Ideological aspects of the translation of business annual reports in Oman (English-Arabic)

The socioeconomic context in the renaissance era in Oman has resulted in the development of new forms of discursive prastises and thus, in the introduction of new genres. One of these new genres is the business annual report, which in Oman exists in English and Arabic. This thesis examines the role of translation in the production of annual reports. This research makes a contribution to the field of Translation Studies by examining institutional translation in order to gain insights into translation agents, processes, practises and underlying policies with reference to national business institutions in their sociopolitical and historical and institutional contexts .Business reports are still largely under-researched as a genre in Translation Studies. The thesis starts with an overview of relevant aspects of Translation Studies to arrive at a theoretical framework which informs the analysis. The empirical analysis is based on sixty seven reports produced by different Oman-based companies which vary in size and organisational patterns. Annual reports are characterised as a genre in terms of function and structure at the macro-level as well as the micro-level. They have an informative and a persuasive function, as they are produced by different companies in their attempt to promote and fulfil their respective business interests and objectives.The thesis presents the sociocultural and political contexts of the production of the English and Arabic versions of the annual reports, focusing on the underlying functions and principles of institutions and agents. The next chapter illustrates the textual profiles of the English and the Arabic versions, identifying typical translation strategies. The discussion here operates within the framework of product-oriented Descriptive Translation Studies (Lambert and van Gorp 1985). It is argued that the two language versions reflect aspects of ideology, political affiliation and power relations at both the macro and micro- structural levels. These ideological aspects can be seen in particular in the addition, omission and change of specific expressions which refer to religious or interpersonal aspects. These strategies signal the aim to appeal to wider Arab readers and to fulfil the agendas of different agents (government, companies, chairpersons, directors, etc.). The description of the texts is followed by an account of these aspects in terms of sociopolitical and institutional conditions in the production of the translations. For this explanation, reference is made to sociological approaches to translation, mainly building on the work of Bourdieu (1991). This thesis emphasises that the translation of annual reports is a collective effort which takes place in a particular institutional context. Consequently, the translation strategies are regulated by the objectives of the institution within which translators and other agents operate. The translations are prepared in order to meet the expectations and needs of the intended Arabic language addressees; in addition, the generic features of the reports reveal a progression of transmission and development over the course of time in the spheres of business and economy in Oman. This thesis demonstrates that business companies too can be seen as institutions which contribute significantly to disseminating business terms and concepts and promoting investment opportunities domestically and internationally through translation work.

Linguistic Corpora as International Cultural Heritage: The Corpus of Bulgarian and Ukrainian Parallel Texts

The paper relates about our ongoing work on the creation of a corpus of Bulgarian and Ukrainian parallel texts. We discuss some differences in the approaches and the interpretation of some concepts, as well as various problems associated with the construction of our corpus, in particular the occasional ‘nonparallelism’ of original and translated texts. We give examples of the application of the parallel corpus for the study of lexical semantics and note the outstanding role of the corpus in the lexicographic description of Ukrainian and Bulgarian translation equivalents. We draw attention to the importance of creating parallel corpora as objects of national as well as global cultural heritage.

Turismo e patrimônio cultural: processo de tombamento e estratégias de utilização turística do Centro Histórico de Natal/RN

In a globalized society, the relations between heritage and tourism are reflected in an ambiguous reality, shaped between the interests of preservation and the aspirations for economic benefits. On the one hand, the cities as a main generating cultural offerings needs to contemplate its heritage as a development axis, finding in the cultural tourism promotion a strategy to support the high cost of recovery and maintenance of its historical center and its expressions cultural. On the other, adds to the new requirements of demand, causing the tourism projects to turn to the cultural factor in the formation of their products, which allows municipalities to attract the growing cultural tourism segment. In this perspective, this study develops into a focused cross-cut in the analysis of Natal’s Historical City Center, in order to understand how this cultural heritage fallen has been used by the municipal administration for tourism. By understanding the heritage as a reference to identity and memory, as well as a cultural symbol of Natal society, characterized as an element surrounded by complex and strictly private situations, it identified the need for a qualitative approach to his deep understanding. The in-depth case study developed in two stages, first the realization of bibliographical and documentary research; and thereafter the interpretation of data collected through semi-structured interviews with municipal administrators and local residents. The survey results show that the official representatives of heritage are concerned about the preservation of the material dimension of the architectural heritage of the city, however, still can not reach and sensitize the local population, which seems to be part of a process that should be democratic and strengthening the sense of belonging of these people. Finally, it indicates an absence of revitalization strategies by the current municipal public administration for Natal’s Historical City Center, revealing a speech covered by a positivist interpretation of tourism, which deals with the use of assets by the scope of the marketing empiricism.

