اصول و روش ترجمه(Meaning based translation)

اصول و روش ترجمه  Mildred L. Larson

Chapter 9

Mismatching of Lexical Systems between Languages

   One important aspect of the meaning of a word is its reference- the THING, EVENT, or ATTRIBUTE the word refers to.

   Even though the same THING, EVENTS, and ATTRIBUTE may exist in the referential world, the systems of reference do not match one-to-one across languages. Languages arbitrarily divide the meaning differently.

   English uses three words to refer to the same area of color which Mbembe refers to with one word. This example indicates that there is mismatch of references across different languages.

Definition of cognitive network

  The lexical items of a language represent a great network of interrelated meanings often called a cognitive network.

   Lexical items may be related to one another in various ways. They may have no meaning components in common, being related to one another simply in that they occur together  when people are talking about a certain topic.

    The translator needs to match the system of one language against the system of the second language. Even when there seems to be a word which is equivalent, there may be some components of the word which are different from the components of the equivalent word s in the source language.

   Different languages have different concentrations of vocabulary depending on the culture, geographical location, and the worldview of the people. That is to say the cultural factors determine the degree of concentration of vocabularies in different languages.

   Because of the different geographical situation, in one language there may be a great concentration of vocabulary that has to do with agriculture, in another language a great concentration of vocabulary related to fishing.

   A translator is not simply dealing with concepts in a system in one language, but rather concepts in systems in two languages. Each language will fence off and label a particular area of reality or experience differently.

   Differentiating words of closely associated meanings is possible only by contrast. Meaning exist only in terms of a systematic contrast with other words which share certain features in common with them and contrast in what they refer to or in what situation they are used.