STRATEGIES APPLIED IN TRANSLATING INFORMATION
TECHNOLOGY (IT) TERMS IN MANUAL BOOKS: IPHONE 12 PRO
AND SAMSUNG S20 FE
Abstract – Technological products nowadays
are always new and innovative. Every day,
many technological products are created to
make our lives easier. But, most technological
products in Indonesia are imported from other
countries, it has resulted in a large number of
Indonesian technological terms that are
derived from other languages. Therefore, a lot
of technological terms in Indonesian are
derived from English. This includes the manual
book which contains the information and
instruction of the technological product we
buy. This research focuses on the translation
of technological terms from English into
Indonesian in the translation of Manual Book
of iPhone 12 Pro and Samsung S20 FE.
Descriptive analytical study are employed in
this research. Then Chesterman’s translation
strategies are used to find out how Information
Technology (IT) terms are translated from
English into Indonesian. The research finding
that four of Chesterman’s translation
strategies are used in the translation of
Manual Book of iPhone 12 Pro and Samsung
S20 FE from English into Indonesian. From
the total 60 data, the four strategies are loan
(35 data), calque (11 data), unit shift (13 data)
and the least used strategies are information
change (1 data). It can be concluded that the
most frequently used strategies are loan (35
data), while the least used strategies are
information change (1 data).
Keywords: information technology,
translation strategy, descriptive, manual book.
INTRODUCTION
In the era of globalization, information
technology (IT) plays a vital role in many
aspects. It changes and eases our lives today, it
is the thing we cannot survive without. We use
many information technology (IT) products in
doing our day-to-day tasks. Technology from
its various products change the way we
communicate, the way we work, the way we
eat, the way we learn, the way we get
entertainment and many more. Nowadays, we
can text from cell phones, connect with
someone on social media, take a picture easily
with a digital camera, print a document in just
one click, turn on or turn off our bedroom
lamp with remote. Technology products let us
find more efficient, faster, and more
convenient ways of doing the same thing.
Many technological products are being created
day by day.
In order to be able to use the new technological
products, we need to read the manual books.
Manual book is a document which is
containing information or instructions about a
product. Kustanti and Agoes (2017, p. 61)
stated that, “…people usually read and try to
understand the manual book first before using
the new object so that they know the steps for
using it correctly”. To be concluded, reading a
manual book is considering necessary.
Additionally, Kustanti and Agoes (2017, p. 61)
also stated that “It means that manual books is
an important part of every product, to make
people easy in using the product and know
what to do if there is a damaged”.
But, since technological product comes and
produces from other country, the manual books
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are not written in Indonesia. It is commonly
written in English. The difficulty comes
because Information Technology (IT) is a new
field that brings its own terminologies. It can
be difficult for the readers to understand the
manual books she/he reads. Therefore, the
researcher is eager find out how Information
Technology (IT) terms are translated from
English into Indonesian. Translation strategies
coined by Andrew Chesterman (2016) are used
in this research. Chesterman (2016) classified
translation strategies into three main groups,
namely syntactic strategies, semantic strategies
and pragmatic strategies.
Relevant researches has been conducted by
Medina (2005). This research entitled
Translating Computer Abbreviations from
English into Spanish: Main Types and
Problems. The problem formulation of
Medina’s research is how to translate computer
abbreviations into Spanish. The aims of this
article is Medina intends to establish the two
main types of English computer abbreviations
that are currently used and provide some
solutions for their adequate translation into
Spanish. The results of this article are there are
two most common types of abbreviations in
English computer terminology: three-initial
and four-initial abbreviations.
