Jun 2026· Traduction et Langues· Vol 25· 0 citations
Abstract
Literary translation involves more than the transfer of semantic content from a source text into a target language; it also requires the recreation of emotional, interpersonal, and culturally embedded meanings so that target readers may engage with the literary work in ways comparable to the original readership. This study examines the strategies employed in translating Vietnamese terms of endearment into English. It focuses on Duong Thuy’s contemporary Vietnamese novel Oxford thương yêu and Elbert Bloom’s English translation, Beloved Oxford. Drawing on Newmark’s (1988) and Baker’s (1992) classifications of translation strategies, the study develops a nine-strategy framework for analysing each endearment term. It further identifies the dimensions of meaning that are successfully transferred and those that resist translation, while providing explanations for cases of partial or full untranslatability. The combination of qualitative interpretation and quantitative description enhances the rigour and coherence of the analytical process. The findings indicate that seven of the nine strategies were used in translating endearment terms: literal translation, transposition, paraphrase, omission, superordination, borrowing, and couplets or triplets. Although most semantic components were adequately conveyed, some strategies generated partial semantic loss, thereby affecting translation quality. The study suggests that endearment terms remain particularly challenging because they encode culturally specific forms of affection, intimacy, hierarchy, and interpersonal relations in Vietnamese and English. Its findings contribute to research on the translation of affective and relational language and offer a basis for further studies on endearment terms in literary translation.
— With the global dissemination of Chinese palace dramas, the honorifics employed in these series reflect the hierarchical social structures of imperial China. To ensure target audiences comprehend the hierarchical relationships and plot developments embedded in these linguistic forms, the translation of honorifics has become a critical concern. The American version of Empresses in the Palace features a well-defined honorific system, making its official English subtitles particularly representative for examining interpersonal meaning transmission. This study employs a combined methodology of literature review and case study, establishing an integrated theoretical framework drawing on Halliday ’ s Systemic Functional Linguistics and Brown & Levinson ’ s Face Theory. Using the official American subtitles as corpus data, this research analyzes translation strategies for honorifics and the cross-cultural transmission of interpersonal meaning, investigating how translators reconstruct comprehensible “ face mechanisms ” for target audiences. This framework offers analytical support for honorific translation in palace dramas, while the summarized strategies provide practical guidance for similar subtitle translation projects.
Peiying Deng· International Journal of Lan...· 0 citations
This study demonstrates that the primary challenge in translating Indonesian literary works into Arabic lies in the cultural elements embedded in metaphors, proverbs, and local expressions. Employing a qualitative textual analysis of Hamka’s Di Bawah Lindungan Kaʿbah, the research reveals that differences in worldview between Indonesian and Arab societies influence lexical choices and stylistic expressions, making literal translation insufficient. The findings highlight the necessity for translators to grasp the cultural context of the source text to ensure comprehensive meaning transfer. The study contributes to translation studies by formulating strategies that integrate semantic and stylistic approaches, including transliteration with explanatory notes, functional equivalence in the target culture, and the preservation of social metaphors. These strategies prove effective in maintaining cultural authenticity while ensuring readability for Arabic audiences. Overall, the research reinforces the view that literary translation is an act of intercultural mediation, synthesizing linguistic, semantic, and cultural dimensions to preserve meaning, aesthetic nuance, and cultural resonance in the target language.
