International Conference
METHODOLOGICAL CHALLENGES FOR THE
CONTEMPORARY TRANSLATOR EDUCATION
KRAKOW, POLAND 10-11 OCTOBER 2013
TRANSLATION STRATEGIES
IN EARLY BILINGUALISM
Leonid Chernovaty
V.N.Karazin Kharkiv National University,
Ukraine
INTRODUCTION
• The translator trainer’s professional competence
has to include, among other components, the
knowledge concerning the principal features of
the translation/ interpreting process.
• The relevant data may be obtained from the
research into the development of translation
capacity both in early and late bilingualism.
• The presentation focuses on the selected data of
the author’s original research
TRANSLATION STRATEGIES IN EARLY BILINGUALISM
SUBJECT
Senia, bilingual male child, 43
months of age, experience in
English - communication with
his mother and native
speakers, both children and
adults, in Ukraine, USA and
UK; watching cartoons,
listening to audiobooks etc;
experience in Russian communication within the
family and beyond.
TRANSLATION STRATEGIES IN EARLY BILINGUALISM
PROCEDURE
The subject, within a game-with-adults
format, interpreted children's fairy-tales
and stories from English into Russian
and vice versa in 11 sessions
(maximum one session a day), from 5 to
32 minutes each.
TRANSLATION STRATEGIES IN EARLY BILINGUALISM
PROBLEMS IN CODE SWITCHING
F: «Но вот лето закончилось»
(Now summer was over)
М: «How do you say it in
English?»
М: «Тhat’s in Russian, sweetie
pie. How do you say it in
English?»
М: «Can you say it in English?»
S (translates): «лето
закончилось» (Summer was over)
S (translates): «зима
закончилась» (Winter was over)
S (translates): «лето
закончилось» (Summer was over)
S (translates): Summer no more
TRANSLATION STRATEGIES IN EARLY BILINGUALISM
CODE MIXTURE
F: «Пошел искать палки и за
два дня тук-тук построил
себе дом» (He went to look for
some sticks and in two days
he knock-knock and built his
house)
F: «А поросенок побежал
прятаться в деревянный
домик своего брата» (And
the piglet ran to hide at his
brother’s wooden house)
S (translates): «In two... днейз
(days)… days he тук-тук
(knock-knock)… knock-knock
и (and) already made his
house».
S (translates): «And he did
run to his... я думаю... брат»
(…I think… brother )
TRANSLATION STRATEGIES IN EARLY BILINGUALISM
AVOIDANCE
F: «нагнулся, хотел
поднять шляпу…» (He bent
down and wanted to pick up
the hat)
М: How do you say:
«наклонился» (bent down)?
S (translates): wanted to...
наклонился (bent down)
S (explains): «наклонился» я
не буду говорить (I won’t
say «наклонился»)
F: «к шляпе подошел…» (He S (explains): I’m not gonna
came up to the hat)
say «подошел» (came up)
TRANSLATION STRATEGIES IN EARLY BILINGUALISM
NARROWING DOWN THE WORD MEANING
М: «She sat down the picnic basket.
She put it away for a second…»
S: «Огурчики она убрала…» (She
took the cucumbers away)
GENERALIZATION
М: «After that the Little Red Riding
Hood and her grandmother had
lunch».
М: «Jake ate a bowl of cereal».
S: «У них была еда» (They had
some meal)
S: «Он чуть-чуть скушал еды» (He
had some food)
USE OF SEMANTICALLY DISTANT WORDS
F: «Там он увидел (печную) трубу»
(He saw a chimney there)
M: «Do not worry mommy, I’ll be
careful».
S: «Did see there a big tunnel».
S: «Ничего, мама. Я буду
аккуратным» (Do not worry
mommy, I’ll be orderly)
TRANSLATION STRATEGIES IN EARLY BILINGUALISM
DESCRIPTIVE TRANSLATION
М: «in the kitchen»
М: «sticky, stinky juice…»
S: «в комнате, где еду
готовят» (in the room
where food is prepared)
S: «липкие… и не
пахнули очень хорошо»
(sticky … and did not
smell very good)
TRANSLATION STRATEGIES IN EARLY BILINGUALISM
TRANSCODING WITH EXPLANATION
F: «Второй поросенок
был менее ленивый»
(The second piglet was
not so lazy)
S: «The other one did
be... Not good like the
other one. Не ленивый
такой (Not so lenivyi
(lazy) as the other one).
