Translation of Culture-Specific Items from English into Lithuanian: the Case of Joanne Harris’s Novels

Abstract

The article, on the basis of two Joanne Harris's novels and their translations into Lithuanian, aims to analyse translation strategies for culture-specific items. The paper describes the concept of culture, investigates peculiarities of culture-specific concepts and discusses possible ways for translating them. The theoretical research has revealed many ambiguities in the translation theory: 1) there is no single term to define culturespecific items and many different terms are used interchangeably; 2) there is no single classification system for culture-specific items; 3) terminology to define translation strategies for culture-specific items is not unified and their number and specifics vary from one source to another; 4) the choice of the translation strategy in a particular case is a controversial issue. Davis's classification of translation strategies is used for the practical part of the research and all the instances are analysed under seven headings: preservation, addition, omission, globalization, localization, transformations and creation. The study results have demonstrated that the strategy of localization has been used most often. The major part of proper names is transcribed taking into account phonemic aspect and applying Lithuanian grammar rules. A few exceptions are made to the names of historical/ religious personalities or names which have the adapted established Lithuanian form of the name. Addition as a footnote is very often used to explain the words of non-English origin. Translation strategies of creation and transformations were not found in the novels under analysis.

The Image of China as a Destination for Tourist: Translation Strategies of Culture-Specific Items in the Chinese-English Food Menus

“…The translatability of CSIs has long been in focus among translators and translation theorists, with some scholars going as far as describing them as problematic and as “indicating the limits of the translatable” (see Petillo, 2012, p. 248; Cronin, 2000, p. 40). Franco Aixelá (1996, as quoted in Farahani & Mokhtari, 2016, p. 309) notes, “It is well-known that culture-specific items (CSIs) are among the most conflicting phenomena in translation which can make translation an arduous kind of task.” The problems posed by CSIs translation include a lack of equivalence (Amenador, 2022a, 2022b; Baker, 2018, p. 19; Nord, 2013; Petrulionė, 2012), information loss (Jiang, 2014, p. 63) or additions (Marco, 2019), and varying grammatical construction of the two languages (Petronienė et al, 2019, p. 182), etc. What is more, “it is not always clear which words and expressions should be considered culture-specific items, [.…”

The Translation of Cultural Specific Items in the Persian Translation of Disney's Animated Classic <i>Cinderella</i>

“…Lolita Petrulionė in "Translation of Culture-Specific Items from English into Lithuanian: The Case of Joanne Harris's Novels" [15] examines translation strategies for culturespecific items in two Joanne Harris's novels and their translations into Lithuanian. She has explained the concept of culture, culture-specific items and techniques applied to translate SCIs.…”

“…Internet-related, politically relevant, film and literary discourses, and states the shaping power of translation on socio-cultural structures. The papers explore intercultural transfer conditions in which translation has a new potential and condition in which the influence of translation mediation has a transferring potential on native identities [15].…”

Literary Translation Analysis of Indonesian Short Story Apel dan Pisau

“…Calque and adaptations are found in not very many rates. The second relevant study is Petrulionė's (2012), whose study is principally founded on two of Joanne Haris' books and their translations in Lithuanian, examining the translation strategies for cultural words. Davis' classification is used as the structure for a definite investigation of the translation strategies.…”