Πρόγραμμα Μετα-Φράσεις

Translation and Difference”

The videopresentation highlights the potential of 'communicative translation' (Newmark 1981) to suggest preferred discoursal patterns and normative behaviour cross-culturally and to reveal cultural and linguistic identities. For instance, the source and target versions of the Waiting for Godot play by Samuel Beckett (transl. into Greek by Alexandra Papathanasopoulou) are claimed to reflect a different interpersonal relationship between the two characters in the play, Vladimir and Estragon. 

The videopresentation reports on evidence from two MA programmes, School of Philosophy, University of Athens (spring 2007), with a view to showing the potential of translation to contribute to the study of intercultural difference. It raises awareness of the potential of translation to construct and/or reflect aspects of the historical memory of a target society, and preference manifested in the use of discoursal petterns cross-culturally.

(a) RAISING AWARENESS OF 'SELF' IDENTITY IN A TARGET ENVIRONMENT. Research activity in the classroom, Translation-Translatology MA Programme, School of Philosophy, University of Athens (2007), focused on texts referring to war and fighting, in the English-Greek paradigm, with a view to accounting for representations of war and fighting, in the two versions of texts. A contrastive view to the source and target versions of Antony Beevor's book (The Battle for Spain. The Spanish Civil War 1936-1939, 2006, U.K.: Weidenfeld and Nicolson/translated into Greek by Yiannis Kastanaras, Ο Ισπανικός Εμφύλιος Πόλεμος 1936-1939. Aθήνα: Γκοβόστης, 2006) reveals that the Greek target version emphasizes the notion of resistance: source items like fighting, defence, resistance are occasionally rendered in terms of the Greek item for resistance (αντίσταση), although target equivalent items to fighting and defence ARE readily available in Greek. The assumption is that the translator has highlighted the notion of resistance in the Greek target version, to ativate associations with the civil war (:Greece had its own resistance and civil war period about the same time as Spain) in order to enhance the communicative potential of the Greek text. The intention also seems to be manifested in the layout of the cover of the Greek edition: the title refers to the civil war theme dominating the cover page, while the picture strongly draws on associations from the Greek civil war. By contrast, the English cover would not activate similar associations in the mind of the target reader. A different frame through which "translators and interpreters in collaboration with publishers, editors and other agents involved in the interaction – accentuate, undermine or modify aspects of the narratives encoded in the source text" (Baker, 2006:5). Textual and paratextual aspects contribute to constructing the historical memory of a target society, as well as the narratives involved in reproducing culturally and socio-politically compatible frames.

In the next section, attention is drawn to findings of research activity in the English Studies MA Programme, Faculty of English, University of Athens (2007). The translation direction is the same, (from English into Greek), but the interest lies on the source version.

(b) RAISING AWARENESS OF FOREIGN LANGUAGE PREFERENCE IN THE FL CLASSROOM. FL coursebooks meticulously deal with correct and appropriate linguistic behaviour in a foreign language. Translation has the potential to highlight linguistic preference across cultures by focusing on different treatment of phenomena across languages, with a view to consolidating preferred linguistic habits. Linguistic preference, as reflected in raw data, can be further verified through electronic processing of parallel translation data (Olohan 2004). Postgraduate students of the English Studies MA Programme selected English source and Greek target versions of published press news items, processed them with Lingua Multiconcord concordancer (CFL Software Development, West Yorkshire, UK), and retrieved information on varying tendencies, shaping experience across cultures. Students compiled part of the T.E.G.MA. corpus (Translated English-Greek MAterial) and highlighted liguistic phenomena treated differently across versions, e.g. the preference of Greek for past tense reference at points where English would opt for present perfect tense reference. Authentic data can contribute to consolidating linguistic habits with a view to improving students FL productive skills. Translation is thus shown to be contributing to raising awareness of linguistic, cultural, political etc. apects of identity and promoting teaching goals in the FL classroom. A lexicographer's view about the potential of translation corpora to contribute to the study of identities would add up options on the list, thus enhancing the potential of raw data to contribute insights to the study of linguistic identities across cultures. For instance, the group of students involved in examining the treatment of war and fighting, in translation, compiled a Greek-English dictionary of collocations used in political discourse, through information retrieval from translation data (Σιδηροπούλου 2008).  The resource would enhance collocational competence in Greek speakers' FL production in political discourse.

Raising awareness of identities of the 'self' and/or 'other' is a highly significant goal in multicultural societies: Raising awareness of the 'self' contributes to highlighting aspects of one's own identity, in view of the globalization of culture (Cronin 2003). Raising awareness of the 'other' contributes to broadening percep­tion of variation in socio-linguistic, socio-cultural behaviour, with a view to developing tolerance and appreciation of intercultural difference.

REFERENCES

Baker, Mona. 2006. Translation and Conflict. London: Routledge.

Cronin, Michael. 2003/2004. Translation and Globalization. London: Roulledge.

Newmark, Peter. 1981. Approaches to Translation. Oxford and New York: Pergamon.

Olohan, Maeve. 2004. Introducing Corpora in Translation Studies. London: Routledge.

Σιδηροπούλου, Μαρία (επιμ). 2008. Ελληνο-Αγγλικό Λεξικό Συμφράσεων Πολιτικής Επικαιρότητας. ΔΔΠΜΣ Μετάφραση-Μεταφρασεολογία. Αθήνα: Δίαυλος [Sidiropoulou, Maria (ed). 2008. Greek-English Dictionary of Political Discourse Collocations. MA ‘Translation-Translatology’ Programme. Athens: Diavlos].

Texts, Aknowledgements, Copyright