a dialogue carried out in conditions of cultural difference in the communicative competence of the participants which is so considerable that it has essential influence on the success or failure of the communicative event» [2]. Intercultural communication is characterized by the use of special language variants and discourse strategies of direct contact participants which are different from those they use in communication within one culture.

Е. Vereschagin and V. Kostomarov in their work «Language and culture» suggest the following definition: «intercultural communication is adequate mutual understanding of two participants of a communicative act belonging to different national cultures» [3].

One of the basic points of consideration in the definition of translation is understanding that communication is interaction of individuals in which communicants appear as subjects of culture and representatives of a lingvosociocultural community, and translation as a type of mediation is a means not only of interlingual but also of intercultural communication.

The view of translation as of a means of intercultural communication follows from the idea of language as a culture component, and culture - as an aggregate of material and spiritual achievements of the society, including all the varied historical, social and psychological features of the ethnos, its traditions, views, values, institutions, behavior, living conditions - in short, all the sides of its life and consciousness, including language [4].

The concept of translation is central in the translation studies. It is important to mention that the concept of translation is polysemantic. Firstly, it refers to translation as an intellectual activity, that is a process, secondly - to translation as the result of this process, a product of translational activity, in other words, the text of translation created by the translator.

V. Komissarov considers that «translation is a complicated and many-sided kind of human activity. Though usually people speak about translation «from one language on another», actually, it is not simply a replacement of one language with another. The different cultures, people, ways of thinking, literatures epochs, levels of development, traditions and world vies clash with each other in translation» [5].

According to M. Brandes, «translation is a kind of language mediation where the content of the foreign text (original) is transferred to other language by way of creating a communicatively equivalent text in this language» [6].

In L. Barkhudarov's opinion, «translation is a process of transformation of a speech product in one language into a speech product in another language, the invariable meaning being preserved» [7].

G. Toury believes that «translation is kind of activity which inevitably involves at least two languages and two cultural traditions» [8].

Serving as a means of communication between people of various ethnic groups, translation is a means of interlingual and intercultural communication. According to A.D. Schweitzer, «translation can be defined as a unidirectional and two-phase process of interlingual and intercultural communication, where a secondary text (metatext) text is created on the basis of the primary text subjected to purposeful («translational») analysis, the secondary text replacing the primary one in another language and cultural environment» [9].

The analysis of the prominent researchers' works in the field of translation shows that they all consider translation in the light of intercultural communication. The cultural factor in translation is obvious and undeniable. Communication is impossible unless the message is transmitted and is understood by the communicants. However, this understanding can be achieved only if the information contained in the language units corresponds to the background knowledge of the facts mentioned in the message. The people speaking one language are the representatives of a certain culture. They have many common traditions, habits and ways to do and to speak about things. They possess the common knowledge about their country, its geography, history, climate, its political, economic, social and cultural institutions. All this information is the basis of the communicants' presuppositions which enable them to produce and understand messages in their linguistic form.

Not only two languages interact in translation process, but also two cultures having both common features and national specificity. Revealing this specificity is crucial in studying intercultural communication and translation.

The translator plays an important role in the process of intercultural communication, since he/she has frequently not only to translate sentences, but also to interpret the cultures of the communicants. He serves as the mediator for both sides explaining to them the main rules of behavior and customs of the countries. The translator should pick up an equivalent for the language phenomenon which directly reflects another culture. Empathy is the basis of mutual understanding in communication. It is the ability to imagine oneself in the place of another person, attempt to see the world with his eyes. And if the translator manages to do it, the translation process is full-fledged and successful.

Collateral elements and uncollateralized elements are distinguished by comparison of languages and cultures. Being a culture component, language as a whole is an uncollateralized element. First of all, equivalent-lacking lexicon is uncollateralized element. The insufficient knowledge of history of a country, traditions and culture lead to misunderstanding of comparisons, historical references, to wrong understanding even in daily conversation, in other words, to language incompetence. J. Catford specifies that «besides language untranslatability there is cultural untranslatability» [10].

