1.1.3. Translation and Culture
Undoubtedly, language is not a purely linguistic entity. It
has a particularly close relationship with all what has to do with the people
who use it, be it concrete or abstract. That is to say with
culture.
As early as 1813, Schleiermacher states that translating is at
the same time understanding, thinking and communicating. He emphasizes,
however, the act of understanding because of its great proximity to
the act of translation. He thinks that the only difference between translating
and understanding is one of degree. According to this author, translating is a
profound act of understanding, since the primary goal of translation is making
the target reader understand the source text. Accordingly, the translator needs
first to make sure he understands it, which is not as simple a task as it may
seem.
The source text, like all kinds of texts, is an entity of a
very complex nature. Form, content, aim, fonction, aesthetic value and all its
traits are the product of a wide range of overlapping factors. These factors
are those involved in determining the choices that the author, consciously or
unconsciously, makes. Many of these factors are, in a way or in another, a
result of culture.
Culture is defined in the Oxford Advanced Learner's
Dictionary (2000) as "the customs and beliefs, art, way of lifè
and social organization of a particular country or group" (pp.322-323).
Oswalt (1970) provides a similar definition stating that it is the "lifeway
of a population" (p.15). This is referred to as the anthropological
definition of culture (Chastain, 1976, p. 388). Although this definition does
not make it explicit, a group who shares all these very elements cannot but
share an
intelligible linguistic code. Newmark (1988), on the other hand,
maintains this point when defining culture. He states that it is:
"The way of life and its manifestations that are peculiar to a
community that uses a particular language as its means of expression."
(p.94)
This definition clearly links between language and culture, as
it implies the assumption that one linguistic community shares necessarily one
culture. Although this statement may be questionable, it is undoubtedly
justifiable to maintain the close relationship it stresses between language and
culture.
Whereas Newmark's (1988) definition of culture perceives
language as its "means of expression", some linguists believe that the
relationship between language and culture is far more intimate. This view is
referred to as the "Sapir-Whorf hypothesis" after the two linguists Edward
Sapir and Benjamin Lee Whorf (Trudgill, 1979). It holds that it is, rather,
language that organizes knowledge, categorizes experience and shapes the
peoples' worldview (Trudgill, 1979). As a direct consequence, it shapes
culture. Edward Sapir (1956) claims that the community's language habits
largely determine experience. And in his words:
"No two languages are ever sufficiently similar to be
considered as representing the same social reality. The worlds in which
different societies live are distinct worlds, not merely the same world with
different labels attached."
(p.69)
Nevertheless, the strongest form of this view is now widely
unacceptable, as it implies " the impossibility of effective communication
between the members of different linguistic communities" (De Pedro, 1999,
p.458). It also means that people cannot see the world but from their native
language perspective. This proves wrong when considering that many people
achieve a high degree of competence and fluency in foreign languages. Moreover,
many translators do render meaning appropriately from one language to another.
This might imply that "they are able to conceptualise meaning independently
of a particular language system" (Hatim and Mason, 1990, p. 30).
Juri Lotman (1978), a Russian semiotician, holds an analogous,
but a more moderate, view as to the relation between language and culture. He
declares that:
"No language can exist unless it is steeped in the context of
culture; and no culture can exist which does not have at its center, the
structure of natural language."
(pp. 211-2)
This opposes the belief that the relationship between language
and culture is that of the part to the whole (Torop, 2000). The semiotician
Peeter Torop (2000) sees language as one of the several semiotic systems found
in a given culture. The "semiotic system" he refers to is any sign system, such
as music, dance, painting and the like.
Despite the differences in views as to whether language shapes
culture or not, we can maintain Linguistics' point of view expressed by Mounin
(1973):
"La linguistique formule cette observation en disant que les
langues ne sont pas des calques universels d'une réalité
universelle, mais que chaque langue correspond à une organisation
particulière des données de l'expérience humaine - que
chaque langue découpe l'expérience non linguistique à sa
manière."
(p. 61)
Bassnett (1991) holds the same view when she says that:
"Language [...] is the heart within the body of culture"(p. 14). This
close relationship between language and culture is, in fact, what gives the
translator's cultural knowledge its crucial value.
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