Lexical transformations in

translation
Lecture 7 17.10.2020
 References

1. Сітко А. В., Гудманян А. Г., Єнчева Г. Г. Вступ до перекладознавства.

Нова Книга, 2017, 296 с.
2. Мамрак А.В. Вступ до перекладу. Київ, Центр учбової літератури, 2009.
304 с.
3. Виноградов В.С. Введение в переводоведение. Москва. ИОСО РАО,
2001. С. 34-61.
4. Алексеева И.С. Введение в переводоведение. Уч. пос. для фил. и лингв.
фак-тов ВУЗов. М., Academia, 2004. 352 с.
5. Комиссаров В.Н. Современное переводоведение. Учебное пособие. М.,
ЭТС. 2002. 424 с.
6. Терехова Г.В. Теория и практика перевода: Учебное пособие. Оренбург,
ГОУ ОГУ, 2004. 103 с.
 Lecture outline

I. Lexical transformations
1) specification,
2) generalisation;
3) differentiation;
4) modulation;
5) compensation;
6) metaphoric transformations.
II. International vocabulary (internationalisms);
III. Equivalent-lacking units (nationally specific lexemes).
 1. Lexical transformations

Lexical transformations stand for conveying the

meaning of lexical units of the original text (in
particular, context) with the lexical units of the target
language, which are not lexicographic equivalents.
Therewith, a translator changes the internal form of
these units so that they convey the sense of the original
language units.
 Lexical transformations
1) Specification, or substituting the words of a wider meaning with
the words of a narrower meaning: 

Will you do the room?

Ти прибереш у кімнаті?

I’ll get the papers on the way home.

Я куплю газети по дорозі додому. 

The underlined English words have larger scopes of meaning than

their Russian counterparts whereas their specific semantics is
recognized from the context.
 Lexical transformations
2) Generalisation, or substituting words of a narrower
meaning with those of a wider meaning: 

People don’t like to be stared at.

Людям не подобається, коли на них дивляться. 

In English stare specifies the action of seeing expressed by

the Ukrainian verb; Ukrainian word дивитися can imply
staring, facing, eyeing etc. A more specific but
connotatively coloured Ukrainian equivalent is
витріщатися)
 Lexical transformations

Another reason for generalisation in translating can be

that the particular meaning expressed by the source
language word might be irrelevant for the translation
receptor: 
She bought Oolong tea on her way home.
По дорозі додому вона купила китайский чай.
Oolong is a sort of Chinese tea but for the receptor, as the
translator implied here, this information is not important;
therefore, generalisation is applied.
 Lexical transformations
3) Differentiation is a rather rare technique of substitution. Here a
word is substituted by another one with parallel meaning, denoting a
similar species: 
Bamboo curtain
Залізна завіса. 
Both bamboo and залізо (iron) are materials known for their hardness.
They are used figuratively to denote the barriers between the
Western and Communist countries (bamboo curtain in reference to
China, залізна завіса  in reference to other Comecon states (Comecon
= Council for Mutual Economic Assistance (CMEA))).
There are no hypo-hyperonymic relations between the notions
of bamboo and iron (though the referential area of залізна завіса  is of
course much wider than that of bamboo curtain.)
 Lexical transformations
4) Modulation is a logical development of the notion
expressed by the word: 
But outside it was raining.
Але на вулиці дощило. 
The primary equivalent of the word outside is зовні. 
However, “Але зовні дощило” is incorrect in
Ukrainian . 
By means of an unsophisticated logical operation
the translator finds another equivalent: на
вулиці. Thus it is necessary to consider traditional
word combinability and acceptability of collocation.
 Lexical transformations
5) Compensation is a deliberate introduction of some
additional element in the TL text to make up for the loss
of a similar element in the SL text. The main reason for
this transformation is an existing vocabulary gap in the
TL.
For example,
one of the Galsworthy’s characters was called a
leopardess. But there is no one-word equivalent of the
same stylistic coloring in Ukrainian. Therefore, the
translator compensated the word by using the
word тигриця  to characterize the lady.
 Lexical transformations
6) Metaphoric transformations are based on
transferring the meaning based on similarity. The TL can
re-metaphorise a word or a phrase by using the same
image.
Don’t dirty your hands with that money!
Не торкайся руками цих грошей!  
or a different one
Він поверне нам гроші, коли коли рак на горі свисне.
He will pay us our money back when hell freezes over. 
 Lexical transformations