Translators tend to omit or change culturally incongruous items so that finally they become translatable or comprehensible. As cultural distinctions are part of culture, cultural untranslatability depends on the combination of languages in translation. It means that cultural untranslatability is not equally applicable to all language combinations, audiences and translators. The concept of cultural untranslatability is important for translation. A good translation should not sound as a translation. The key requirement is naturalness. Cultural untranslatability is important only when cultural distinctions are very big, because without facing these distinctions, it is difficult for translators to achieve naturalness or even to convey the communicative function of the initial text.

In conclusion, it is important to notice that translation is the basic mechanism of intercultural communication. With the help of translation, languages interact, influence each other, get richer and change. In translation of texts representing a certain national culture, not only the target language, into which the words naming realities of another culture penetrate, but also the receiving culture is exposed to a certain influence. However, the compromise between two interactive national cultures is not always reached in favor of the culture which has generated the original text. Radical changes of a cultural and historical background of a translated material should always be justified, pertinent, plausible and consistent. Inappropriate or inconsistent cultural displacements deform the image and create the reader's incorrect idea of the initial culture and the author's intention.

2. What is a culture?

Let us more closely analyze the concepts that can be found in the expression intercultural communication. One of them is culture which has been analyzed in several different ways by different researchers. See Kroeber and Kluckholm (1952) for an account of about 200 ways to to define the concept. It will be used here in the following way. The term «culture» refers to all the characteristics common to a particular group of people that are learned and not given by nature. That the members of a group have two legs is thus not a cultural characteristic but a natural one, while a special but common way of walking would probably be cultural.

Analytically, we can differentiate between the following four primary cultural dimensions: (i) Patterns of thought - common ways of thinking, where thinking includes factual beliefs, values, norms, and emotional attitudes.

(ii) Patterns of behavior - common ways of behaving, from ways of speaking to ways of conducting commerce and industry, where the behavior can be intentional/unintentional, aware/unaware or individual/interactive.

(iii) Patterns of artifacts - common ways of manufacturing and using material things, from pens to houses (artifact = artifical object), where artifacts include dwellings, tools, machines or media. The artifactual dimension of culture is usually given special attention in museums.

(iv) Imprints in nature - the longlasting imprints left by a group in the natural surroundings, where such imprints include agriculture, trash, roads or intact/ruined human habitations. In fact, «culture» in the sense of «growth» (i.e. a human transformation of nature) gives us a basic understanding of what the concept of culture is all about.

All human activities involve the first two dimensions. Most activities involve the third dimension, and ecologically important activities also involve the fourth. When a particular activity lastingly combines several of these traits, one usually says that the activity has become institutionalized and that it is thus a social institution.

Similarly, one may speak of a culture or a subculture when one or more of the characteristics are lastingly connected with a certain group of people. In the context of intercultural communication, the groups are often associated with national states, and we may speak about Swedish culture, French culture, etc. However, a group does not necessarily have to be a national group. It may be any group at all that is distinguishable over a longer period of time. We can thus speak about teenage culture, male culture, working-class culture, bakers' culture or the culture of the city of Gothenburg. Cultural differences between groups of these types are often just as great or even greater than those that exist between national cultures.

The danger of stereotypical descriptions

Studies and teaching programs that deal with intercultural communication are often based on attempts to understand national cultures; therefore there is a great risk of neglecting the significant differences which exist between activities, groups and individuals on a non-national level. An orientation toward national cultures combined with efforts to find easily conveyed generalizations gives a further risk, namely that of taking over stereotypical notions of a «national character» that have arisen to serve what a certain group sees as its own or national interests. See Tingsten (1936). For example, Swedes may be characterized as envious, Scots as stingy, French as vain, Americans as superficial, etc.

The danger of misleading and biased generalizations is one of the greatest risks in research on intercultural communication, and that danger increases as soon as someone tries to describe the differences between groups from the perspective of a particular group's interests.

Social identity and ethnicity

Two important concepts in this discussion are ethnicity and social identity. I believe that these concepts can be related to culture and national states in the following way. A group is an ethnic group when certain of its cultural characteristics are used to socially and politically organize it and when this organization is allowed to continue for a relatively long period of time. The group's ethnicity is comprised of those traits which have a politically cohesive power. If the group comprises or strongly aspires to comprise its own politically independent nation, the characteristics are termed nationally ethnic and the desire to emphasize and/or spread them is called nationalism. Depending on the strength of this nationalism or the evaluation of it, it can further be characterized as chauvinism or patriotism.

