Handling Equivalent-lacking Words

It has been pointed, out that many English words have no regular equivalents, and a number of techniques have been suggested for rendering the meanings of such equivalent-lacking words in TT. Now the practicing translator most often has to resort to such techniques when he comes across some new-coined words in the source text or deals with names of objects or phenomena unknown to the TL community (the so-called “realia”).

New words are coined in the language to give names to new objects, or phenomena which become known to the people. This process is going on a considerable scale as shown by the necessity of publishing dictionaries of new words. With the English vocabulary constantly expanding, no dictionary can catch up with the new arrivals and give a more or less complete list of the new words. Moreover there are numerous short-lived lexical units created ad hoc by the English-speaking people in the process of oral or written communication. Such words may never get in common use and will not be registered by the dictionaries but they are well understood by the communicants since they are coined on the familiar structural and semantic models. If someone is ever referred to as a “Polandologist”, the meaning will be readily understood against such terms as “Kremlinologist” or “Sovietologist”. If a politician is called “ a nuclearist ”, the new coinage will obviously mean a supporter of nuclear arms race. “A zero-growther” would be associated with some zero-growth theory or policy and so on.

When new words come into being to denote new objects or phenomena, they naturally cannot have regular equivalents in another language. Such equivalents may only gradually evolve as the result of extensive contacts between the two nations. Therefore the translator coming across a new coinage has to interpret its meaning and to choose the appropriate way of rendering it in his translation. Consider the following sentence: “In many European capitals central streets have been recently pedestrianized.”¹ First, the translator will recognize the origin of “pedestrianize” which is coined from the word “pedestrian” — „пішохід“ and the verb-forming suffix -ize. Then he will realize the impossibility of a similar formation in Ukrainian (опішоходити!) and will resort to a semantic transformation: „рух транспорту був заборонений“, „вулиці були закриті для транспорту“ or „вулиці були відведені тільки для пішоходів“.

As often as not a whole set of new words may enter in common use, all formed on the same model. Thus, the anti-segregation movement in the United States in the 1960’s introduced a number of new terms to name various kinds of public demonstrations formed from a verb + -in on the analogy of “sit-in”: “ride-in” (in segregated buses), “swim-in” (in segregated swimming pools), “pray-in” (in segregated churches) and many others.

Various translators may select different ways of translating a new coinage, with several substitutes competing with one another. As a rule, one of them becomes more common and begins to be used predominantly. For instance, the new term “word-processor” was translated into Ukrainian as „обробник слів“, „словниковий процесор“ and „текстовий редактор“, the last substitute gaining the upper hand. The translator should carefully watch the development of the usage and follow the predominant trend.

Similar problems have to be solved by the translator when he deals with equivalent-lacking words referring to various SL realia. As often as not, the translator tries to transfer the name to TL by way of borrowing, loan word or approximate equivalents. Many English words have been introduced into Ukrainian in this way: „бейсбол“ (baseball), „хмарочос“ (skyscraper), „саквояжники“ (carpet baggers), etc. Quite a number of equivalent-lacking words of this type, however, still have no established substitutes in Ukrainian, and the translator has to look for an occasional equivalent each time he comes across such a word in the source text. Mention can be made here of “filibustering”, “baby-sitter”, “tinkerer“, “know-how”, “ladykiller”, and many others.

A large group of equivalent-lacking English words includes words of general semantics which may have a great number of substitutes in Ukrainian which cannot be listed or enumerated. These are such words as “approach, control, corporate, pattern, record, facility”, etc. Numerous lexical units of this type are created by conversion especially when compound verbs are nominalized. What is “a fix-up” for example? It can refer to anything that is fixed up. And “a set-up” is anything that is set up, literally or figuratively. The translator is expected to understand the general idea conveyed by the word and to see what referent it is denoting in each particular case.

Special attention should be paid to English conjunctions and prepositions which are often used differently from their apparent equivalents in Ukrainian and are, in fact, equivalent-lacking. Such common conjunctions as “when, if, as, once, whichever” and some others are not infrequently the cause of errors in translation and should be most carefully studied.

Similar pitfalls can be set for the translator by such productive English “semi-suffixes” as -minded, -conscious, -oriented, -manship, etc.

In conclusion, let us recall that any word may become equivalent-lacking if the particular context makes it impossible to use its regular equivalent and forces the translator to resort to some semantic transformation.

Translating equivalent-lacking words calls for a good deal of ingenuity and imagination on the part of the translator who should be well trained to use the appropriate semantic transformations, whenever necessary. At the same time he must be prepared to look for new ways of solving his problems whenever the standard methods cannot be applied to the particular context.

LECTURE 22: Handling Translator’s False Friends

There are words in the source and target languages which are more or less similar in form. Such words are of great interest to the translator since he is naturally inclined to take this formal similarity for the semantic proximity and to regard the words that look alike as permanent equivalents.