A Spanish Translation of the American Crime TV Series "Wicked City"

El siguiente trabajo de fin de Master tiene como objetivo la realización de una traducción audiovisual al español de la serie americana de crimen Wicked City, en concreto de los dos primeros episodios de esta. El creciente desarrollo tecnológico sufrido en los últimos años así como el aumento en el número de producciones audiovisuales, ha colocado a la rama de la traducción audiovisual en una de las más demandadas hoy en día. Aun habiendo una gran cantidad de productos audiovisuales, sobre todo series y películas, que son importadas y exportadas y por lo tanto traducidas y adaptadas a la cultura receptora, siendo las más traducidas las estadounidenses, hay aun algunas que todavía no han sido objeto de este proceso. Y este es el caso de, por ejemplo, la serie elegida en este trabajo, Wicked City, que no ha sido oficialmente traducida al español. Por lo tanto, este trabajo propone una traducción para los dos primeros capítulos de esta serie, y dicha traducción es acompañada de un análisis de las prioridades y restricciones que se han seguido para llevarla a cabo, así como de una ejemplificación de las características específicas pertenecientes al género del crimen en esta serie concreta y de algunas de las técnicas de traducción usadas en el proyecto. La disertación se estructura en cinco partes aparte de la introductoria. La primera es un marco teórico sobre la traducción audiovisual y el género del crimen. En la segunda, se presenta la metodología usada para el proyecto. La tercera se centra en la traducción de la serie en sí. La cuarta es un análisis y discusión sobre la traducción. La quinta y última, está destinada a las conclusiones y sugerencias para investigación futura. En el marco teórico se define la traducción audiovisual como una traducción de cualquier producto audiovisual, ya sea de cine, televisión, teatro, radio, o de aplicaciones informáticas, siendo esta una disciplina relativamente nueva. Así mismo, también se da una vista general de todos los modos de traducción audiovisual, así como de las prioridades técnicas y lingüísticas de esta y la situación de la disciplina en el ámbito universitario español. También se comentan los aspectos más básicos del crimen ficticio así como las características de este género en las series televisivas. En la sección de metodología se explica que con el fin de llevar desarrollar el objetivo del trabajo, el primer paso a seguir fue, tras la visualización de la serie, el transcribir los diálogos de los dos episodios a un documento aparte, creando así lo que podríamos llamar el “script original”. Una vez hecho esto, se tradujeron ambos episodios al español. Seguidamente, se imprimó tal script para poder señalar todos los aspectos a discutir, es decir, las restricciones, las características del crimen de televisión y las técnicas de traducción. Finalmente, se llevó a cabo un análisis cualitativo de todos los aspectos mencionados previamente. Así bien, en la sección de análisis, se destaca que se llevó como prioridad el intentar conservar un lenguaje natural y no forzado. Para tal prioridad hay que tener en cuenta las restricciones que nos presenta la traducción: los referentes culturales, los nombres propios, la intertextualidad, las unidades fraseológicas, las rimas, los calcos, las normas ortotipográficas, los diferentes acentos y las interjecciones. Además, esta serie presenta una serie de características pertenecientes al género del crimen que son las preguntas, la terminología específica, los marcadores pragmáticos y los “suavizadores” . Por último, para llevar a cabo la traducción se siguieron diversas técnicas, así como préstamo, traducción palabra por palabra, traducción literal, omisión, reducción, particularización, generalización, transposición, amplificación, variación, substitución y adaptación. Todos estos aspectos son ejemplificados con ejemplos extraídos de la traducción. Como conclusión, se resalta que una traducción audiovisual contiene mayormente dos tipos de restricciones: las técnicas y las lingüísticas. Las primeras van a estar especialmente ligadas a la modalidad de traducción audiovisual. Aunque en este trabajo la traducción no ha sido realizada con el fin de adaptarla a una modalidad específica, y por tanto las restricciones técnicas no suponen tantos problemas, es importante tener en cuenta la coherencia visual y auditiva, que de cierta manera van a condicionar la traducción. Así, a la hora de familiarizar, extranjerizar y naturalizar un término cultural, es importante mantener dichas coherencias. Por lo tanto, va a ser más fácil usar estas técnicas con un término que no aparece en pantalla. En cuanto a las restricciones lingüísticas, nos encontramos con los referentes culturales, los nombres propios, la intertextualidad, las unidades fraseológicas, las rimas, los calcos, las normas ortotipográficas, los diferentes acentos y las interjecciones, aspectos que el traductor tiene que cuidar especialmente. Finalmente, ya que ha sido muy poca la investigación realizada en el género del crimen desde un punto de vista traductológico, algunas líneas de estudio futuras podrían ser: estudiar en mayor profundidad las características que son específicas al genero del crimen, especialmente en las series de televisión; comparar estas características con las características de otro tipo de textos como por ejemplo la novela; estudiar si estas características especificas a un género condicionan de alguna manera la traducción, y si es así, hasta qué punto; y por último, determinar cómo una traducción puede ser diferente dependiendo del género, es decir, por ejemplo, si es de tipo romántico, de crimen, o de comedia.