Metaphoric transformations (continued)

The SL metaphor can be lost if no similar idiom is available or found by
the translator in the TL: 
Весна вже на порозі.
Spring is coming (very soon). 
Or, on the contrary, the target language text can be metaphorised either
to compensate a stylistically marked word or phrase, whose colouring
was lost for some reason, or merely to express a SL vocabulary gap: 
Він вирішив почати жити по-новому.
He decided to turn over a new life.
 2. International vocabulary
(Internationalisms)

Words of the common origin that exist in many languages

with the same meaning, but normally they are adapted
phonetically and morphologically to the principles of their
language.
Atom – атом
Proton – протон

NB internationalism ≠ borrowing when it exists in at least

three unrelated languages.
 2. Internationalisms

Can you think of any other internationalisms?

What areas of knowledge and/or science they refer to?

Why do you think these words emerge in languages?

 2. Internationalisms
 Academy  Coffee  Hotel  Motor  Sardine  Tennis
 Airport  Colony  Inspection  Number  Satan  Test
 Antenna  Comedy  Internatio  OK  Sauna  Ticket
 Athlete  Computer nal  Olympiad  Shock  Tomahaw
 Atom  Copy  Internet  Operation  Signal k
 Automobil  Corridor  League  Party  Sport  Tornado
e  Coupon  Literature  Pedal  Station  Tractor
 Bar  Design  Machine  Pistol  Stress  Transport
 Ballerina  Dictator  Magnet  Police  Studio  Tsunami
 Blog  Diploma  Margarine  Politics  Taboo  Visa
 Bus  Doctor  Marmalad  Psycholog  Taxi
 Cabin e y
 Gorilla vs  Telephone
 Cable Guerilla  Medal  Radio  Telescope
 Centre  Harmony  Metro  Register  Television
(Center)  Hospital  Micropho  Sandal
 Chocolate ne
 Microscop
e
 2. Internationalisms???

artist
engineer
idea
complexion
data
accurate
replica
decade…
 2. Internationalisms.
False friends/misleading words
Interlingual homonymy
and paronymy
mayor - major – майор
type - tip - тип fabric – factory – фабрика
beacon – bacon – бекон marsh – march – марш
specially – especially –
спеціально
bucket – bouquet – букет
chef – chief – шеф
history-story - історія
False friends/misleading words

Translator’s false friends are the words associated or

identified in the source and target languages with
identical or similar form but partial or no
correspondence in their meaning and use.
False friends/misleading words

The typology of misleading words is as follows:

1) Words which are formally (graphically or acoustically)
similar, but semantically different.
e.g. accurate, decade, formal etc.
False friends/misleading words

2) Words that have developed a different meaning in the plural form.

e.g. difference – differences
(disagreements/disputes),
development – developments
(події, обставини),
security – securities,
(shares, bonds etc.)
work – works
(a plant or a factory)
False friends/misleading words

3) Words that can be either internationalisms or pseudo-

internationalisms.
e.g. argument, artist, engineer, general, conductor, moral,
technique
4) Words that do not coincide in number in English and
Ukrainian.
e.g. policies / politics, weapons, elections, money, watch.
False friends/misleading words

However, as a rule, the interlinguistic paronymy is

unilateral (one-way), e.g. affect-effect.
3. Equivalent lacking vocabulary (realia)

Realia means a term or a phrase that describes

something that is specifically local – something that
doesn’t easily translate to other languages because the
locality doesn’t exist there.
e.g.
fjords in Scandinavian languages
3. Equivalent lacking vocabulary (realia)

Complications
Finding an equivalent to the realia? In routine circumstances this
approach might work, but in special translation, including
technical, legal, or academic settings the translator may not be
‘close enough’ – he/she must be accurate.
Accuracy is a key requirement for many documents, or one
might finally play a game of ‛telephone’, where inaccuracy
gradually increases. Comments can be necessary, too (e.g. in
legal translation), since the realia may be picked up and used by
the other party(-ies).
 Realia sample story

A translator is working on court records. One witness uses

the realia ‘Bigfoot’ to describe his opponent in a lawsuit in a
rather impolite way.
A translator might think this far too local and substitute it
with a more general phrase to convey the insult without
the local flavour.
However, thirty pages later, another witness refers back to
‘Bigfoot’ and builds an argument off of it…
Therefore, realia are not to be ignored.
 Realia translation. Strategies.

