The Application of Domestication and Foreignization Strategies in Translating Arabic-English Collocations in Awlad Haratina’s Novel

Adham Mousa Obeidat

doi:10.36777/ijollt2019.2.2.024

Abstract

This paper examines the translations of collocations in a literary text in light of the translation strategies used. This paper examines the translations of collocations in a literary text in light of the translation strategies used within the framework of Venuti's foreignization and domestication strategies. The study aims to examine the translation strategies that are frequently employed to translate collocations. It also attempts to find out if the translators of the TTs follow Venuti’s preferred strategy of translation, foreignization. Moreover, it investigates if using these strategies resulted in any distortion of the SL message. Accordingly, a comparative quantitative analysis and an expressive interpretive examination are followed to analyze the collected data. The study reveals that foreignization is highlighted by the heavy usage of literal translation, cultural borrowing and descriptive equivalence procedures. Domesticating procedures are manifested in cultural equivalent, addition, reduction, omission and adaption. According to the nearly equal percentage of using the two strategies, the study results in finding that collocations can be translated by using the two strategies, domestication and foreignization depending on the type of the collocation. However, foreignization strategy is used as the most frequent strategy to translate collocations.

Highlights

Translation strategies play a vital role in translating cultural collocations
Foreignization strategy contains literal translation, cultural borrowing and descriptive equivalence. The categorizing of those procedures as domestication or foreignization procedures refers to the fact if the translated collocation exists in the TL as a collocation or not, if the translated collocation reflects the source text (ST) culture or the TT culture and if the translated collocation convey the meaning equivalently
In order to have a reliable assessment of translating collocations in the light of domestication and foreignization

Summary

Introduction

Translation strategies play a vital role in translating cultural collocations. Due to the significance of translation strategies, scholars theorized and developed different translation strategies such as those suggested by Newmark (2001), Nida (1964) and Venuti (1995). Translation is a process of transferring meaning from one language into another. Oxford Advanced Learner's Dictionary (2005) defines translation as “the procedure of transferring something that is spoken or written into another language. From this definition, the translation process looks an easy process as it indicates to replace words by words. The difficulty of translation arises from the culture or style substitution which cannot be achieved by only replacing words. Nida (1969) states that translation as a process includes the terms of meaning and style as the goal is to reproduce the natural equivalence of the source language message to the target language The difficulty of translation arises from the culture or style substitution which cannot be achieved by only replacing words. Nida (1969) states that translation as a process includes the terms of meaning and style as the goal is to reproduce the natural equivalence of the source language message to the target language

Methods

Results

Discussion

Conclusion