Social identity can be related to culture in the following way. At a particular point in time, a culture provides a number of properties and relations around which individual persons can organize their lives. People construct their social identity by regarding a part of these properties and relations as decisive for who he/she is. In this way, it is possible for a person to identify him or herself with his/her age, sex, family position, profession, political ideology, religious belief, regional residence or national affiliation, etc. As social organizations are constructed around most of these characteristics, by identifying with them, one often simultaneously comes to belong to a group of people who think alike. Most people have a potential for identifying themselves with several of these characteristics but come gradually to focus on a few as primarily creating his/her identity.

One possibility is that you strongly identify with characteristics that you consider important for your national or ethnic group. You mainly become a Swede, a Finn, a Basque or a Sami. Being a father or a teacher may become less important. For a person of this type, national or ethnic membership is what gives him/her their main identity. But as we have seen, identity can of course be constructed on the basis of other characteristics. Personal preferences and degree of social recognition are among the decisive factors in constructing one's identity. This probably means that people with high status jobs will be less prone than people with low status jobs to let ethnic membership be the characteristic they mainly identify with.

In studying what we here call intercultural communication, it is particularly important to be aware that there are no necessary relationships between identity on the one hand and ethnicity or nationalism on the other. A position taken without reflection can easily lead to hasty assumptions about stereotypical cultural differences.

3. Culture and activities

One way to escape the danger of stereotypes, at least to a certain extent, is to connect the concept of culture with the concept of activity. A culture, that is a way of thinking, behaving, etc., surfaces in the activities which the people in a certain group pursue. An activity here can be anything from arguing to hunting, fishing or farming. Most people participate in a number of activities and can often think and act in substantially different ways in different activities. There is a great difference between being a father, a pastor and a lover but, at least in Sweden, it is completely possible for one person to have each of these roles simultaneously.

By taking into consideration the variation in activities among a group of people, we can begin to get an understanding of the nature of intranational and international cultural similarities and differences. At the same time, the variation in activity must also be supplemented with differences that are e.g. biological or regional.

Intercultural communication. As for the other key concept in intercultural communication - communication - I largely follow the analysis presented in Allwood (1976). In this context, one can briefly characterize communication as the sharing of information between people on different levels of awareness and control. I want especially to emphasize the latter since, in a intercultural context, this can become a problem particularly with features in communication about which people have low degree of awareness and find difficult to control. Examples would include the ways in which we show and interpret feelings and attitudes.

If we use what is said above about «culture» and «communication» as a base, we would now be able to define intercultural communication as the sharing of information on different levels of awareness and control between people with different cultural backgrounds, where different cultural backgrounds include both national cultural differences and differences which are connected with participation in the different activities that exist within a national unit.

Questions for discussion:

1. What is intercultural communication?

2. What is the difference between culture, communication and translation?

3. How do you understand social identity and ethnicity?

4. What definitions did the linguists give to intercultural communication?

5. What definitions did the linguists give to translation?

References

linguistics translation intercultural communication

1. Ter-Minasova S.G. Language and intercultural communication. - Moscow, 2000.

2. Bergelson M. Intercultural communication // http://www.countries.ru/library/intercult/mkk.htm.

3. Vereschagin Е. М, Kostomarov V.G. Language and culture. - Moscow, 1988.

4. Valeyeva N.G. Translation - language mediation, a means of intercultural and interlingual communication. // http://www.trpub.ru/valeeva-perevod-kommunik.html

5. Komissarov V.N. Introducing modern Translation Studies. - Moscow, 2001.

6. Brandes M. Translational text analysis. - Moscow, 2001.

7. Barhudarov L.S. Language and translation. - Moscow, 1975.

8. Komissarov V.N. Introducing modern Translation Studies. - Moscow, 2001.

9. Schweitzer A.D. Theory of translation: status, problems, aspects. - Moscow, 1988.

10. Munday J. Introducing Translation Studies. - London, 2001.

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