Title: FROM GENERAL ENGLISH TO LANGUAGE(S) FOR SPECIAL PURPOSES, OR SPECIALIZED DISCOURSE
1FROM GENERAL ENGLISH TO LANGUAGE(S) FOR SPECIAL
PURPOSES, OR SPECIALIZED DISCOURSE
- Language for general purposes (LGP) is the
language that we use every day to talk and write
about ordinary events in a variety of common
situations (e.g. asking for instructions,
ordering a meal, writing a letter to a friend)? - Language(s) for special purposes (LSP) is used to
talk and write about specialized fields of
knowledge ( e.g. marketing, computing,
linguistics, tourism, psychology)?
2 SPECIALIZED DISCOURSE A DIACHRONIC
PERSPECTIVEIN LINGUISTICS
- Some major 20th century linguistic models have
described language as a system (De Saussure) or
as an abstract mental model (Chomsky), often not
paying attention to its social and functional
varieties - 1920s and 30s a group of linguists known as
The Prague School payed attention to the
functional style of scientific and technical
texts, often seen as restricted and inferior
to literary language or language for general
purposes - After the Second World War stress on the
linguistic features that diverge from the
default level of general language
3SINCE THE 1960s THERE HAS BEEN GROWING ATTENTION
- to the study of variation according to the USER
(geographical and social) and to USE (who
speaks/writes to whom, about what and through
what medium, M.A.K. Hallidays tenor, field,
mode). A language consists of different
registers that realize its potential in
different ways - from focus on terminology to the
morpho-syntactic, textual and contextual levels,
from a microlinguistic to a macrolinguistic
approach terminological proliferation, e.g. ESP,
ESL, ESD, microlanguages, special languages,
specialized discourse, language of the
professions, legal English, business English,
English for tourism - Development of corpus-based methodology, which
allows the study of authentic texts in electronic
form
4The Italian tradition in the study of specialized
discourse
- DIFFERENT LABELS e.g.linguaggi settoriali,
microlingue, sottocodici, lingue speciali,
linguaggi specialisti, le lingue delle
professioni)? - CERLIS (Centro di Ricerca sui Linguaggi
Specialistici), Universita di Bergamo
http//www.unibg.it/cerlis/home.htm
5The complexity of specialized discourse
- HORIZONTAL DIMENSION DIFFERENT FIELDS, OR
DOMAINS, AND SUB-FIELDS (e.g. business,
economics, new economy, finance, marketing,
e-commerce, franchising) - VERTICAL DIMENSION
- a) specialist to specialist (exposition)?
- b) specialist to specialist-to-be
- (instruction)?
- c) specialist to layperson (journalism)?
6Specialized discourse
- What parts/features appear to be typical of
specialized discourse and make its comprehension
and translation difficult ?
7LEXICAL CHARACTERISTICS
- SPECIALIZED TERMS (simple or compound) referring
to precise scientific concepts e.g. behaviour,
chronic, psychoactive, addiction - COLLOCATIONS REFERRING TO ACADEMIC RESEARCH. e.g.
estimates vary, factors explain, show evidence,
apply criteria, classify - LACK OF EMOTION e.g. the words risk,
threatened and are used in a
technical/descriptive sense - REPETITION OF TERMS
- PRECISION is favoured over lexical richness
- CONCISENESS
- LEARNED WORDS OF CLASSICAL ORIGIN criteria,
phenomenon
8SYNTACTIC CHARACTERISTICS
- PREMODIFIED NOUN PHRASES a small car-factory
a small-car factory - SIMPLE SENTENCE STRUCTURE. Out of 9 sentences,
only 3 of them have finite subordinate clauses - USE OF VERB TENSES frequent use of the simple
present tense, few present perfect forms, several
non-finite verb forms, both ing-forms and past
participle - FREQUENT USE OF PASSIVE AND INANIMATE SUBJECTS
e.g. languages have been classified , the
factors do not explain. There is only one
first person verb form here I show to
highlight the authors voice
9TEXTUAL FEATURES
- TEXT GENRE it is the introduction to a fairly
specialized contribution (the subgenre of
letter) published in the authoritative
scientific journal Nature. EXPERT-TO-EXPERT - COHESION is obtained through LEXICAL REPETITION
more than through anaphoric reference, use of
GENERAL WORDS (criteria, factors) and FEW
CONJUNCTIONS (also, however, for example)? - TEXTUAL STRUCTURE The text establishes the
field of investigation and the key research
questions. It is both informative and
argumentative. - Sentence 1 general statement
- Sentence 2 identifying a niche for research
- Sentence 3/4 acknowledging difficulties and
giving an example - Sentence 5 making the research claim explicit
- Sentences 6-9 expanding on the research
- The text is CONCISE AND SKILFULLY BUILT
10Lexical features of specialized discourse
- MONOREFERENTIALITY and PRECISION
- OBJECTIVITY and LACK OF EMOTION
- TRANSPARENCY, STANDARDISATION, TERMS OF CLASSICAL
ORIGIN - CONCISENESS
- LEXICAL PRODUCTIVITY, e.g. computing e.g. mouse,
emotycon, netiquette
11and some exceptions
- SEMANTIC INSTABILITY e.g. noun phrase/noun
group/syntagm - Use of METAPHORS and IDIOMATIC EXPRESSIONS e.g.
bulls bears/ a sperm bank / spam/ to launch a
hostile bid - CLASSIC versus GERMANIC SYNONYMS, e.g.
