Automotive Customer Facing Literature is increasingly responsible for enticing customers to a car brand or car model. Low translation quality in this documentation can have a detrimental effect on...Show moreAutomotive Customer Facing Literature is increasingly responsible for enticing customers to a car brand or car model. Low translation quality in this documentation can have a detrimental effect on the quality perception of the brands by potential customers. This thesis examines the Automotive Customer Facing Literature, such as brochures, specification and price guides, and website texts, for the premium car brands Jaguar and Land Rover (JLR) and can be positioned within the fields of Terminology, Translation and Translation Quality Assessment. Since the involvement of the new communication agency Spark44, two years ago, the translation quality of ACFL texts has decreased due to mistranslations, incorrect language use and polluted translation memories and term bases. This is a serious problem that an increasing number of markets complain about. Therefore, this study has examined the translation process for JLR Nederland and provides a Translation Quality Assessment (TQA) utilizing the Multidoc adaptation of the SAE J2450 model, which was specially designed for assessing automotive translations. Based on the results from both the mathematical and observational TQA, the main problems have been identified and solution/advices for these problems have been presented. The aim of this thesis is to present solutions and advice to the involved companies to help them improve the translation quality of their target texts in the Netherlands and other European markets, and eventually all markets worldwide. This has been done in cooperation with the Dutch Product Manager and the in-house transcreator of Jaguar Land Rover Nederland (JLR NL), who, thanks to extensive translation reviews, is responsible for the high quality of the translated texts for the Dutch market, and the Product Manager of JLR NL. Therefore, this thesis will be presented to the Dutch Product manager of JLR NL, the in-house transcreator of JLR NL, Spark44, and the translation agency responsible for all the translations of Automotive Customer Facing Literature (above the line) for both brands.Show less
The present Master’s thesis seeks to develop a better understanding of the translation of idiolect in narrative dialogue. Idiolect found in three characters (two villains and one hero) from Roald...Show moreThe present Master’s thesis seeks to develop a better understanding of the translation of idiolect in narrative dialogue. Idiolect found in three characters (two villains and one hero) from Roald Dahl’s children’s novels Matilda and The Witches is analyzed by means of Juliane House’s model for translation quality assessment. Central to this discussion is the way in which the idiolects function regarding character portrayal, and how the Dutch translations affect this, if at all. The analyses demonstrate that idiolect is retained in all translations, although slight shifts have occurred in the translation process. These alterations mainly affect the humorous effect of the villains. The hero is less notably affected, because her idiolect is less explicitly present. Concluding, retaining idiolect in translation texts is salient for character portrayal.Show less
There exists a significant amount of research on translation strategies regarding the subtitling of humour and wordplay. However, the translation of eggcorns, malapropisms, and other types of...Show moreThere exists a significant amount of research on translation strategies regarding the subtitling of humour and wordplay. However, the translation of eggcorns, malapropisms, and other types of linguistic blunders have been largely ignored. This thesis attempts to fill this research gap by investigating the translation strategies used for linguistic blunders, or ‘Rickyisms’, in the Dutch subtitles of the Netflix mockumentary Trailer Park Boys. The strategies omission, literal translation, and retention, which occur in taxonomies of existing research were identified. A high rate of omission (64.4%) indicates a significant loss of Rickyisms and humour for the following reasons: no suitable Dutch equivalent (21.5%), temporal/spatial restrictions (15.4%), and grammatical errors (33.8%). Additionally, an overlap between temporal/spatial restrictions and grammatical errors (13.8%) and some omissions which are unjustified (15.4%) were identified. A new two-phase model for the strategies where the Rickyism is retained has been developed. Phase one pertains to the translation of the phrase as if it were correct and phase two pertains to the translation of the error. This resulted in the categories Literal-Literal (58.3%), Literal-Substitution (13.9%), and Substitution-Substitution (27.8%). This first strategy seems to be the preferred one when the linguistic properties of the source and target language permit it. Substitution in phase two includes numerous different shifts in terms of type of error.Show less
