Werner Koller

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Werner Koller (* 14. December 1942 in Zurich ) is a Swiss linguist and Emeritus Professor of German Linguistics at the German Studies Institute of the University of Bergen ( Norway ). In his translation studies publications and research, he primarily focused on typology and specification of the concept of equivalence in the context of translation .

Live and act

Koller studied German, general linguistics , philosophy and Nordic studies at the University of Zurich and Stockholm University and graduated in 1968 in Zurich with a licentiate . Between 1969 and 1974 he worked at both universities in the areas of assistance and teaching. In 1972 he received his doctorate in Stockholm on the subject of basic problems in translation theory. With special consideration of Swedish-German translation cases. From 1974 to 1978 Koller worked as a professor for applied linguistics at the University of Heidelberg . In 1978 he began teaching as a professor of German at the University of Bergen. On December 31, 2012, Koller retired.

Equivalence typology

The monograph Introduction to Translation Studies, published in 1979 (completely revised in the 4th edition 1997), is considered to be Koller's main work . In this, after a more general examination of the practice and history of translation, he devotes himself to a detailed typology of the equivalence in translation, which made the book a “legendary work” that had a great influence on translation studies and was much discussed .

In the course of this typology, he defines five frames of reference that play a role in determining the type of translation equivalence:

Denotative equivalence

The denotative equivalence is based on the extra-linguistic facts that are conveyed in a text. Its central object is the lexicon , i.e. the words and syntagms of a language, or the textual factors.

Koller differentiates between the following types of denotative equivalence:

  • One-to-one correspondence ( synonyms on the denotative level), e.g. B .:
engl. car → dt. Auto
  • One-to-many correspondence (diversification), e.g. B .:
engl. river → frz. fleuve (mündet ins Meer) / rivière (ergießt sich in anderen Wasserlauf)
dt. Großvater → schwed. morfar (mütterlicherseits) / farfar (väterlicherseits)
  • Many-to-one correspondence (neutralization), e.g. B .:
engl. control / control unit / regulator / governor → dt. Regler
  • One-to-zero correspondence (gap), e.g. B .:
engl. layout → dt. ?
dt. Berufsverbot → frz. ?
  • One-to-part correspondence, e.g. B .:
dt. Geist → engl. mind
dt. Stimmung → frz. ambiance

Denotative equivalence exists when the target text depicts the same extra-linguistic facts as the source text.

Connotative equivalence

Besides the denotative meaning, each word has connotative values. There are often several ways of expressing what is meant denotatively, e.g. B .: 

essen / speisen / tafeln / fressen
sterben / entschlafen / ins Gras beißen

A distinction can be made between the following categories of connotations:

A connotative equivalence exists if the type of verbalization of facts in the source and target text causes comparable emotional and associative reactions.

Text normative equivalence

The text normative equivalence refers to text genre-specific features such as text and language norms (usage norms). Certain types of text , e.g. B. Contract texts, instructions for use or scientific texts, require certain linguistic norms (style norms) with regard to the selection and use of linguistic means in the syntactic and lexical area. For example, when translating a package insert for medication, it may be necessary to take into account the different legal requirements in the country of origin and destination. If the source text is an acceptable US package insert, the target text must be an acceptable German package insert in order to establish normative equivalence, even if parts of the text have to be omitted, supplemented or rearranged.

A text normative equivalence exists if the target text fulfills or breaks language and text norms in the same way as the source text.

Pragmatic equivalence

The pragmatic equivalence refers to the recipient to whom the translation is aimed and who should be able to receive the text on the basis of his understanding requirements , or to whom the translation is "adjusted" so that it can fulfill its communicative function. It is assumed that there are different reception conditions for the source and target language text.

The communicative context in which a text is received depends on certain norms of expectation. In addition to the language community, these are influenced by:

  • the social milieu of the recipient
  • the individual and group-specific knowledge and understanding requirements
  • the educational level , language and expertise of the recipients
  • and the individual and historical-social reception situation of the recipient in general.

A pragmatic equivalence exists when the source and target texts fulfill their communicative function in the same way (information, entertainment, creating a sense of community, etc.) in a certain situation.

Formal-aesthetic equivalence

The formal - aesthetic equivalence refers to the aesthetic, formal and individualistic properties of the source-language text. The aim of a formal-aesthetically equivalent translation is the analogy of the design with regard to categories such as rhyme , rhythm, special stylistic forms of expression in syntax and lexicons, language games , metaphors, etc. This category is particularly - if not exclusively - significant when translating literary texts .

A formal-aesthetic equivalence exists when the source and target text show an analogy of the design.

Conclusion

For every translation task, there are large quantities of different equivalence requirements. These must be arranged in a hierarchy, since they can never all be fulfilled in the same way. Different translatological approaches differ particularly frequently and sharply in the extent to which this hierarchy is determined by the source text (preservation of as many aspects as possible) or the target text (as good as possible), and in the extent to which the functions of a source text and one as a translate are assigned descriptive target text may differ from one another, as the definition of a "translate", a "translation" or "interpreting" is to be understood. Here, for example, Koller's requirement for equivalence differs greatly from functionalist approaches such as the Scopo theory , according to which the function and purpose of the translation are viewed as determining factors in every translation.