The second relevant researches entitled An
Analysis of the Translation Procedure Text
in Android, iOS, Windows Operating
Systems Mobile Phones’ Manual Book is
conducted by Kustanti and Agoes (2017). The
aims of this research are to find out the
translation result of similar words and phrases
used in source language among Android, iOS
and Windows mobile phones’ manual books
and to find out the translation technique mostly
used in translating the similar words and
phrases of Android, iOS and Windows mobile
phones’ manual books. The method of this
research are: the first step, to conduct this
research is collecting the data. The next step
analysing those data. The step in analysing the
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data as be seen as follows: electing the data,
reading the manual books, identifying the
similar words and phrases at each part of the
manual book, identifying the translation
technique used in translating mobile phones’
manual books, recording the similar words and
phrases and translating technique found into
table form and the last is conclusion. The
results show us that there are 100 similar
words and phrases found and there are 8
translation technique used: adaptation,
amplification, borrowing, calque, establish
equivalent, discursive creation, generalization
and particularization and the mostly used is
calque with the percentage are 35% in
Android, 41% in iOS and 39% in Windows
mobile phone’s manual books.
Another relevant research has been conducted
by Hadithya (2014). This research title is
Translation Procedures Used in Translating
Computer Terms from English into Bahasa
Indonesia. The aim of this research is to
identify the computer terms and procedures
used by the translator in translating the book
Wireless Networking in the Developing World
2nd edition from English into Indonesian. This
research applies the theory proposed by Vinay
and Darbelnet as cited in Hatim Munday’s
theory. From the total of 31 data; 20 data are
translated by using borrowing procedure, 4
data are translated by using borrowing
combined with transposition, 2 data are
translated by using literal translation, 1 data is
using calque and the rest 4 data are translated
by using transposition.
And the last relevant researches is conducted
by Amanda (2015). This research title is
Translation strategy in Twitter terms:
English and Indonesian version. The aims of
this research is to find out the kinds of
translation strategies that used by translator in
Twitter terms: English and Indonesian version.
This research used descriptive qualitative
method. The results show us that from 75 data
collected, the researcher found 7 kinds of
translation strategies and used in translating
terms from English version of Twitter website
to Indonesian version. The translator employed
literal translation strategy in 33 collected data,
loan strategy in 9 collected data, paraphrase
strategy in 3 collected data, naturalization in 2
collected data and unit shift in 2 collected data.
The findings of this research is the researcher
found that the translator employed 2 strategies
in each datum and there are 9 data.
The similarity from the three of previous
research is all researchers analyze the object
related to Information Technology terms: 1)
computer abbreviation, 2) procedure text in
manual book, 3) computer terms and 4)
Twitter terms English-Indonesian version.
Another differences are the research’s
objectives: 1) Medina in her research aims to
find out what are the main types and problems
in translating computer abbreviations from
English into Spanish, 2) Kustanti and Agoes’s
research aims are to find out the similar words
and phrases and the technique mostly used in
translating those similar words and phrases, 3)
and 3) Hadithya’s aim is to identify the
computer terms translation procedures in a
computer textbook and 4) Amanda’s objectives
is to find out the strategies of translation.
While this research aims is to find out how
Information Technology (IT) terms in manual
books are translated into Indonesian related to
strategies proposed by Chesterman.
