#3 Sept 30 - Studies on Translation Theories
#3 Sept 30 Chapters 4 and 5 of Peter Newmark’s A textbook of translation (1988). Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall.
skip to main |
skip to sidebar
Copyright 2009
NTNU GITI BLOG
All rights reserved | Powered by
Blogger
Blogger Templates created by Deluxe Templates
Wordpress Theme by EZwpthemes
Blogger Templates created by Deluxe Templates
Wordpress Theme by EZwpthemes
2 意見:
The trichotomy of Newmark’s expressive, informative, vocative functions of text as well as the eight kinds of translation methods have been frequently discussed in many dissertations or thesis in Taiwan. With Newmark’s discussion on the different functions and text types, the different foci of translation, such as the core of translation (writer, truth or readership) or the status of the author’s could be revealed. In this case, the different approaches to translate various texts could also be adopted. As far as I am concerned, Newmark’s endeavor in sorting out the different functions of translation is quite crucial. It seems that translation has long been viewed as a product with a monadic entity, namely, the product of the translated source text. Under this point of view, translation then becomes something that does not possess its own character/ function (as it only possesses the character of the source text). Hence, the potential of translation might be limited under the previously mentioned perspective. However, if the functions of the target texts can be identified, then it may endow the translators the right to put different degrees of emphasis on different texts. Therefore, I would say that Newmark’s work on text type and functions not only is useful for translators to decide what to focus in the translation, but also helps to identify the status and, to some degree, the entity of translation.
In addition, it seems to me that Newmark’s theory can also be adopted in the assessment of translation. For instance, the types of texts can be used as the basis of the assessment criteria to decide the main focus of the translation items. When assessing, the participants are informed with the different main function of the target texts and are asked to obtain those function as much as possible. A checklist can then be made to verify to what degree the test-takers have obtained the main functions of the text. In this case, the assessment could then be more than mere digit marks but with more solid-based criteria behind it. However, I do acknowledge that translation assessment is a much more complicated issue. A simple checklist can hardly cover all the complexity of translation assessment. But it could potentially be helpful to help the assessment process be more objective.
張貼留言