The Difficulties Faced by Saudi Learners of English in Translating Collocations from English into Arabic

Abstract

The objective of this research was to assess the translation skills of Saudi students in rendering a specific set of English collocations into Arabic. To achieve this, twenty students in their fourth year from the Department of Languages and Translation participated in the study. The data collection method utilized was a translation test, in which students were required to translate ten collocations embedded in full sentences within one hour. These sentences were sourced from Hussain Ghazala’s Translation as Problems and Solutions. Each student translated sentences containing one of the specified collocations to address the research questions concerning the difficulties faced by Saudi EFL learners and the strategies they employ during translation. After administering the test, the researcher collected and analyzed the students’ translations. The analysis revealed that more than three-quarters of the students faced significant challenges in accurately and effectively translating English collocations into Arabic. This difficulty was largely due to their tendency to translate the individual words within the collocations separately, often relying on literal translation and incorrect paraphrasing. In light of these findings, the study offers several practical recommendations aimed at assisting Saudi English learners in overcoming these challenges and improving their ability to translate collocations more effectively.