thoracic versus chest - REDUNDANCY in legal language e.g. last will an
testament - CONSERVATISM e.g. henceforth in legal language
12Some frequent syntactic phenomena in specialized
discourse
- PREMODIFICATION (e.g. a water-cooled engine/ the
inflation growth rate/ a small car factory)? - NOMINALIZATION (e.g. A day and night weather
observation station a station in which people
observe the weather both by day and by night))? - LEXICAL DENSITY (e.g. high percentage of content
words versus function words in a text)? - Relatively SIMPLE SENTENCE STRUCTURE e.g. fewer
subordinate clauses/more non-finite clauses
The proton is the opposite of the electron, being
a particle of positive electricity. Longer and
more complex structure in legal English - USE OF VERB TENSES AND MODALITY, linked to the
type of text, higher number of non-finite forms - Use of PASSIVE FORMS and DEPERSONALISATION e.g.
This hypothesis is confirmed by. Rare
languages are more likely
13TEXTUAL GENRE
- A relatively stable form of communication that
answers a specific function and is recognised
within a discourse community at a given period of
time - e.g. A business letter, a business e-mail, a fax,
an executive summary, a first degree or second
degree dissertation, an abstract, a press
release, an editorial, a death notice, an ad, a
tourist brochure, a booking form
14Translating texts ( or dire quasi la stessa
cosa as U. Eco says)?
- Is translation still needed, since English has
become the lingua franca of the world? - What is the difference between the translation of
literary texts and specialized texts? - What are the elements in the process of
translation? - What are the best translation strategies?
- What makes a translation good?
- What are the most important types of competence
and knowledge a translator should have, and the
resources he/she should be familiar with?
15Types of translation in the world (according to
Nida 1997)?
- 1 literature
- 30 institutional/international organizations
- 50 industrial and business fields
- 19 general, newspapers and essays
- Dubbing and subtitling are not considered
16The translation of literary versus specialized
texts
- Completely different activities
- or
- the two ends of a continuum?
- Literary texts more open texts translators
can/have to be more creative but cannot rewrite
the text and may have to deal with specialized
language - Specialized texts more closed texts but also
including highly sophisticated and rich
linguistic choices translators should be
faithful but also localize, that is adapt
to the target audience
17What are the elements in the process of
translation
- The source text
- The authors intention/context
- The translator
- The target audience
- The purchasers needs
18Translation of different text types, or genres
- According to the domain (e.g. legal, economic,
medical)? - According to the authors intention ( expressive,
informative, vocative) or prevailing function
(descriptive, narrative, expository,
argumentative, and instructive)? - According to different genres, e.i. socially
recognised text types
19CORRESPONDING TEXTS IN THE TARGET CULTURE
- EQUAL (e.g. the European legislation)?
- PARALLEL ( e.g. a contract)?
- WITH THE SAME FUNCTION (e.g. university handbook)
- may be similar or culturally conditioned
- DERIVED , e.g. summaries or abstract
- AUTONOMOUS, e.g. an ad that is adapted to a
different culture - but
- Texts can either be adapted to the target
culture and localized ( e.g. advertising and
computing software) , or follow international
models ( e.g. hard sciences)
20What are the best translation strategies in
specialized discourse ?
- Reading from global to intensive
- to a reading geared to the awareness of
translation difficulties at a both socio-cultural
and linguistic level. Contrastive awareness of
Source Language versus Target Language (e.g.
false friends, different word order, cultural and
conceptual differences) - 2. Translation several drafts, from literal to
idiomatic. Use of different types of paraphrase.
Awareness of options. - 3. Revision and final version
21Some English-Italian differences which require
adaptation strategies(Scarpa, pp. 120-165)?
- English specialized texts are more
reader-oriented than Italian texts, e.g. more
informal and redundant - English scientific and technical texts tend to be
simpler and more direct than their Italian
counterparts, e.g. computing style - English specialized texts favour lexical
reiteration rather than a variety of lexical and
grammatical patterns - English specialized texts use fewer connectors
than Italian texts
22 Some English-Italian adaptation
micro-strategies
- 5) From left-dislocation in English to
right-dislocation in Italian , e.g. a
slow-growing industry un settore industriale in
lenta crescita - 6) More verbal forms in English than in Italian
e.g. Opening a document apertura di un documento - 7) From simple clauses to coordination and
subordination - 8) English passive and impersonal forms in
English can also be rendered in Italian with si
passivante e.g. Additional information can be
obtained Si possono ottenere ulteriori
informazioni - 9) Retention of anglicisms in Italian, e.g.
scanner, non-profit organizations, RAM, turnover - 10) Calques e.g. randomizzare
23What are the types of competence a translator
needs?
- Linguistic/cultural competence in the source
language and in the target language - General cultural competence
- Competence in specialized domains (e.g. a
specialist who is also a translator or a
translator who is also a specialist?)?
24What are the resources for a specialized
translator?
- The Internet !!?
- General and specialized dictionaries and
glossaries (monolingual and bilingual)? - Encyclopaedias and expert literature
- Terminological data banks
- Software for machine-aided human translation e.g.
Trados - Specialized monolingual and bilingual corpora
25TEXT 2 (see Dossier)
- Putting the boot in
- From The Economist, 25h February 2006
- In the Section entitled The World This
- Week. A selection of political and
- business news in brief