The main ways to handle realia and idioms are:

Transcription: You can simply copy the realia exactly as it appears, perhaps
with an explanatory note. This can suffice, although it’s not the best
solution as it pushes the work off onto the reader.
Explanation: You can try to create an explanatory translation that maintains
the overall structure of the speech while getting the point across. This is
often clumsy.
Equivalency: You can try to find something similar in the target language.
Sometimes this works and sometimes it doesn’t, and you have to be careful
that you know the local stories behind the realia and the substitute well
enough to judge that they convey exactly the same meaning.
 Realia translation. Translation
strategies.

Realia can be translated in the following ways:

- transcrption/transliteration (Saxon Hall – Сексон-Хол;
Selma Thurner – Сельма Тернер (транскрибоване
слово-реалія виділяється як чуже, надає предмету,
який воно позначає, конотацій небуденності,
оригінальності, що сприяє перенесенню читача в
атмосферу чужої мови, а не перекладу з однієї
мови на іншу);
 Realia translation. Strategies.

- hyperonymic renaming
some Indian in Yellowstone Park – індіанець племені
Навахо у Єллоустонському Парку
(concretization of the meaning and information,
unknown to the reader, but important for the literary
characters and right understanding of their thoughts)
 Realia translation. Strategies.

- descriptive periphrasis
Central Park South – Південні ворота
(transcription would be inappropriate as the reader would not
fully understand it, whilst the descriptive translation helps
him/her understand and imagine the scene venue and other
settings);
Princeton – коледж у Прінстоні
(Ukrainian readers will imagine little from the word Princeton as
a town, but the description about the local college helps
understand events correctly)
 Realia translation. Strategies.

- Combined renomination
Transcription + descriptive periphrasis (or a hyperonym):

англ. Vogue – “Вог” (журнал для жінок), Quaker – квакер

(Квакери – релігійна секта в Америці)*,

Tom Collins’s – Том Коллінз – прохолодний коктейль із

льодом; Brown Betty – “руда Бетті” – листковий пудинг із
сухарів з яблуками
 Realia translation. Strategies.

- Translation loans
A structural and semantic models of SL are reproduced element-by-
element with the material of the TL. This method reproduces the inner
form of the word, incl. figurative meaning(s) :
Vicks Nose Drops – “краплі Вікса від нежиттю”,
the Lavender Room – “Лавандова зала”
in this La Salle convertible – у своєму кабріолеті “ласаль”;
(proper names, mechanical nature of calquing)
 Realia translation. Strategies.

- Interlingual connotative substitution

Replacement of a SL realia with another one that has a
different denotative but similar connotative meaning in
the TL:
Compare
Сагайдак (in Ukrainian “футляр для стріл, колчан”)
Quiver (a long, thin container for carrying arrows);
 Realia translation. Strategies.

- Adaptation/assimilation (уподібнення)
Reproduction of SL realia semantic and stylistic
functions

“Besides the national beetroot soup, there were pirohy (a

sort of small dumplings) which absolutely swam in butter,
and the most artistic sour cream dumplings”.
 Realia translation. Strategies.
- Contextual explanation of realia
It is related to the integrity of a fiction/non-fiction text and is in
explaining the realia in the immediate context:
It’s the opening night of the Ziegfield Follies.
Сьогодні ввечері прем’єра в Зігфельда (Щорічний музикальний
огляд на Бродвеї),
to grab for the gold ring
схопити “золоте кільце” (той, хто схопить підвішене, так зване
“золоте кільце”, отримає приз).
Contextual explanation is used to describe kids’ imagination and the
influence of the gold ring on them, as it triggers their actions and
encourages to be agile and smart both in a game and in adult life.
Translation of phraseological units
Substitution with a phraseological equivalent (analog) that fully
semantically corresponds to the original phraseologism and is based
on the same mental image. These units often come from the same
source (mythology, including the Bible)

The apple of discord – яблуко розбрату

The Augean stables - Авгієви конюшні
The sword of Damocles - Дамоклів меч
Achilles’ heel – ахіллесова п’ята

E.g. As a Grand Prix driver, you have the Sword of Damocles hanging
over your head at every moment.
Translation of phraseological units

However, in interpretation it is preferable to sustain the image, as a new

(changed) figurative meaning may confuse the translator.

