Theme: Analisys of stylistic connotation

Работать над собой - to work at oneself (instead of to develop one's abilities)
Создавать комиссию - to create a commission (instead of to set up ...)
Государственные работники - state workers (instead of state officials)
Крытая арена - closed arena (instead of canopied ...)
Посещать уроки - to visit lessons (instead of to attend classes)
Опера, написанная Моцартом (instead of composed by Mozart)
Представлять на рассмотрение - to set for consideration (instead of to submit to consideration)
Бег с препятствиями - running with obstacles (instead of steeplechase)
Наша страна - our country (instead of this country)
Постоянное место жительства - permanent residence (instead of permanent residence)
Простое совпадение - simple coincidence (instead of mere coincidence)
Ошибки повторяются - mistakes repeat themselves (instead of mistakes recur)
У него золотые руки - He has golden hands (instead of he has golden fingers)
Требует усилий со стороны переводчика - requires efforts on the side of an interpreter (instead of on the part of ...)
Мыть голову - to wash one's head (instead of to wash one's hair)
Легкая атлетика - light athletics (instead of track-and-field athletics)
Хоккей на траве - grass hockey (instead of field hockey)
Similar errors occur when translating from English into Russian.
Whooper swans fly to Iceland, beyond the arctic circle (instead of the polar circle) [BBC-Wildlife broadcast in Russian]
Japan - the country of blossoming cherries (instead of cherry blossoms) [television program]
Mrs. G., first violinist of the Cologne Broadcasting Orchestra, has always successfully coped with the tasks assigned to her (instead of artistic tasks).
"... the driver, a man with a large walrus mustache, seemed sullen." (instead of a mustache, like a walrus) [Rosamund Pilcher "On Christmas Eve", M., Slovo, 2002, Rosamunda Pilcher. Winter Solstice]
I am out of the question - The question is not in me (instead of me, there can be no talk about me) [English film "Mansfield Park" based on the novel by J. Austin]
Of interest are both examples, and especially comments on them, given in the candidate's dissertation of M.V. Umerova. They also illustrate the violation of the norms of lexical compatibility when translating from English into Russian.
“ человеческая раса - the human race (instead of humanity)
американская роль - American role (instead of the role of America)
The phrase “federalworker” should not be rendered by the obscure “федеральныйработник”, but it is necessary to use the technique of concretization and, in certain contexts, convey this combination as “employee, agent of the FBI”. In the sentence “Access to unskilled labor and inexpensive raw materials is no longer as important as access to information,” the words “unskilled” and “labor force” do not mix well, since the very concept of “labor force” in this context means the presence of a certain qualification. The English "unskilled workforce" in this case obviously means “cheap labor”[8].
And, finally, as an optimistic ending - an example of an absolutely correct translation of the phrase, when the same Russian adjective eternal is conveyed by two different English epithets - in accordance with the compatibility of the nouns beauty and land:
The eternal beauty of the eternal land - the timeless beauty of an eternal land [Yulia Maryashkina. Land of talking stones. AEROFLOT, October-November 1998].
In this case, an excellent translator mastered the military tricks of a foreign language, and “friendship won.”
"False Friends"
Another insidious trap, another trick of the “war” of the language, against “strangers” and in defense of “our own”.
The term “false friends of the translator” is usually used in linguistic literature (tracing paper from the French language “faux amis du traducteur”).
In this way, words are denoted that look deceptively familiar, phonetically and / or orthographically similar or identical to words and expressions of the native language, but differ from them either in meaning (in whole or in part) or in connotations. However, since “deceptively familiar words deceive not only translators, one can simply call this linguistic phenomenon: “false friends.”
Ivan Susanin comes to mind in the metaphor of military operations.
This is how author described her grandmother's visit to Ukraine. So, a grandmother in Ukraine went to the store and asked if there were gloves. The saleswoman answered in Ukrainian that there is, but only “human” “человечьи”. Grandmother was frightened: How is it human? and decided that the saleswoman was mocking her. And “человik” in Ukrainian is not only a person, but also a man, which is very politically incorrect, just like in English. They would learn from the Russian language: a man is a man, a woman is also a man, because for a man there is a separate word. Very cultured and politically correct. And the gloves were only for men, and the saleswoman did not scoff, but the “false friend” turned out to be an insurmountable obstacle.
The next day, the same grandmother went to hand over the bottles, and the receptionist asked her: “«У Вас богато?»”“Are you rich?”, Which means “Are you a lot?” A normal, completely legitimate question, but the grandmother was indignant, said, “What do you care if we are rich or not!” and left upset. She did not like Ukraine, and only the language barrier and insidious “false friends” were to blame.
