Microsoft Word Revised Syllabus Ver doc

Theories of the Twentieth Century
Philological theory
This theory is primarily concerned with literary texts. This is based on a philological 
approach to literary analysis. They deal with corresponding structures in the source and 
receptor languages and attempt to evaluate their equivalences. The problem of equivalence of 
literary genres between source and receptor languages is very important. The functional 
correspondence of such genres is very essential. The philological approach is also concerned 
to deal with deep structures. The Philological analysis must deal with the deep structure of 
symbolic levels. This becomes very important as lack of an adequate appreciation of this may 
led to serious mistakes, particularly when certain types of actions have quite different 
symbolic meanings in other cultures. The translator should be aware of the probable 
differences in interpretation. During the first half of this century all attempts to formulate 
theories of translation were based essentially on philological comparison of texts. 
Considerable theoretical formulations were made following this and most of the translations 
were based on this model.
Linguistic theory
The dawn of this century saw Linguistics emerging as a major discipline. The results 
of linguistic analysis were applied to several different areas of intellectual activity such as 
language learning, anthropology, semiotics and translation. Linguistic theory placed more 
importance on a comparison of the linguistic structures of source and receptor texts rather 
than relying on a comparison of literary genres and stylistic features. The linguists were able 
to provide considerable insights into the nature of meanings as well as in the similarities and 
dissimilarities in the linguistic systems of both source as well as target languages. 
Some worked on the comparison of surface structures of sources and target languages. 
They compared the formulations of sentences in the languages involved and the way in which 
the word combinations are formed. They also framed an elaborate set of rules for matching 
the corresponding structures. They also worked on the metaphoric usages and their 
realizations in the other language.

---

45 
Later some linguists worked on the deep-structure model. They felt that analyzing the 
structure at the deep level could clear misgivings ambiguity. They argued that the meaning 
would be clear and less ambiguous if taken at the deep level, although most of the transfers 
were done from source to receptor language at various surface levels, depending upon the 
extent to which the two languages involved have corresponding semantic and grammatical 
structures.
Nida (1952) first advocated the back-transformation of complex surface structures to 
an underlying level, in which, the fundamental elements are objects, events abstracts and 
relational. Chomsky's (1955) formulation of generative transformational grammar appeared a 
few years latterly. Several other scholars also advocated a two level approach to language 
structure similar to the distinction between surface and deep structures. Many grammarians 
debated on the relevance of deep structure for translation theory.
In short, the work of linguists paved the way for a better understanding on the 
structures of the languages and their working.