Target. International Journal of Translation Studies - Volume 26, Issue 3, 2014

In The Maltese Falcon (1929/1930), U.S. hard-boiled author Dashiell Hammett used common colloquial terms (queer and fairy) and specialized slang terms (gunsel, the gooseberry lay) to include homosexual characters at a time when pulp magazines and mainstream publishers frowned on diverse sexualities. Hammett subversively introduced these terms in a resolvably ambiguous fashion, relying on readers to trigger underlying homosexual interpretations. Instances of queer and fairy were attenuated in early versions (1933, 1946) but in more recent versions (1968, 1974, 1992, and 2011) were generally preserved (marica) or even intensified (maricón). In many cases, the Spanish translators misinterpreted the gooseberry lay, which has no sexual connotations at all, thinking it meant something homosexual. In all cases, the term gunsel, which does have a homosexual meaning, was stripped of all male same-sex significance and was cast into slang terms for gunman, thug or killer.

The search for translation universals has been an important topic in translation studies over the past decades. In this paper, we focus on the notion of explicitation through a multifaceted study of causal connectives, integrating four different variables: the role of the source and the target languages, the influence of specific connectives and the role of the discourse relation they convey. Our results indicate that while source and target languages do not globally influence explicitation, specific connectives have a significant impact on this phenomenon. We also show that in English and French, the most frequently used connectives for explicitation share a similar semantic profile. Finally, we demonstrate that explicitation also varies across different discourse relations, even when they are conveyed by a single connective.

This paper explores some aspects of the socio-biography of the Turkish writer Elif Şafak, who made substantial changes to Baba ve Piç, the Turkish translation of her novel The Bastard of Istanbul. Arguing that Şafak’s habitus has a considerable influence on her style in Baba ve Piç, the paper focuses on Şafak’s incorporation of Ottoman Turkish words into the Turkish translation in order to show that the addition of these words frames the Turkish translation within the broader narrative of language planning in Turkey. Ultimately, the study argues that the concept of habitus and the concept of narrative can be fruitfully brought together to explain how certain socio-stylistic aspects of the habitus-governed translation respond to the larger narratives of the target society.

This study explores the (re)creation of referential cohesion in Hungarian-English translation and examines the extent to which shifts of reference are motivated by the differences between the languages, the characteristics of the translation type (news translation) and the genre (news story). As referential cohesion is hypothesized to be affected by certain universals of translation, the explicitation and the repetition avoidance hypotheses are also tested. Analyses show considerable shifts of reference in translations, but these are not statistically significant. The corpus also fails to provide evidence for the universals of translation investigated; however, the in-depth analysis of optional shifts suggests that they are conditioned by the discursive features of the genre and contribute to a more explicit presentation of news content.

Intercomprehension didactics aims at exploiting intercomprehension (or mutual intelligibility) for the time-saving acquisition of receptive skills in a language unfamiliar to an individual by systematically comparing it to cognate languages the individual is already proficient in. As the cognitive processes underlying intercomprehensive language acquisition seem to have much in common with those underlying translation activity, intercomprehension didactics might contribute to developing efficient new methods for multilingual translator training. The paper provides empirical evidence for the feasibility of intercomprehensive language instruction in translator training. It addresses the following questions: Does the exploitation of knowledge of Russian promote the comprehension of Polish texts and the subsequent translation of these texts into learners’ L1? How do translation competence and intercomprehension competence interact? To what extent can interference errors induced by false friends be avoided in the translation of texts decoded through intercomprehension?

Analysis of 217 associations for translators and/or interpreters shows that, after the heroic age of the generalist national and international groupings in the 1950s and 1960s, there has been a progressive specialization of associations. In rough chronological order, separate institutions have been created for literary translators, sworn/authorized translators and interpreters, conference interpreters, public-service interpreters and audiovisual translators. This process might be seen as a division of labor, a normal result of increasing memberships. Analysis of the communication strategies employed by the associations nevertheless suggests that there has been a profound shift in their very nature: from a model where the association ideally vouches for the professional trustworthiness of several thousands of members, thus implicitly speaking to clients and other professions, we find a tendency toward communication patterns where the association becomes a place for social, pedagogical and political action between its members. The greater density and plexity of the interactions means that the newer associations involve smaller groups of people, selected on the basis of either professional specialization or geographical proximity. Similar interactive models are found in online marketplaces for translations and in communities of volunteer translators, which prove to be innovative not only in promoting interactive communication but also in inventing new ways of signaling translators’ trustworthiness. A way forward for the traditional associations might be to adapt some of the communication strategies operative in the electronic marketplaces and among volunteers.