The English word “nationality” has been much written about as a “false friend”[9]. How to understand the column “former nationality” in the Japanese visa application form, which comes immediately after “nationality”? How can a person have a “former/previous nationality”? In another world, in another incarnation, or what? Nationality cannot be former, but nationality as citizenship may well be. And address is also a false friend of an address, since it includes only the street and the number of the house, apartment, and even then in the reverse order: first the house - the apartment, then the street. And the city and country - does not include, this is a separate new line in the questionnaire. And everything looks deceptively similar.
The English word nationalism is spelled exactly like the Russian национализм, only in Latin letters. However, one must be careful with it - it is a "false friend", and all dictionaries of modern English define it as a patriotic desire to achieve the independence of one's country or people. That is, where we have a big minus, in English there is a big plus. The same applies to the words nationalist and “националист”.
“False friends” - the difficulty is much more serious and unpleasant without the equivalent vocabulary, all these machetes and nesting dolls.
The English word ideology and its Russian “friend” – идеология differ in connotations: the English word has a pronounced (marked by dictionaries) negative connotation.
“The word “professionals” can mean not only “professionals, people doing something professionally”, but also “persons of a free profession or intelligent labor”, therefore, when translating, it is important to take into account the context in order to avoid mistakes ... "
... “The following examples are well known: the translation of the English words “dramatic”, “routine”, “academic” as “dramatic”, “routine” and “academic”, respectively. Translations often appear "dramatic changes" instead of "significant, huge changes", "routine report" instead of "standard report"; "revolutionary changes" - "revolutionary changes" (instead of "substantial" or "radical changes"); “marginallylarger” - “marginally more” (instead of “a little more”), etc.” (M.V. Umerova, op. cit. p. 45).
The name “Kizhi State Museum Preserve” was translated with the help of a very false friend: “State Air-Open (so! - S.T.) Museum Preservative Kizhi.”
The “false friends” also include stable phrases and phraseological units that are similar in structure, in lexical composition, but have different meanings. Sometimes they are called pseudo-synonyms.
For example,
- to lose ones head [потерять контроль над собой] ¹ to lose one’s mind [сойти с ума, потерять рассудок]
- to keep one’s head [сохранить хладнокровие] ¹ to keep up one’s head [не падать духом, не вешать нос]
- to wash one’s hair [мыть голову] ¹ to wash one’s head «освежить мозги» выпивкой.
The same category of “false friends” can also include such expressions that, based on their lexical composition or figurativeness, can be interpreted as opposite in meaning, which they actually are not (pseudo-antomimes);
- absence of mind [рассеянность] - presence of mind [присутствие духа]
- in low water [страдать от безденежья, сидеть на мели] - in deep water [в затруднительном положении]
- find oneself [очутиться, оказаться] – lose oneself [затеряться, погрузиться]
- snap into it [давай, жми!] – snap out of it [освободиться, избавиться].
All the difficulties, traps, and obstacles listed above on the way to the search for overcoming linguistic and cultural barriers that hinder the unity of people belong to the category of linguistic ones proper. This language protects itself and the identity of the nation it created from aliens, invaders, invaders, without understanding who is a friend and came to be friends, share, exchange, and who is an enemy and wants to steal, spoil, deceive, rob, kill.
However, along with the actual linguistic factors, there are also extralinguistic, extralinguistic aspects of the use of language as a means of communication.
Language is inseparable from Man, its bearer, user, master and servant at the same time. A person is inseparable from the world around him, the product and user of which he is. Accordingly, language is inseparable from a person, his inner world and the external, real world. Language reflects this world and forms Man, and through him - the world surrounding him.
The main and obvious connection of language with extralinguistic reality is carried out through vocabulary, through the meaning of linguistic units, of which the main one is the word.
Meaning is a thread that connects the world of language with the world of reality, or a path that connects these worlds.
The meaning of the native word leads to the native world, to its own picture of the world, reflected by the language and imposed on all its speakers. The meaning of a foreign word leads, accordingly, to a foreign world, foreign and alien, to an a foreign and alien culture in the broadest, anthropological sense of the word.
This point is well illustrated by Andrey Makin, a contemporary French writer of Russian origin who has been repeatedly cited. Bilingu, who since childhood spoke the French of his French grandmother and Russian, the languages of his homeland, he was monocultural, as he grew up in the culture of the Russian hinterland. For people like Makin, the paths of the meanings of both languages lead to the same world, in his case, Russian. In his most famous French novel, The French Testament, he reveals the process of his knowledge of the single Russian world through two different languages, the growing bewilderment, inconvenience, awareness of his duality, dissimilarity to the people around him, who have one native language, one native culture, growing over the years, one home world.
