TRANSLATION PROPERLY DEFINED
While translation no doubt shares a number of significant features with a range of other text-processing activities that proceed from a source to a derived text (e.g. summarizing, explaining), mainstream translation theory suggests that funda-mental differences exist between translation and these other activities. But the question that has not yet been answered satisfactorily is:what preconditions must be met for a text to be classified as translation proper? Koller proposes the following working definition of what he takes to be translation:
Between the resultant text in L2 (the TL text) and the ST in L1 (the SL text) there exists a relationship which can be designated as a translational, or equivalence, relation. (1995:196)
Note that ‘translational’ (or ‘translatory’) can be glossed as ‘strictly pertaining to translation’ (as opposed to, say, original writing) and may thus be seen in terms of an equivalence relation that is different from the kind of relations obtaining under such conditions as ‘deriving texts’ in summaries or ‘explaining’ in a dictionary entry. We are still not told what ‘equivalence’ is, but it is clear that translations are produced under conditions different from those obtaining in freer forms of writing. The translator confronts and resolves a number of problems not likely to feature in original writing, and vice versa. In translation, these limitations have a great deal to do with the need to reconcile differences in linguistic code, cultural values, the ‘world’ and how it is perceived, style and aesthetics, etc.
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