Translation difficulty
Translation difficulties , also known colloquially as translation traps, are sources of error when translating or interpreting between natural languages , caused by gaps in knowledge or interference that favor automatisms . Translation problems , on the other hand, are objectively sources of the difference between the source text and the target text due to linguistic, cultural and situational differences.
Translation difficulties are basically subjective and can therefore theoretically (depending on the availability of information material for the respective language) be clarified relatively easily through research; Errors that have arisen due to a lack of concentration are often even noticed by the writer himself immediately after the text has been written, simply by careful proofreading.
Types of translation difficulties
The basic problem of translation difficulties is missing information. These can be z. B. in the case of ambiguity ("What is actually meant in context?") Of the terms used or interference phenomena (incorrect translation due to similar-sounding words or the adoption of spellings that are correct in the original language but incorrect in the target language). A lack of concentration also plays a role here, which leads to the speaker or writer succumbing to the suggestion of the original language, although in principle he knows how the formulation should be translated correctly into the target language.
But the simple lack of knowledge of the words, especially when it comes to technical terms , repeatedly creates obstacles for translators to reproduce content in the correct sense and context.
- Example of a movie scene: Two men are radioed. The first asks the other to give him “the radio ” and confirms the message with “ten four” - the viewer can see that it is not a radio receiver but a radio; With the US- CB radio abbreviation “10-4” (pronounced “ten-four”) he may not even be able to recognize the meaning (as much as “understood”, “confirmed” or simply “OK”).
interference
In linguistics, interferences are deviations from linguistic norms caused by the influence of another language - see also false friend , list of false friends . A distinction must be made between interferences that result from ignorance and those that are based on a lack of concentration, automatisms and the like.
- Lexicon: One of the interference phenomena at the word level is the mistranslation of " false friends ", i.e. words that are orthographically or soundly similar in several languages, but whose meanings differ (for example, this means known in Japanese , Korean and other languages of East Asia , Arubaijtu pronounced word (Japanese ア ル バ イ ト arubaito , Kor. 아르바이트 ) precisely “secondary activity”, “part-time job”, but not “work”, although it is a loan word derived from it). The ignorance of such "false friends" can also lead to unusable translations, as is the case with German companies that offered sleeping bags or rucksacks under the name "body bag".
Furthermore, words can be mistakenly taken over as loan translations from the foreign language; an example would be the mistranslation of the American high school (German about secondary school) as "college".
Interference also occurs at the level of collocations and idioms , for example when formulaic phrases or proverbs are translated word for word. If the word order or the order of the parts of the sentence is incorrectly transferred directly from the source language to the target language, this is syntactic interference. In machine translation in particular, free ride is the ability to directly adopt syntactic structures.
There are also interference phenomena with regard to spelling and grammar :
- Orthography: Especially with internationalisms , it is often not recognized that words in German are often, but not always, written differently than in the original language. The spelling “Circus” has a different effect than the spelling “Circus”, and a “Photographer” may have a different customer base than a “Photographer”. Conversely, many Germans do not expect that there is no freedom of choice in other languages. The phoneme written in German "sch" is written differently in other languages. Hardly anyone who only knows Hungarian superficially calculates e.g. For example, the word “bus” is written in Hungarian as “busz” because “bus” would be pronounced like “bush” in Hungarian. There are also cases of over-generalization : Anyone who has learned to write “rhythm” with two “h” may find it strange that the Italian counterpart is written ritmo . In this case, affective locks take effect. Such internal resistance can unconsciously lead to incorrect spelling.
Textual and cultural interference are more complex phenomena of interference. Textual interference occurs when the text-type- typical conventions of the source text are followed in the target text , although different norms apply in the target language and culture, for example for the order of certain text sections, for the way in which the reader is addressed, etc. Cultural interference occurs when cultural differences are ignored . Perhaps the application of initial cultural politeness forms in the target language is particularly clear. B. when dealing with disagreements can lead to resentment.
Word formation through back translation
Literal translation of fixed, mostly compound terms (especially from English, see also → Anglicism ), without checking whether there is already a known German equivalent, can lead to already existing German words, which, however, already have other meanings , the "wrong friends" .
Alternatively, this can lead to previously unknown or unused new words. The degree of dissemination and understanding of these neoplasms is different: While about "heart attack" (from the English Heart attack , "heart attack") is already in use on several occasions, which has " side effect " (of effect side , "side effect") in the computer science jargon has already moved in. The too precise translation of supercritical state as "supercritical state" instead of " supercritical state " is another example of a translation difficulty due to the incongruity of the two terms .
Sometimes the fear of “wrong friends” leads to avoiding correct foreign language expressions or seeing them as wrong just because they are very similar to familiar forms in the native language. In such cases, for example, one speaks of “bogus German English”. So these are English phrases that sound like German but still represent correct English. Examples: heavy rainstorm “heavy rain”, a lousy delivery service “a lousy delivery service”, we sit in the same boat “we are in the same boat”, to be in the picture “ be in the picture , be informed”.
literature
- Mary Snell-Hornby (Ed.): Handbook Translation. Stauffenburg, Tübingen 1999, ISBN 3-86057-992-4 ; 2nd, improved edition 1999, reprint 2003, ISBN 978-3-86057-995-4 .
Individual evidence
- ↑ Dina Schüle: Words and what they have to say to us. Denglisch 2. I want to flip out . "Rheinpfalz am Sonntag" from April 7, 2019, p. 24.