PORTRAYING NATURE BY THE FOOT OF THE CIBALAK HILL: THE IDEOLOGY AND STRATEGIES IN THE ENGLISH TRANSLATION OF SELECTED AHMAD TOHARI’S WORKS (Representasi Alam dalam By the Foot of the Cibalak Hill: Ideologi dan Strategi dalam Terjemahan Bahasa Inggris Karya Ahmad Tohari)

Abstract

Identity is an essential part of an entity that can be reflected by distinctive tradition, culture, nature, and language found in literary works. In the issue of identity, there are some challenges, mainly if the discussion covers translated literature or literary translation, i.e. maintaining the identity in a translated literary work. Therefore, to answer this problem, this research is aimed at investigating the ideology, i.e., Venuti’s domestication and foreignization, and strategies of translation using Baker’s theory in representing the identity depicted in culture-specific items, mainly nature terms, of selected Ahmad Tohari’s works, Di Kaki Bukit Cibalak (ST) and its English translation, By the Foot of the Cibalak Hill (TT). All nature terms in the objects were collected based on Newmark’s ecology classification of culture-specific items. Besides, it further unravels the characteristics of the nature terms in Tohari’s Di Kaki Bukit Cibalak and how the ideology and strategies applied can maintain the identity contained in the works. This research was conducted through a descriptive qualitative approach with nature terms collected through document analysis utilizing content and thematic analysis. This study concludes that in the English translation of Di Kaki Bukit Cibalak, the ideology of domestication is aimed to ease the readers’ understanding of the story in English by using the translation with a cultural substitution strategy. In contrast, foreignization by loan words employed by the translator to maintain the identity in the works aims to introduce and promote local Indonesian culture seen from the translation, to show the Indonesian-ness in the English translation, i.e. portraying the richness and diversity of Indonesian nature to a broader audience.