Further research areas

Publications (excerpt)

Monographs

  • Basic problems of translation theory. With special consideration of Swedish-German translation cases. Francke, Bern / Munich 1972 (dissertation; also as Vol. 9 of the Stockholm German Research Research).
  • Idioms . Linguistic aspects, occurrence analyzes, language game. Niemeyer, Tübingen 1977 (= German Linguistics Series, Vol. 5).
  • Introduction to translation studies. Quelle & Meyer, Heidelberg 1979 (= Uni-Taschenbücher, vol. 819).
  • Germans in German-speaking Switzerland. A sociological investigation. With a contribution by Heinrich Hänger. Sauerländer, Aarau / Frankfurt a. M./Salzburg 1992 (= Sprachlandschaft series, Volume 10).

Essays

  • The simple truths of sayings. In: Language and Literature in Science and Education , 56/1985, pp. 26–36.
  • The literary translation from a linguistic point of view. Conditional factors for translation using the example of Henrik Ibsen . In: H. Kittel (Ed.): The literary translation. Status and perspectives of their research. Erich Schmidt, Berlin 1988 (= Göttingen Contributions to International Translation Research, 2), pp. 64–91.
  • The Concept of Equivalence and the Object of Translation Studies. In: Target , 7: 2, 1995, pp. 191-222.
  • Stereotypes and stereotypes . Social psychological and linguistic aspects. In: Mutterssprache , 108, 1998, pp. 38-53.
  • National language (s) culture of Switzerland and the question of the “national varieties of German”. In: Andreas Gardt / Ulrike Haß-Zumkehr / Thorsten Roelcke (eds.): History of language as cultural history . De Gruyter, Berlin / New York 1999 (= Studia Linguistica Germanica, 54), pp. 133-170.
  • Nation and language in Switzerland. In: Andreas Gardt (Ed.): Nation and Language: The Discussion of Their Relationship in Past and Present . De Gruyter, Berlin / New York 2000, pp. 563-609.
  • Linguistics and the cultural dimension of translation - in the 1970s and today. In: Heidrun Gerzymisch -Arbogast / Claudia Giehl / Gisela Thome (eds.): Culture and translation: Methodological problems of cultural transfer . Narr, Tübingen 2001 (= yearbook of the German Society for Translation and Interpreting Science, 2), pp. 115–130.
  • People and text in the foreign language: overt and covert. In: Nicole Baumgarten / Claudia Böttger / Markus Motz / Julia Probst (eds.): Translation, intercultural communication , language acquisition and language teaching - living with several languages. Festschrift for Juliane House on her 60th birthday. In: Zeitschrift für Interkulturellen Fremdspracheunterricht , 8 (2/3), 2003, pp. 1–9.
  • Situationally bound interaction expressions (routine formulas) in an intercultural and translation-related perspective. On some problems of a conceptual and methodological nature. In: Harald Burger / Gertrud Gréciano / Annelies Häcki Buhofer (eds.): Flood of texts - diversity of cultures . Schneider, Baltmannsweiler 2003 (= Phraseology and Parömiologie, 14), pp. 427–441.
  • The concept of equivalence in translation studies. In: Armin Paul Frank / Norbert Greiner / Theo Hermans / Harald Kittel / Werner Koller / José Lambert / Fritz Paul (eds.): Translation - Translation - Traduction. An international handbook on translation research. An International Encyclopedia of Translation Studies. Vol. 1. De Gruyter, Berlin / New York 2004 (= Handbooks for Linguistics and Communication Studies, Vol. 26), pp. 343–354.
  • Semiotic “equivalences” in Naipaul's The Enigma of Arrival / The Riddle of Arrival. In: Juliane House / Werner Koller / Klaus Schubert (eds.): New perspectives in translation and interpreting. Festschrift for Heidrun Gerzymisch -Arbogast. AKS-Verlag, Bochum 2004 (= series of foreign languages ​​in teaching and research, 35), pp. 113–128.
  • Problems translating phrases. In: Harald Burger / Dmitrij Dobrovol'skij / Peter Kühn / Neal R. Norrick (eds.): Phraseology. An International Handbook of Contemporary Research. Vol. 1. De Gruyter, Berlin / New York 2007 (= Handbooks for Linguistics and Communication Studies, Vol. 28: 1), pp. 605–613.
  • Translation and German language history. In: Armin Paul Frank / Norbert Greiner / Theo Hermans / Harald Kittel / Werner Koller / José Lambert / Fritz Paul (eds.): Translation - Translation - Traduction. An international handbook on translation research. An International Encyclopedia of Translation Studies. De Gruyter, Berlin / New York 2007 (= handbooks for linguistics and communication studies, Vol. 26: 2), pp. 1701–1712.

Co-editing

  • Armin Paul Frank / Norbert Greiner / Theo Hermans / Harald Kittel / Werner Koller / José Lambert / Fritz Paul (eds.): Translation - Translation - Traduction. An international handbook on translation research. An International Encyclopedia of Translation Studies. Berlin / New York, de Gruyter (= handbooks on linguistics and communication studies, Vol. 26), Vol. 1: 2004, Vol. 2: 2007, Vol. 3: 2011.

Web links

  • Werner Koller , website of the University of Bergen, with a complete list of publications

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Werner Koller on the website of the University of Bergen ( Memento of the original from May 19, 2013 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.hf.uib.no
  2. ↑ Jörn Albrecht , Heidrun Gerzymisch-Arbogast, Dorothee Rothfuß-Bastian (eds.): Translation - Translation - Traduction. New research questions under discussion. Festschrift for Werner Koller. Narr, Tübingen 2004, p. 1.
  3. ↑ Werner Koller: Introduction to Translation Studies . 4th completely revised edition. Quelle & Meyer, Heidelberg / Wiesbaden 1992, p. 216 ff.
personal data
SURNAME Koller, Werner
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Swiss linguist, university professor
DATE OF BIRTH December 14, 1942
PLACE OF BIRTH Zurich