«Lenivyi» means that he
didn’t want build a
house».
TRANSLATION STRATEGIES IN EARLY BILINGUALISM
INVENTING NON-EXISTING WORDS
F: «И увидел соломенS: «Did see his hay
ный домик самого
house. The lie piglet».
ленивого поросенка»
(And he saw the straw
house of the laziest piglet)
USING WRONG WORDS
М: «Those are just little
problems».
S: «Просто маленькие
наказания» (Just little
punishments)
TRANSLATION STRATEGIES IN EARLY BILINGUALISM
COMPRESSION
F: «Наступила осень и три
S: «Three little piglets did know that
поросенка поняли, что прошли
they already need to work».
веселые времена и нужно
поработать» (Autumn came and the
three little piglets realized that the
merry times were over and they had
to work)
CALQUING
F: «Сначала построю дом, а потом S: «First I’m gonna build the house
пойду играть» (First I’ll build the
and then I’m gonna go and paly».
house and then I’ll go and play)
TRANSLATION STRATEGIES IN EARLY BILINGUALISM
PERMUTATION (WITH ADDITION OR REMOVAL OF WORDS)
F: «Но домик из палочек не
понравился третьему
поросенку» (But the house made
of sticks was disliked by the third
piglet)
S: «But the other one didn’t like his
house».
SENTENCE SPLITTING
М: «Then he put on a special cap
for sleeping and got into the
grandmother’s bed».
S: «Потом он одел такую
шапочку, чтоб для спания. Он
зашел в бабушкину кровать»
(Then he put on a special cap to
sleep in. He came into the
grandmother’s bed)
TRANSLATION STRATEGIES IN EARLY BILINGUALISM
CIRCUMSTANTIAL CALQUING
F: «Он как закричит!» (Suddenly
he burst into shouting)
F: «Шляпа как подпрыгнет!» (All
of a sudden the hat jumped up)
S: «He did like yell!».
S: «The hat how did jump!».
TRANSFORMATIONS
М: «The wolf felt very happy and
satisfied in his belly».
S: «Волк был очень… ему
понравилось. Не хотел больше
кушать» (The wolf was very… he
liked it. He was not hungry any
more)
TRANSLATION STRATEGIES IN EARLY BILINGUALISM
CONTEXTUAL SUBSTITUTIONS
F: «Волк удивился, потому что дом
оказался более крепким» (The wolf
was surprised that the house turned
out to be stronger)
S: «He think: Why I can’t blow this
house away?»
ANTONYMIC TRANSLATION
F: «Домик стоял» (The house stood)
S: «The house didn’t fall down».
ADJUSTING THE TARGET TEXT TO THE ADDRESSEE’S
POSSIBLE LACK OF KNOWLEDGE
М: «What are you doing out here, little
girl?», – the wolf asked in a very
friendly voice».
S: «Что ты делаешь, маленькая
девочка?», – сказал волк хорошим
голосом (What are you doing, little
girl?», – the wolf asked in a good
voice) (explains: «а вообще-то он был
плохой, потом он бабушку
скушал»)».(Actually he was not that
good, he ate up grandma later on)
TRANSLATION STRATEGIES IN EARLY BILINGUALISM
200
173
180
160
181
144
128
121
140
120
103
100
81
98
109
99
89
78 79
106
109
150
137
107
80
80
60
40
30
31
33
20
0
1
2
3
4
5
текст оригіналу
6
7
8
текст перекладу
9
10
11
TRANSLATION STRATEGIES IN EARLY BILINGUALISM
• It seems reasonable to assume the existence of a natural capacity for
translation that is probably based on certain innate universal principles,
as the bilingual child, lacking any training whatsoever, intuitively applied
most of the strategies and techniques described in Translation Studies.
• In translating from the more frequently used language (LA) into the less
used one (LB) there is a tendency for a wider application of literal
translation, which is probably related to the unequal language
mechanisms development in the two languages. That might force the
bilingual child to rely more heavily on the source text structure when
translating into LB.
• In translating from LB into LA the impact of the source text structure
lessens and the bilingual child resorts to the interpretive translation as a
prevailing model with a wider use of grammar and lexical
transformations.
• The conducted sessions of translation have stimulated the bilingual
child’s natural translation capacity rapid development. Throughout the
experiment the sizes of the source and target texts translated kept
steadily increasing having exceeded fivefold in the final session the initial
level in the first session.