Lost in Translation? Russian Media Portrayals and Laypersons’ Interpretations of Angelina Jolie’s Breast Cancer Discourse

In May 2013, Angelina Jolie revealed that because she had a family history of breast and ovarian cancer and carried a rare BRCA gene mutation, she had undergone a preventive double mastectomy. Media coverage has been extensive around the world, including in Russia, not an English-language country, where all global news is inevitably filtered by translation. After examining the reactions of Russian mass media and members of the public to Jolie’s disclosure, I consider what transformations have occurred with Jolie’s message in the process of cross-cultural transfer. I explore the mass media portrayal of Jolie’s announcement, laypersons’ immediate and prolonged reactions, and the reflections of patients involved directly in the field of hereditary breast cancer. To my knowledge, this multifaceted and bilingual project is the first conceptualization of Jolie’s story as it has been translated in a different sociocultural environment. I start with examination of offline and online publications that appeared in Russia within two months after Jolie’s announcement. In this part of my analysis, I conceptualize the representation of Jolie’s case in Russian mass media and grasp what sociocultural waves were generated by this case among general lay audiences. Another part of my study contains the results of qualitative in-depth interviews. Eight women with a family history of hereditary breast cancer were recruited to participate in the research. The findings represent Jolie’s case through the eyes of Russian women with the same gene mutation as Jolie. Consolidating my findings, I argue that Jolie’s announcement was misinterpreted and misrepresented by Russian mass media, as well as misunderstood by a considerable part of the media audience. Jolie’s perspective on hereditary breast cancer mostly remained unheard among members of the Russian public. I make suggestions about the reasons for such a phenomenon, and demonstrate how Jolie’s case is implicated in politics, economics, and the culture of contemporary Russia.

Defining ‘Community’ for Community Translation

Unlike community interpreting, community translation engages with the members of the community both at individual and group levels. This duality of the process makes the identification of the community as a socio-cultural entity and of its individual members all the more important. There have been several attempts to define the concept of ‘community’ in different professional and academic contexts. Mindful of the difficulty of defining community, the paper proposes three methods that can help community translators in visualizing the characteristics of the intended audience and in making informed translation decisions. The three methods, derived from user-centred translation, are scrutinized using a case study based on a real-life National Health Service (NHS) text.