Song translation is one of the most difficult forms of translation (Susam-Sarajeva, 2008). In addition to the semantic code, translators have to take account of prosodic, poetic, rhythmic, and...Show moreSong translation is one of the most difficult forms of translation (Susam-Sarajeva, 2008). In addition to the semantic code, translators have to take account of prosodic, poetic, rhythmic, and audial codes, to name but a few. Di Giovanni (2008) and Chaume (2012) add to this list the visual code, which is not only prevalent in film or musical, but also in popular music (Kaindl, 2005) and other live performance music genres (Low, 2005). The combination of all these factors contribute to establish some exceedingly severe limitations for song translators. Despite that, however, it is a surprisingly well-established fact that audiovisual translation in general, and song translation in particular, are relatively new and usually ignored areas of research (Franzon, 2008; Mateo, 2008; Susam-Sarajeva, 2008; Siitonen, 2014). Susam-Sarajeva, in the introduction to her 2008 special issue of The Translator, explains that one of the reasons of this is the relative difficulty and craftsmanship that song translation requires, as song translators should not only be near-fluent in both languages, but also have an extensive knowledge of music or drama theory. Another reason is that the field is somewhat outside the borders of traditional translation studies. A third objection may be that in song translation, the borders between translation, adaptation, and rewriting are not as clear-cut as in most other forms of translation. Whatever the exact reasons, however, to date only three major collections seem to have been published on the subject: Songs and Significance, a book of collected articles edited by Gorlée (2005); the aforementioned special issue of The Translator dedicated to music (Susam-Sarajeva, 2008); and Music, Text and Translation, a text book edited by Minors (2013) with chapters by different translation scholars active in the field. This is not to say that there are no other sources, or that the field was only established in 2005 (indeed, articles on the subject have been appearing since the early 20th century [Gorlée, 2005; Kaindl, 2005]), but research has traditionally been quite sparse.Show less
This piece of research looks at contemporary Chinese poetry through the lens of translation. The theoretical framework acting both as a premise and as the background for the whole project, which...Show moreThis piece of research looks at contemporary Chinese poetry through the lens of translation. The theoretical framework acting both as a premise and as the background for the whole project, which ties contemporary Chinese poetry and translation together, is the idea of world literature as defined by David Damrosch. By considering specific poems by Bei Dao and Yang Lian, this work aims at defining the crucial role of translation in determining the "trajectory" of texts within world literature.Show less
Tom Lanoye's play Koningin Lear is an adaptation of Shakespeare's King Lear. Not only is it a radical modernization of the plot, it is also a translation from English to Dutch. In adapting and...Show moreTom Lanoye's play Koningin Lear is an adaptation of Shakespeare's King Lear. Not only is it a radical modernization of the plot, it is also a translation from English to Dutch. In adapting and translating King Lear, Lanoye uses for his play Koningin Lear elements from the original combined with new elements, resulting in hybridity. This hybridity is a dual hybridity since there is hybridity in both the play as a translation and as an adaptation.Show less
The purpose of this paper is to evaluate the quality of translations of legal texts produced by DeepL, a neural machine translation system. By consulting relevant laws and legal dictionaries, this...Show moreThe purpose of this paper is to evaluate the quality of translations of legal texts produced by DeepL, a neural machine translation system. By consulting relevant laws and legal dictionaries, this study finds that DeepL's Dutch to English translation of legal texts contains syntactic and terminological errors.Show less
In this thesis, an analysis of cultural differences through language in film translation is made. Looking at three versions of the Disney film Frozen, cultural elements have been illustrated and...Show moreIn this thesis, an analysis of cultural differences through language in film translation is made. Looking at three versions of the Disney film Frozen, cultural elements have been illustrated and compared to show how American, Japanese and Dutch culture differ from each other.Show less
The Dutch television programme Langs de Oevers van de Yangtze (“Alongside the Yangtze Shores”; 2016) was a great success in the Netherlands with a million viewers weekly and a nomination for two...Show moreThe Dutch television programme Langs de Oevers van de Yangtze (“Alongside the Yangtze Shores”; 2016) was a great success in the Netherlands with a million viewers weekly and a nomination for two Dutch television awards (Lips, 2018). The programme concerns Chinese modern lifestyle and it is spoken in both Dutch and Chinese, the latter being subtitled in Dutch. Since this programme has a focus on Chinese culture, it is relevant for the audience to have a full grasp of the meaning of the Extralinguistic Cultural References (ECRs). Preliminary academic research has shown a gap in the study of both written and subtitled translation of ECRs from Chinese into a Germanic language. The aim of this research is therefore to investigate which translation strategies were used for the translation of cultural references in the subtitles of Langs de Oevers van de Yangtze. All the ECRs in the program have been categorized based on the taxonomy of ECRs provided by