summary of translation procedures

1.      INTRODUCTION

Translation itself has been used to transform a written or spoken source language or usually called “SL” text into written and spoken translation language or “TL” text in equivalent form. It means that the meaning of text in SL and TL must be in the same level. The purpose of translation is to reproduce various kinds of texts including religious, literary, scientific, and philosophical texts in another language and then make them available to wider readers.

Translate from an SL to a TL would be easy if language were just a classification for a set of general or universal concepts. Culler (1976) believes that languages are not nomenclatures and the concepts of one language may differ radically from those of another, since each language articulates or organizes the world differently, and languages don’t simply name categories; they articulate their own. Culler said that one of the troublesome problems of translation is the disparity among languages.

2.      TRANSLATION PROCEDURES

According to Nida (1964), translation procedures are divided into two types.

I .  Technical Procedures: 

a. Analysis of the source and target languages

If translators want to be success when translating a SL to TL, they have to analyse them first. It’s because each language has different grammatical language. So they should learn the languages to understand the grammatical structure of the language itself first. Translators also should have broad knowledge about the language comes from, it can help them to know the culture. Therefore, they can translate the SL into TL with appropriate meaning. 

b. A through study of the source language text before making attempts translate it

Translators also should have to know the meaning of the text content. From this study, the translators will understand the content easily and they can make a good translation.

c. Making judgments of the semantic and syntactic approximations

In this last step, the translators have to make a judgement of  the semantic and syntactic approximations. That both of them have a correlation and interconnect each other. Because of that translators must understand this step well.

   

II. Organizational Procedures:

Constant reevaluation of the attempt made; contrasting it with the existing available translatio      ns of the same text done by other translators, and checking the text's communicative effectiveness by asking the target language readers to evaluate its accuracy and effectiveness and studying their reactions.

a.      Procedures of translating culture-specific concepts (CSCs)

     According to Graedler (2000:3), procedures of translating CSCs are divided into four steps:

    * Making up a new word.

    * Explaining the meaning of the SL expression in lieu of translating it. 
    * Preserving the SL term intact.
    * Opting for a word in the TL which seems similar to or has the same "relevance" as the SL
        term.

b.      Procedures of translating culture-bond terms (CBTs)
   According to Harvey (2000:2-6), procedures of translating CBTs are divided into four major
techniques:

- Functional Equivalence:

It means using a referent in the TL culture whose function is similar to that of the source language (SL)
referent. As Harvey (2000:2) writes, authors are divided over the merits of this technique: Weston
(1991:23) describes it as "the ideal method of translation," while Sarcevic (1985:131) asserts that it is
"misleading and should be avoided"

    - Formal Equivalence or 'linguistic equivalence': It means a 'word-for-word'
 translation.

   - Transcription or 'borrowing' (i.e. reproducing or, where necessary, transliterating

the original term):
It stands at the far end of SL-oriented strategies. If the term is
formally transparent or is explained in the context, it may be used alone. In other
cases, particularly where no knowledge of the SL by the reader is presumed,
transcription is accompanied by an explanation or a translator's note.

   - Descriptive or self-explanatory translation: It uses generic terms (not CBTs) to
convey the meaning. It is appropriate in a wide variety of contexts where formal
equivalence is considered insufficiently clear. In a text aimed at a specialized reader,
it can be helpful to add the original SL term to avoid ambiguity.

III CONCLUSION

Some stylists consider translation "sprinkled with footnotes" undesirable, their uses can assist the TT readers to make better judgment of the ST contents.It seems that the procedures 'functional equivalent' and 'notes' would have a higher potential for conveying the concepts underlying the CSCs embedded in a text; moreover, it can be claimed that a combination of these strategies would result in a more accurate understanding of the CSCs than other procedures.

Various strategies opted for by translators in rendering allusions seem to play a crucial role in recognition and perception of connotations carried by them. If a novice translator renders a literary text without paying adequate attention to the allusions, the connotations are likely not to be transferred as a result of the translator's failure to acknowledge them. They will be entirely lost to the majority of the TL readers; consequently, the translation will be ineffective. It seems necessary for an acceptable translation to produce the same or at least similar effects on the TT readers as those created by the original work on its readers. This paper may show that a translator does not appear to be successful in his challenging task of efficiently rendering the CSCs and PNs when he sacrifices, or at least minimizes, the effect of allusions in favor of preserving graphical or lexical forms of source language PNs. In other words, a competent translator is well-advised not to deprive the TL reader of enjoying, or even recognizing, the allusions either in the name of fidelity or brevity. It could be claimed that the best translation method seem to be the one which allows translator to utilize 'notes.' As a result, employing 'notes' in the translation, both as a translation strategy and a translation procedure, seems to be indispensable so that the foreign language readership could benefit from the text as much as the ST readers do.