The formal similarity is usually the result of the two words having the common origin, mainly derived from either Greek or Latin. Since such words can be found in a number of languages, they are referred to as “international”.

As a matter of fact, very few international words have the same meanings in different languages. In respect to English and Ukrainian we can cite the words like the English “parliament, theorem, diameter” and their Ukrainian counterparts „парламент, теорема, діаметр“. In most cases, however, the semantics of such words in English and in Ukrainian do not coincide and they should rather be named “pseudo-international”. Their formal similarity suggesting that they are interchangeable, is, therefore, deceptive and may lead to translation errors. For that reason they are often referred to as the translator’s false friends.

The pseudo-international words can be classified in two main groups. First, there are words which are similar in form but completely different in meaning. Here the risk of making a bad mistake is very great whenever the translator fails to consult his dictionary. Lots of mistakes have been made translating such English words as “decade, complexion, lunatic, accurate, actual, aspirant” and the like. E.g.:

1. It lasted the whole decade.

2. She has a very fine complexion.

3. Well, he must be a lunatic.

The respective Ukrainian words „декада, комплекція, лунатик“ are pseudo-international and cannot be used in translation. Cf.:

1. Це продовжувалось ціле десятиліття.

2. У неї прекрасний колір обличчя.

3. Та він, мабуть, не сповна розуму.

Second, there are many pseudo-international words which are not fully interchangeable though there are some common elements in their semantics. They may become the false friends if the translator substitutes one of them for the other without due regard to the difference in their meaning or to the way the English word is used in the particular context. The translator should bear in mind that a number of factors can preclude the possibility of using the formally similar word as an equivalent. Among these factors the following are most important:

1. The semantic factor resulting from the different subsequent development of the words borrowed by the two languages from the same source. For instance, the English “idiom” can be well rendered by its Ukrainian counterpart to convey the idea of an expression whose meaning cannot be derived from the conjoined meanings of its elements but has developed such additional meanings as dialect (local idiom) and individual style (Shakespeare’s idiom). When the word is used in either of these meanings its equivalent in Ukrainian will not be „ідіома“, but „діалект, говірка“ or „стиль“, respectively.

As often as not, the translator may opt for an occasional equivalent to a pseudo-international word just as he may do while dealing with any other type of the word:

South Vietnam was a vast laboratory for the testing of weapons of counter-guerrilla warfare.

Південний В’єтнам став полігоном для випробування зброї, яка використовувалась у війні проти партизанів.

2. The stylistic factor resulting from the difference in the emotive or stylistic connotation of the correlated words. For example, the English “career” is neutral while the Ukrainian „кар’єра“ is largely negative. The translator has to reject the pseudo-international substitute and to look for another way out, e.g.:

Davy took on Faraday as his assistant and thereby opened a scientific career for him.

Деві взяв Фарадея до себе в асистенти й тим самим відкрив йому шлях у науку.

3. The co-occurrence factor reflecting the difference in the lexical combinability rules in the two languages. The choice of an equivalent is often influenced by the usage preferring a standard combination of words to the formally similar substitute. So, a “defect” has a formal counterpart in the Ukrainian „дефект“ but “theoretical and organizational defects” will be rather „теоретичні й організаційні прорахунки“. A “gesture” is usually translated as „жест“ but the Ukrainian word will not be used to translate the following sentence for the combinability factor:

The reason for including only minor gestures of reforms in the program...

Причина включення в програму лише жалюгідної подоби реформ...

4. The pragmatic factor reflecting the difference in the background knowledge of the members of the two language communities which makes the translator reject the formal equivalent in favor of the more explicit or familiar variant. The reader of the English original will usually need no explanation concerning the meaning of such terms as “the American Revolution”, “the Reconstruction” or “the Emancipation Proclamation” which refer to the familiar facts of the US history. In the Ukrainian translation, however, these terms are usually not replaced by their pseudo-international equivalents. Instead, use is made of the descriptive terms better known to the Ukrainian reader:

The American Revolution was a close parallel to the wars of national liberation in the colonial and semi-colonial countries.

Війна за незалежність в Америці була прямим прототипом національно-визвольних війн в колоніальних і напівколоніальних країнах.

This counter-revolutionary organization was set up to suppress the Negro — poor white alliance that sought to bring democracy in the South in the Reconstruction period.

Ця контрреволюційна організація була створена для придушення спільної боротьби негрів і білих бідняків, які добивались встановлення демократії на півдні після відміни рабства.

The Senator knew Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation by heart.

Сенатор знав напам’ять проголошену Лінкольном декларацію про відміну рабства.

With the knowledge of, and due regard to, these factors, the translator stands a good chance of making the pseudo-international words his good friends and allies.

LECTURE 23: Collocational Aspects of Translation

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