Nedergaard-Larsen (1993) and the translation strategy for each ECR has been determined according to Pedersen’s taxonomy for ECRs in subtitles (2011). The results showed that for the categories geography, society and culture, most of the used translation strategies are source-oriented, whereas for the history category both source-oriented strategies and target-oriented strategies are used the same number of times. For the categories society and culture the most used strategy is direct translation. Direct translation is also the most used strategy in the category history along with the translation strategy generalization. For the category geography, the most used translation strategy is retention. In addition, the results showed that the subtitler also uses the Dutch commentary as a strategy in translating ECRs.Show less
This thesis tries to answer the question of what constitutes ‘good’ translation in order to help translators (and translator students) gain insight into the various academic perspectives on the...Show moreThis thesis tries to answer the question of what constitutes ‘good’ translation in order to help translators (and translator students) gain insight into the various academic perspectives on the nature of a high-quality translated text. It seeks this answer by way of examining the work of renowned translation theorists from across the five perspectives found in Translation Studies. The distinction and definitions of these perspectives are made by Hurtado Albir (1994) in his work Perspectivas de los Estudios Sobre Traducción. This thesis uses Ordóñez-Lopez’ (2008) English translations of these definitions. The five perspectives are named as follows: the Philosophical and Hermeneutic perspective, the Textual perspective, the Communicative and Socio-cultural perspective, the Cognitive perspective,and the Linguistic perspective. Each perspective approaches the field of Translation Studies in a different manner, which is the cause for many different interpretations and idea regarding translation practice. As this thesis seeks to unite opinions from across the academic field, and a number of perspectives only deal with written texts, multimodal translation will only lightly be touched upon. It will be shown that no more than three aspects are shared by more than one perspective, and none are shared by all.Show less
This thesis discusses the peripheral position of children's literature in the literary polysystem and the consequences this position has on the translation of it. The hypothesis is that this...Show moreThis thesis discusses the peripheral position of children's literature in the literary polysystem and the consequences this position has on the translation of it. The hypothesis is that this position will lead translators of children's literature to use a more laissez-faire approach when translating. With the use of Antoine Berman's model of deforming tendencies, texts for adults and texts for children and their translations are compared to see whether more "negative" changes occur in children's literature, thus showing that children's literature is indeed situated in a peripheral position in the literary polysystem.Show less
This thesis aims to show how the differences in the way dialect is translated affects the characters in litarature. To do so, thee translations of The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn will be...Show moreThis thesis aims to show how the differences in the way dialect is translated affects the characters in litarature. To do so, thee translations of The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn will be compared to the English source text: translations by A.J. van Dragt (1885), E.M. Cameron (1946) and E. Dabekaussen (2019). These three translations show a shift in translation strategy over time; moving from standardizing the language to translating into stereotypes to honest effort in emulating the source text dialect in the target language.Show less
This thesis researches the nuances in the wording of the official English version and the Dutch translation of the Convention on the Elimination of all Forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW)...Show moreThis thesis researches the nuances in the wording of the official English version and the Dutch translation of the Convention on the Elimination of all Forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW). CEDAW imposes obligations on the States Parties, but it is unclear how these obligations are legally enforced. This thesis first investigates the enforcement mechanisms of CEDAW and secondly it analyzes the differences between how the English version and the Dutch translation express obligation, both lexically and grammatically. This research is based on the following thesis question: How strong is the expression of degrees of obligation within CEDAW’s official English version and its Dutch translation, and has this strength changed in the process of translation? The findings led to a dichotomy between legislative obligations and the linguistic obligations, where the former is less strong than proposed and the latter is equal in both version.Show less
