Many people believe that the process of translation is an extremely simple one, how hard can it be to translate a text from one language to another? Anita Raja, an award-winning translator, knows first hand that this is not the case. Translation is a much more complex process, stating in her essay \u201cTranslation as a Practice Appearance\u201d that translation is \u201ca relationship between two modes of writing, between two utterances that are by nature strongly personal.\u201d No one language is the same, along with the culture attached to the language. Translation is not only the process of translating words but it is the process of translating context.<\/p>\n
An interesting concept mentioned in the essay is that there is not an equal relationship between the source language and the target language; the source text will always hold a deeper meaning than the target text. This is a fact that translators must come to terms with as they attempt to fully immerse themselves into the language of the source text. This means that a translator needs to truly understand the source language and its components, a factor I believe is extremely important in regards to translating. If a translator does not understand what is being said in the original text; whether it is a cultural reference or dialect, then they will not be able to properly convey that same meaning. This would lead to a target text that lacks context, not giving off the same effect as the original text.<\/p>\n
The inequality that is spoken of is not a bad thing, but it is the idea of trying to bridge the gap between two texts as much as possible. Is that actually possible though? Are there some things that are just \u201cuntranslatable\u201d? Anita believes that this is not the case, as it is up to the translator to \u201cunravel and resolve\u201d any issue that may come up. However, in my opinion, although I believe anything can be translated, I also believe that sometimes the target language has certain limitations that don\u2019t allow it to properly convey the same context given in the source text. For example, when it comes to translating Italian dialect to English, I think that in most cases the meaning of the dialect phrases are lost because the English language doesn\u2019t have the same intensity of dialects as the Italian language. An example of this can be seen in the short story \u201cIl ladro di merendine\u201d, with the line \u201c Pirch\u00ec il morto era di Mazara, lui l\u00ec travagliava.\u201d. This line is purposely written using Sicilian dialect; however, it is simply translated to \u201cBecause he was from Mazara. That\u2019s where he worked.\u201d The dialect is lost here, which also slightly changes the context. In the story, the character saying this line is supposed to be a nuisance who speaks with a thick dialect that confuses many; but, with its translation, you don\u2019t really get that same vibe from the character.<\/p>\n
I\u2019ve come to understand that no translation is perfect. Everyone interprets things differently, and go about translating differently. The main point I took away from Anita Raja is that the world is ever-evolving. As languages develop and change, the translations of today will no longer be relevant in the future. With each generation that goes by, there will always be a new handful of translators offering new ways of interpretation to bring translations to life. That is what I believe the beauty of translation is; the fact that no translation is completely accurate nor definitive.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"