Operationalising Intercultural Competence for Translation Pedagogy

This article discusses intercultural competence in the context of translator training. It looks at the way this competence is incorporated and defined in the overall translation competence models, moving on to introduce two models that focus on intercultural competence in particular and serve to operationalize the concept for pedagogical purposes. Making this competence more explicit in translator training is considered vital: in the light of results gained from a survey into the current pedagogical practice (PICT 2012), translator trainers’ and translation students’ understanding of the nature and extent of (inter)cultural training do not match. This calls for re-evaluation of teaching practice which, in turn, presupposes a detailed, comprehensive account of the various dimensions of intercultural competence a translator is to possess. This article discusses these dimensions and provides exemplary scenarios on how to address them in translator training.

Culture in Transfer: Translation and Transcultural Communication International Conference

It is widely acknowledged that interpreters need to have knowledge of the cultures represented by the languages they work with (e.g. Roy 2002, Angelelli 2004, Wadensjŏ 2008). However, it is not clear what interpreters are expected to do with this knowledge. Some scholars recommend that interpreters be cultural mediators (e.g. Katan 2004 & 2014). As an attempt to examine existing guidelines on interpreters’ roles in the face of cultures/cultural issues, the research reported in this paper compares and contrasts the codes of conduct for interpreters from a number of associations and institutions in the UK, the US and China. The research has collected three different sets of data and has sought to investigate (1) in what ways interpreters are expected to do with their knowledge of cultures; (2) to what extent interpreters’ role as cultural mediators is referred to or defined in these codes of conduct; and (3) whether or not relevant guidelines are practically helpful for interpreters to deal with the range of cultural issues they may encounter in interpreting. Data analysis suggests that while cultural knowledge is a requisite for interpreters, the expectation for them to be cultural mediators may depend on the types of interpreting setting they work with and further guidelines are needed so that interpreters are clear on what they are required to do in dealing with cultural issues. The paper then discusses the implications of these findings and points to some directions for future research. Key references Brunette, L., G Bastin, I. Hemlin and H. Clarke (ed.). The Critical Link 3: Interpreters in the Community. Amsterdam/Philadephia: John Benjamins. Hale, S. 2007. Community Interpreting. Hampshire, New York: Palgrave Macmillan. The International Association of Conference Interpreting, 2015. Interpreting Explained. Available from: http://aiic.net/; accessed on 24 June 2015 Katan, David, --- 2004. Translating Cultures: An Introduction for Translators, Interpreters and Mediators. St Jerome. --- 2014. Workshop: Translation at the cross-roads: time for the transcreational turn? University College London. Martín, Mayte C. & Mary Phelan, 2009. Interpreters and Cultural Mediators – different but complementary roles. In: Translocations: Migration and Social Change. ISSN Number: 2009-0420 (online) McDonough Dolmaya, Julie, (2011. Moral ambiguity: Some shortcomings of professional codes of ethics for translators. In: The Journal of Specialised Translation. Issue 15, January 2011 (online). Pöchhacker, F., 2008. Interpreting as Mediation. In: (ed.) Valero Garcés, C. and Martin, A, Crossing Borders in Community Interpreting: definitions and dilemmas, pp. 9-26. John Benjamins Amsterdam and Philadelphia. Roy, Cynthia B., 2002. The Problem with Definitions, Descriptions, and the Role Metaphors of Interpreters. In: (ed.) Pöchhacker, Franz & Miriam Shlesinger, The Interpreting Studies Reader. Routledge. Wadensjö 1998. Interpreting as Interaction. New York: Addison Wesley Longman Inc.

Los emigrantes en las áreas mineras y las ciudades de Hispania: religión, identidades y difusión cultural

En el presente artículo analizamos los desplazamientos de cultos indígenas hispanos desde distintas áreas de la Península Ibérica hacia los principales lugares de inmigración en Hispania: las áreas mineras y las ciudades. Proponemos que estos grupos de emigrantes rendían culto en su nueva residencia a las deidades que veneraban en sus regiones de procedencia como un medio de preservar su cohesión social y su identidad cultural. La dureza de la vida laboral en las áreas mineras reforzaba la necesidad de fortalecer los lazos culturales.