Despite SF’s general underrepresentation both in academia and the publishing world, there are scholars that have turned to this genre and studied it in relation to Lawrence Venuti’s concepts of...Show moreDespite SF’s general underrepresentation both in academia and the publishing world, there are scholars that have turned to this genre and studied it in relation to Lawrence Venuti’s concepts of foreignization and domestication, introduced in The Translator’s Invisibility (1995). Domestication has been considered “especially problematic due to its inventiveness of fictive worlds and the reliance of its estrangement function upon specific language” (Campbell, 2021, p. 6). One of the ways in which this inventiveness is expressed, is through neologisms, as Freedman (2000) explains, “this device being perhaps the most paradigmatic expression of science-fictional diction” (2000, p. 37). One of the scholars that has discussed neologisms in his work is Peter Newmark (1988), whom we will be discussing in this thesis. Newmark (1988) recognizes in his book, A Textbook of Translation, that translating neologisms is a challenging task, as he emphasizes that “neologisms are perhaps the non-literary and the professional translator’s biggest problem” (p.140). The aim of this thesis is thus to study neologisms within the SF genre in relation to Venuti’s concepts of domestication and foreignization. It will do so by conducting a case study on a SF text, namely Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? (DADOES) by American writer Philip K. Dick. In the case study, three Dutch translations of DADOES will be compared to each other and the source text: De Elektrische Nachtmerrie (1969) by Frank Visser, Dromen Androïden van Elektrische Schapen? (1979) by Ivain Rodriguez de León and Blade Runner: Dromen Androïden over Elektrische Schapen? (2017) by Irving Pardoen. The research will focus on chapter three and the neologisms in it. The 26 neologisms were classified using Newmark’s (1988) nine categories of translation procedures, with an additional 10th (proposed category) and 11th category to cover instances of omission. The central research question of this thesis then, is whether the translation choices made by the three translators point to a foreignization or domestication-oriented approach, and which of the three translations can be considered the most domesticated based on the findings. As for the hypothesis, it is speculated that the 1969 and 1979 translations of neologisms will reveal a more domestication-oriented approach, whereas the 2017 text is expected to be more foreignized. In writing this thesis and conducting the case study, I set out to give insight into the potential that SF texts hold for academia and the translation field. Campbell (2021) emphasizes how SF is a “powerful means of communication, not only because it can serve to explore and explain the effect of technological developments, whether native or important, but also and more importantly because it can be a powerful means of social criticism” (p.2.). In a world that is constantly evolving as technology advances at a rapid rate, the subjects discussed in SF are more relevant than ever. Therefore, by studying the “inventiveness” (Freedman, 2000, p.37) of the SF genre in the form of neologisms and in how they are translated, we could learn more about the dynamics and developments in our own world as we speculate about the reasons for these translation choices.Show less
“Can equivalent effect be reached in Korean to Dutch translation?” I want to examine this by analyzing Oh Jung-hee’s novel: ‘새’ (2009) and its Dutch translation: ‘Vogel’. I want to answer this...Show more“Can equivalent effect be reached in Korean to Dutch translation?” I want to examine this by analyzing Oh Jung-hee’s novel: ‘새’ (2009) and its Dutch translation: ‘Vogel’. I want to answer this question by searching for units that might pose a problem for translating 새 regarding communicative equivalence. I will discuss why it is problematic to reach an equivalent effect with the help of various translation strategies.Show less
This study uses the study by Valdez & Vandepitte (2020) as a framework to answer the research question: To what extent are the differences in attitude and expectation of translators and...Show moreThis study uses the study by Valdez & Vandepitte (2020) as a framework to answer the research question: To what extent are the differences in attitude and expectation of translators and reviewers on the Dutch translation market similar to the situation on the Portuguese biomedical translation market, as described in Valdez & Vandepitte (2020)? This is done by distributing a questionnaire to a group of translators and reviewers, who are active on the Dutch translation market with the language combination English and Dutch. Their answers reveal that the situation on the Dutch translation market is very similar to the situation on the Portuguese biomedical translation market: Translators and reviewers agree on the important aspects of translations (fluency and grammatical correctness) and on the degree to which reviewers should make changes to translations (only if actual mistakes are found, while ignoring personal preference). However, translators and reviewers on both the Dutch and Portuguese translation markets are somewhat unsatisfied with the work of their colleagues, because they appear to not follow the standards that they agree on. This dissatisfaction could be resolved by better communication between translators and reviewers, which is another point of dissatisfaction for translators and reviewers. The findings of this study support the recommendation made by Valdez & Vandepitte (2020) to focus more on communication during translator training.Show less
