우리는 번역학 용어를 제대로 쓰고 있는가? - ‘곁텍스트’, ‘화면해설’, ‘통역사’ 등을 기반으로 -

Abstract

In this essay, I discuss the question of how to better translate English terms for translation studies. First, I consider Gérard Genette’s terms paratext, peritext, and epitext, with an emphasis on the prefixes “para,” “peri,” and “epi,” and compare existing translations of the three terms. I argue that the widely used terms 곁텍스트 (paratext), 주변텍스트 (peritext), and 후텍스트 (epitext) are highly misleading. Second, I briefly explain the origin of 화면해설(lit. screen commentary) as the traditional Korean term for audio description and argue that 음성해설 (lit. voice commentary) is a better term since audio description services are offered in live events too. I also argue that 영상번역 (lit. image translation) should not be used as an umbrella term for audiovisual translation. Third, I discuss subtle nuances of the synonyms 번역가, 번역사, and 번역자 (all referring to “translator”), with an emphasis on the hanja affixes -家, -士, and -者. Then, I show that in the legal community the terms 통역인(interpreter, -人) and 번역인 (translator, -人) are preferred. After discussing all these examples, I suggest how Korean researchers could better deal with foreign terms.