An Investigation into the Problems of Translating English Modal Auxiliary verbs as used by Kurdish EFL Learners

Abstract

This study entitled “An Investigation into the Problems of Translating English Modal auxiliary verbs as used by Kurdish EFL learners” attempts to investigate the problem of translating English modal auxiliaries by fourth-year students in the English departments at the university level.The study aims to explore the most common problems in translating modal auxiliaries that face Kurdish EFL students at university level. It also seeks to find out whether these problems stem from the inherent semantic features of the modals or not, as well as determining the best translation strategies to overcome the difficulties.The study hypothesizes that Kurdish EFL learners encounter problems during translating modal auxiliaries and that translation problems of modals stem from the inherent semantic features. Moreover, Kurdish EFL learners must consider translation strategies and techniques to overcome the difficulties. Finally, the study concludes that, modal auxiliary verbs in English and their shades of meaning bring serious difficulties for Kurdish EFL learners, and the students are not knowledgeable about using translation strategies. Thus, they face great number of problems such us linguistic, grammatical, equivalence, and structural difficulties.