For example, in his speech M. Khruschev once said

“всякий кулик свое болото хвалит”.
Some minutes later he continued,
“Долго ли мы с вами будем торчать в этом болоте холодной войны?”
Luckily, the translator did not use the analog in the first case,
“Every cook praises his own broth.”
The continuation of the metaphor would have caused an impossible phrase
of the kind “broth of cold war”.

It is essential to stay consistent in style and meaning of the idiom.

Translation of phraseological units
The substitution of a figurative expression with its analog may
require generalization or specialization of some idiom elements:
They could not conceive of any greater joy in life; to work their own
land, to keep what they produced by the sweat of their brow, for
themselves and their children.
Вони не могли собі уявити більшої радості в житті, ніж
працювати на своїй землі й робити запаси того, що виробляли
потом і кров’ю для себе і своїх дітей.
(brow – обличчя is the example of generalization).
On the other hand, specification can be seen in:
Richard drove back to East Hampton, Maria’s tirade still ringing in his
head. – Річард повертався до Іст-Хемптона, а тирада Марії все ще
гукала у його ухах.
Translation of phraseological units

Substitution with a simile.

After getting married she is living in clover.

Після одруження, вона живе як сир в маслі (живе й
лиха не знає).

A simile also contains an image, so it is as expressive as

a metaphor.
Translation of phraseological units

Antonymous translation takes place when the

translator uses a negative construction to translate an
affirmative sentence:
The situation was serious, but he kept his head. –
Ситуація була серйозною, але він не втрачав сили
духу (волі).
Translation of phraseological units
Literal, or calque translation.
This technique can be employed even if there is an idiom analog.
A word-for-word translation is used in translating sustained metaphors,
phraseological synonyms, and puns.
Literal translation usually leads to playing upon the figurative and literal sense of an
idiom, that is, to enlivening an idiom (in the context).

as dead as a door nail figuratively (‘lifeless’, мертвий)

It can be used in both denotative and figurative meanings:

Old Marley was as old as a door nail. Mind! I don’t mean to say that I know of my own
knowledge what there is particularly dead about a door nail. I might have been inclined,
myself, to regard a coffin-nail as the deadest piece of iron mongery in the trade. (C.
Dickens)

Старый Марлей был мертв как дверной гвоздь. Заметьте, я не хочу сказать, что
дверной гвоздь является чем-то особенно мертвым. Я сам скорее склонен
считать гвоздь от гроба самым мертвым предметом из скобяных изделий.
Translation of phraseological units

Descriptive or explanatory translation.

When the original set expression appears to be
somewhat obscure and not essential, it may be replaced
with a description.
сім п’ятниць на тиждень. – be confused/ rain at seven,
fine at eleven
Це закиди на мою адресу? – Was that aimed at me?
Challenges in translating phraseological
units
1. Selecting a variable equivalent.
It should be as expressive as the original and correspond in style
and connotation, and convey an adequate meaning.
E.g., to pull one’s leg (надурити, розіграти, водити за ніс).
“You are pulling my leg.”
“ I’m not pulling your leg; nothing would induce me to touch your
beastly leg.”
(P. D. Wodehouse),
«Ты морочишь мне голову.»
«Я не морочу тебе голову; ничто не заставит меня даже
прикоснуться к твоей дурацкой голове.»
Challenges in translating phraseological
units

Variable equivalents, or synonymous idioms, used in one and

the same text, break the monotony of the text and help to
diversify the style.
For instance, J. Galsworthy repeatedly used the expression to
cost a pretty money. To avoid monotony in the target language,
the translator resorted to variable equivalents:
She cost him a pretty money in dress. – Ее туалеты, должно
быть, недешево ему обходятся.
She was spending a pretty penny on dress. – Она тратит уйму
денег на наряды.
Challenges in translating phraseological
units

The choice of equivalents must take into account the proper style.
Can the leopard change its spots? (proverb)
Compare to several Ukrainian/Russian equivalents:
Чи може людина змінити свою долю? (neutral explanatory equivalent)

Хто дурнем уродився, тому дурнем і вмерти / Горбатого могила

исправит. (informal expression).
Черного кобеля не отмоешь добела. (low colloquial)

Kick the bucket – дати дуба – Any other synonymic equivalents?

Challenges in translating phraseological
units

Local (e.g. ethnic) coloring is another translator’s trap.

For example,
to carry coals to Newcastle is semantically equal ездить
в Тулу со своим самоваром.
However, the following in some contexts a neutral
expression might be more appropriate:
Додати води до моря...