Multilingualism and conceptual modelling

One of the leading motivations behind the multilingual semantic web is to make resources accessible digitally in an online global multilingual context. Consequently, it is fundamental for knowledge bases to find a way to manage multilingualism and thus be equipped with those procedures for its conceptual modelling. In this context, the goal of this paper is to discuss how common-sense knowledge and cultural knowledge are modelled in a multilingual framework. More particularly, multilingualism and conceptual modelling are dealt with from the perspective of FunGramKB, a lexico-conceptual knowledge base for natural language understanding. This project argues for a clear division between the lexical and the conceptual dimensions of knowledge. Moreover, the conceptual layer is organized into three modules, which result from a strong commitment towards capturing semantic knowledge (Ontology), procedural knowledge (Cognicon) and episodic knowledge (Onomasticon). Cultural mismatches are discussed and formally represented at the three conceptual levels of FunGramKB.

Motivating film title translation: a cognitive análisis

This proposal is a non-quantitative study based on a corpus of real data which offers a principled account of the translation strategies employed in the translation of English film titles into Spanish in terms of cognitive modeling. More specifically, we draw on Ruiz de Mendoza and Galera’s (2014) work on what they term content (or low-level) cognitive operations, based on either ‘stands for’ or ‘identity’ relations, in order to investigate possible motivating factors for translations which abide by oblique procedures, i.e. for non-literal renderings of source titles. The present proposal is made in consonance with recent findings within the framework of Cognitive Linguistics (Samaniego 2007), which evidence that this linguistic approach can fruitfully address some relevant issues in Translation Studies, the most outstanding for our purposes being the exploration of the cognitive operations which account for the use of translation strategies (Rojo and Ibarretxe-Antuñano 2013: 10), mainly expansion and reduction operations, parameterization, echoing, mitigation and comparison by contrast. This fits in nicely with a descriptive approach to translation and particularly with skopos theory, whose main aim consists in achieving functionally adequate renderings of source texts.

Outcome of the Public Consultation on the Draft Opinion of the Scientific Panel on Dietetic Products, Nutrition, and Allergies (NDA) on Dietary Reference Values for Fats, Including Saturated Fatty Acids, Polyunsaturated Fatty Acids, Monounsaturated Fatty Acids, Trans Fatty Acids, and Cholesterol

On 2 July 2009, the EFSA Panel on Dietetic products, Nutrition and Allergies (NDA) endorsed a draft Opinion on Dietary Reference Values for fats to be released for public consultation. This Scientific Report summarises the comments received through the public consultation and outlines how these were taken into account in the final opinion. EFSA had received contributions from 40 interested parties (individuals, non-governmental organisations, industry organisations, academia and national assessment bodies). The main comments which were received during the public consultation related to: the availability of more recent data, the nomenclature used, the use of a non-European food composition data base, the impact of genetic factors in modulating the absorption, metabolism and health effects of different fatty acids, the definition of “nutritionally adequate diet”, the use of Dietary Reference Values in the labelling of foods, the translation of advice into food-based dietary guidelines, nutrient goals and recommendations, certain risk management issues, and to Dietary Reference Values of fats, individual fatty acids, and cholesterol. All the public comments received that related to the remit of EFSA were assessed and the Opinion on Dietary Reference Values for fats has been revised taking relevant comments into consideration.

Translating Wordplay: A case study on the translation of wordplay in Terry Pratchett’s Soul Music

Wordplay and the translation of wordplay is a complex subject that has been addressed by various studies. The combination of a single form and multiple meanings created by wordplay makes it challenging to translate. Translating wordplay has even been considered impossible. This thesis explores wordplay and the translation of wordplay through an analysis of wordplay found in an English novel and its Finnish translation. The purpose is to shed light on the problems and solutions found in the data. The study consists of a quantitative analysis and a subsequent discussion on the findings. The findings from the study indicate that cultural aspects such as idioms and allusions are especially problematic when it comes to translating wordplay. Also, the communicative functions of wordplay were found to be central for a successful translation. It is concluded that these aspects require further study.