Literary translation involves more than linguistic conversion; it also entails the reconstruction and re-encoding of cultural meanings. From the perspective of cultural translation theory, this study takes Liu Cixin’s original Chinese novel The Three-Body Problem and its Spanish translation El problema de los tres cuerpos by Javier Altayó as the objects of analysis. Drawing on Nida’s framework of cultural classification, culturally embedded elements in the source text are grouped into five categories: ecological, material, social, religious-philosophical, and linguistic. Through a comparative reading of the Chinese and Spanish versions, the paper examines the translator’s shifting strategies among foreignization, domestication, and cultural negotiation. The analysis suggests that the translation does not rely on a single or fixed strategy. When dealing with culture-specific elements that carry strong historical or regional specificity, the translator is more likely to preserve foreignness through transliteration, literal translation, or brief explanatory additions. In contrast, for expressions that may hinder comprehension or lead to cultural misinterpretation, freer rendering, generalization, or contextual adjustment tend to be adopted in order to reduce the cognitive burden on target readers. Overall, the Spanish translation of The Three-Body Problem reveals a flexible negotiation process, in which cultural difference is retained to varying degrees while comprehension is facilitated and narrative flow is maintained. This case offers a useful reference for the Spanish dissemination of Chinese science fiction and more broadly for the cross-cultural transmission of heterogenous cultural elements.
Yueyang Zhang· Journal of Language, Culture...· 0 citations
Domestication and foreignization are two common strategies for translators to deal with cultural differences. Based on Berman’s translation ethics and twelve deformations, this paper takes Bai Juyi’s the Everlasting Regret (selected sentences) as the object of study, adopts close reading and comparative analysis, and selects the English versions of Xu Yuanchong, Xu Zhongjie and W. J. B. Fletcher for comparative analysis, focusing on the different degrees of domestication and foreignization in the aspects of word choice, syntax, rhetorical organization, cultural transmission and so on, as well as the effects caused by these differences. The study found that in the English translation of classical Chinese poetry, in addition to the necessary domestication adjustment, the translator should retain the cultural background and aesthetic logic of the original poem as much as possible, so that the translation can achieve the purpose of conveying the cultural nature of this special literary genre. Therefore, in the English translation, foreignization enjoys ethical priority.
Chenfan Wang· English Language Teaching an...· 0 citations
Metaphor, or istiʿāra in Arabic, is one of the most prevalent rhetorical devices used in Qur'anic discourse. The Qur'an employed metaphor to convey meanings not immediately apparent on the surface of the text, yet significant. Thus, translating these metaphors into English was extremely difficult due to linguistic and cultural differences. Three well-known English translations of the Qur'an by Ali, Pickthall, and Abdel-Haleem were examined in this study. The study adopted a theoretical approach depending on metaphor translation and Newmark’s conceptual metaphor theory. To achieve its goals, the study was based on 40 Qur'anic verses in Arabic, as only 13 metaphors were selected for analysis. The study adopted a qualitative approach, using content analysis to analyze the data. The findings indicated that literal translation was the most common strategy for rendering metaphorical meaning and religious concepts in Qur'anic discourse. It was also discovered that many translation attempts employed general literary strategies to systematically achieve meaning and impact. Lastly, the study recommends that translation be carried out carefully to guarantee that English-speaking readers can understand it well. The accurate translation of Qur'anic metaphors was essential for proper understanding.
Sultan Almjlad· Journal of Arabic Sciences a...· 0 citations
The non-use of completed local language (LL) Scripture translations is a persistent and costly problem for the Bible translation movement. This article opens a broader Vernacular Scripture Use research program with a pilot study conducted across eighteen language communities in Sulawesi, Indonesia. Drawing on the sociolinguistic principle of diglossia and on Fishman’s lesser-known notion of media variance, the study advances a “timing of translation” hypothesis: a local language translation is unlikely to become the normative text for public worship if a national or regional language (NL) translation has already assumed that role, whereas a local translation established before the arrival of national Scripture stands a greater chance of continued normative use. Evidence was gathered through an intentionally evidence-based methodology combining historical research, observation, eighty-five interviews, recordings of worship services, and a Scripture photography tool, with findings triangulated across sources. Across the region, local language Scripture was read in public worship on average four Sundays per year, while national language Scripture was used weekly in every community surveyed. Reformed churches, guided by synod policy, accounted for most of the local language use observed. The Sulawesi data support the hypothesis and identify church policy as the one operative “ecology of resistance,” with implications for translation strategy and for the studies that will follow.
Stan Anonby, David M. Eberhard, T. Simanjuntak· Journal of Language, Culture...· 0 citations