With age, the hero of the novel feels more and more inconvenience from a double vision of the world, from a split personality, from a constant peculiar conflict of languages within one culture.
So, in his mind there is a collision of two different images when using the Russian word tsars of French borrowing from the Russian language -tsar. The words are absolutely equivalent in terms of language, but behind the Russian word is the bloody tyrant Nicholas II from the Soviet textbook of Russian history. The French word evoked in the boy associations with the elegant young Tsar Nicholas II and his beautiful wife, who came to Paris to lay the bridge of Alexander III, with the atmosphere of a holiday, balls and banquets in honor of the august couple, that is, the image that was created by the stories of the French grandmothers.
It is at the word Tsar's Hero of the novel that Makina realizes her "feature", her difference from those around her, in particular from her aggressive and hating schoolmates.
“The question, at first glance, was very simple: “Well, yes, I know, it was a bloody tyrant, so it says in our textbook. But then what to do with that fresh, sea-scented wind that blew over the Seine, with the sonority of poems carried away by this wind, with the creak of a golden spatula on granite - what to do with that distant day? After all, I feel its atmosphere so piercingly!
No, I was not going to rehabilitate Nicholas II at all. I trusted my textbook and our teacher. But that distant day, that wind, that sunny air? I was confused in incoherent reflections, half-thoughts, half-images. Pushing away my naughty comrades, who showered and deafened me with ridicule, I suddenly felt a terrible envy of them: “How good it is for those who do not carry this windy day in themselves, this past, so rich and, apparently, useless. Look at life with a single eye. Don't see it the way I see it..."
The last thought seemed so outlandish to me that I stopped fighting off the scoffers and turned to the window, behind which stretched a snow-covered city. So, does that mean I see things differently? What is this advantage? Or maybe a flaw, a defect? I did not know. But I decided that the double vision could be explained by my bilingualism - in fact, when I pronounced “tsar” in Russian, a cruel tyrant appeared before me; and the French "tsar" was filled with light, sounds, wind, the sparkle of chandeliers, the gleam of bare shoulders - the unique air of our Atlantis. And I realized that this second view of things must be hidden, because it causes only ridicule in others ”(A. Makin. French testament, Translated by Yu. Yakhnina and N. Shakhova. Foreign Literature, 1996, No. 12 p. 36 ).
The huge, “untranslatable” difference between these two languages is revealed only by one phrase, said in passing by his French grandmother Charlotte (hence, in French) in response to a question about the fate of the President of France at the beginning of the 20th century: “Le President est mort a l'Elysee, dans les bras de sa maitresse, Marguerite Steinheil ... [The President died in the Elysee Palace in the arms of his mistress , Marguerite Stenel ...]. It turned out that this phrase cannot be "translated" into Russian, because behind it stands a completely different - not Russian - culture.
“Felix Faure… President of the Republic… In the arms of a mistress…” Atlantis-France, more than ever before, appeared before me terra incognita, where our Russians had no idea.
The death of Felix Faure made me aware of my age: I was thirteen, I guessed what it meant to "die in the arms of a woman", from now on I could talk about these topics. However, the courage and complete lack of hypocrisy in Charlotte's story confirmed what I already knew: Charlotte was not like other grandmothers. No, not a single Russian grandmother would dare to have such a conversation with her grandson. In this freedom of expression, I foresaw an unaccustomed look at the body, at love, at the relationship between a man and a woman - a mysterious “French look”.
In the morning, I went out into the steppe alone to reflect in solitude on the amazing shift that the death of the President had made in my life. To my great amazement, the scene was difficult to describe in Russian. Yes, it was simply impossible to describe! An inexplicable verbal bashfulness subjected her to censorship, a strange outlandish morality retouched her offendedly. And when the words were finally spoken, they were something between a twisted obscenity and a euphemism that turned the two lovers into the characters of a sentimental romance in a bad translation.
“No,” I said to myself, lying in the grass swayed by the hot wind, “he could die in the arms of Marguerite Stenel only in French ...” (A. Makin. French testament, p. 52).
Those difficulties of communication in a foreign language that are associated with the cultural background of the language, with shades of meanings directly determined by culture, can be called cultural and linguistic. In such cases, both linguistic and cultural barriers hold a double defense - sometimes openly, more often secretly - and therefore their overcoming requires special efforts.