SERU Translation

Knowledge Exchange has funded the translation a recommended practice of the National Information Standard Organization (NISO) called SERU: Shared Electronic Resource Understanding. The SERU wording offers publishers and libraries the opportunity to save both the time and the costs associated with a negotiated and signed licence agreement by agreeing to operate within a framework of shared understanding and good faith. The statements in the document provide a set of common understandings for publishers and libraries to reference as an alternative to a formal licence when conducting business. The SERU wording has been translated in three languages of the Knowledge Exchange partners. German organisations are recommended to make use of the English wording

Our own language: Scots verse translation and the second-generation Scottish renaissance

This thesis examines the role of Scots language verse translation in the second-generation or post-war Scottish Renaissance. The translation of European poetry into Scots was of central importance to the first-generation Scottish Renaissance of the nineteen twenties and thirties. As Margery Palmer McCulloch has shown, the wider cultural climate of Anglo-American modernism was key to MacDiarmid’s conception of the interwar Scottish Renaissance. What was the effect on second-generation poet-translators as the modernist moment passed? Are the many translations undertaken by the younger poets who emerged in the course of the nineteen forties and fifties a faithful reflection of this cultural inheritance? To what extent are they indicative of a new set of priorities and international influences? The five principal translators discussed in this thesis are Douglas Young (1913-1973), Sydney Goodsir Smith (1915-1975), Robert Garioch (1909-1981), Tom Scott (1918-1995) and William J. Tait (1918-1992). Each is the subject of a chapter, in many cases providing the first or most extensive treatment of particular translations. While the pioneering work of John Corbett, Bill Findlay and J. Derrick McClure, among other scholars, has drawn attention to the long history of literary translation into Scots, this thesis is the first extended critical work to take the verse translations of the post-MacDiarmid makars as its subject. The nature and extent of MacDiarmid’s influence is considered throughout, as are the wider discourses around language and translation in twentieth-century Scottish poetry. Critical engagement with a number of key insights from theoretical translation studies helps to situate these writers’ work in its global context. This thesis also explores the ways in which the specific context of Scots translation allows scholars to complicate or expand upon theories of translation developed in other cultural situations (notably Lawrence Venuti’s writing on domestication and foreignisation). The five writers upon whom this thesis concentrates were all highly individual, occasionally idiosyncratic personalities. Young’s polyglot ingenuity finds a foil in Garioch’s sharp, humane wit. Goodsir Smith’s romantic ironising meets its match in Scott’s radical certainty of cause. Tait’s use of the Shetlandic tongue sets him apart. Nonetheless, despite the great variety of style, form and tone shown by each of these translators, this thesis demonstrates that there are meaningful links to be made between them and that they form a unified, coherent group in the wider landscape of twentieth-century Scottish poetry. On the linguistic level, each engaged to some extent in the composition of a ‘synthetic’ or ‘plastic’ language deriving partly from literary sources, partly from the spoken language around them. On a more fundamental level, each was committed to enriching this language through translation, within which a number of key areas of interest emerge. One of the most important of these key areas is Gaelic – especially the poetry of Sorley MacLean, which Young, Garioch and Goodsir Smith all translated into Scots. This is to some extent an act of solidarity on the part of these Scots poets, acknowledging a shared history of marginalisation as well as expressing shared hopes for the future. The same is true of Goodsir Smith’s translations from a number of Eastern European poets (and Edwin Morgan’s own versions, slightly later in the century). The translation of verse drama by poets is another key theme sustained throughout the thesis, with Garioch and Young attempting to fill what they perceived as a gap in the Scots tradition through translation from other languages (another aspect of these writers’ legacy continued by Morgan). Beyond this, all of the writers discussed in this thesis translated extensively from European poetries from Ancient Greece to twentieth-century France. Their reasons for doing so were various, but a certain cosmopolitan idealism figures highly among them. So too does a desire to see Scotland interact with other European nations, thus escaping the potentially narrowing influence of post-war British culture. This thesis addresses the legacy of these writers’ translations, which, it argues, continue to exercise a perceptible influence on the course of poetry in Scotland. This work constitutes a significant contribution to a much-needed wider critical re-assessment of this pivotal period in modern Scottish writing, offering a fresh perspective on the formal and linguistic merits of these poets’ verse translations. Drawing upon frequently obscure book, pamphlet and periodical sources, as well as unpublished manuscripts in the National Library of Scotland and the Shetland Archives, this thesis breaks new ground in its investigation of the role of Scots verse translation in the second-generation Scottish Renaissance.