Related to the theory of translation strategies,
Andrew Chesterman’s (2016) in his book
Memes of Translation: The Spread of Ideas in
Translating Theory classified translation
strategies into three main groups, namely
syntactic strategies, semantic strategies and
pragmatic strategies. Syntactic strategies
primarily manipulate form. Syntactic strategies
are: (1) literal translation which is according to
Chesterman (2016, p. 91) literal translation is a
translation strategy that is “...maximally close
to the SL form, but nevertheless grammatical”,
it means that, the general principle behind
literal translation is to retain syntactical
features in the target language rather than
following free translation which gives
translators the freedom to use different
syntactical features in the TL so long as the
meaning of the SL is conveyed, (2) loan or
calque which Chesterman (2016, p. 92) refers
loan and calque to “...the borrowing of
individual items and the borrowing of
syntagma”, so loan can be interpreted as
borrowing of single terms and following the
structure of the source text which is foreign to
the target reader, (3) transposition which
Chesterman (2016) refers to Vinay and
Darbelnet defines transposition is “to mean
any change of word-class, e.g., from noun to
verb, adjective to an adverb”, (4) unit shift
which is a shift that occurs when a source
language unit is translated as a different unit in
the target language, (5) phrase structure change
which occurs when a source language (SL)
phrase structure is translated as a different
phrase structure in the target language (TL)
without altering the meaning of the source text,
(6) clause structure change which Chesterman
(2016) defines clause structure change as
“changes that have to do with the structure of
the clause in terms of its constituent phrases”
(7) sentence structure change which
Chesterman (2016, p. 95) defines sentence
structure change has an effect on “...the
structure of the sentence unit, insofar as it is
made up of clause units. Included are changes
between main-clause and sub-clause status,
changes of sub-clause types, etc” , (8) cohesion
change Chesterman (2016) mentions that “a
cohesion change is something that affects
intra-textual reference, ellipsis, substitution,
pronominalization, and repetition, or the use of
connectors of various kinds”, (9) level shift
which Chesterman states that level shift
happens when “the mode of expression of a
particular item is shifted from one level to
another”, and (10) scheme change which the
kinds of changes that translators incorporate in
the translation of rhetorical schemes such as
parallelism, repetition, alliteration, metrical
rhythm, etc. There are four types of scheme
changes that the translator can use: (1) ST
scheme X → TT scheme X, (2) ST scheme X →
TT scheme Y, (3) ST scheme X → TT scheme Ø
and (4) ST scheme Ø → TT scheme X.
Chesterman (2016) stated that semantic
strategies manipulate nuances of meaning.
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This group includes synonymy, antonymy,
hyponymy, converse, abstraction change,
distribution change, emphasis change,
paraphrase, trope change. Here are the
description of semantic strategies: (1)
Synonymy, Chesterman (2016) states that “this
strategy selects not the “obvious” equivalent
but a synonym or near-synonym for it, e.g., to
avoid repetition”, (2) Antonymy, in this
strategy, the translator selects an antonym of
the equivalent and combines it with a negation
element, (3) Hyponymy which refers to the
generalization using subordinators or the
specification using hyponyms of the SL text in
TT, (4) Converses which Chesterman (2016)
describes converses as “pairs of (usually)
verbal structures which express the same state
of affairs from opposing viewpoints, such as
buy and sell”, (5) Abstraction change which
Chesterman (2016) refers to abstraction change
as “a different selection of abstraction level
may either move from abstract to more
concrete or from concrete to more abstract”,
(6) Distribution change which is stated by
Chesterman (2016 means “the distribution of
the “same” semantic components over more
items (expansion) or fewer items
(compression)”, (7) Emphasis change which
Chesterman stated that “this strategy adds to,
reduces or alters the emphasis or thematic
focus, for one reason or another”, (8)
Paraphrase, Chesterman (2016) stated that
“The paraphrase strategy results in a TT
version that can be described as loose, free, in
some contexts even under-translated.” He
further adds that this strategy is a typical
strategy to translate idioms when no equivalent
for the idiomatic expression can be found in
the TL, (9) Trope change which refers to trope
change as a set of strategies that apply to the
translation of rhetorical tropes such as
figurative expressions.
The last strategy is pragmatic strategies, it
manipulates the message of the text. This
group includes cultural filtering, explicitness
change, information change, interpersonal
change, illocutionary change, coherence
change, partial translation, visibility change,
trans-editing, and other pragmatic changes.
The description will be described below: (1)
Chesterman (2016) explains that cultural
filtering “describes the way in which SL items,
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particularly culture-specific items, are
translated as TL cultural or functional
equivalents so that they conform to TL
norms.” This strategy can be referred to as
naturalization, domestication or adaptation; or
exoticization, foreignization, or estrangement,
(2) As stated by Chesterman (2016), “this
change is either towards more explicitness
(explicitation) or more implicitness
(implicitation)”, (3) According to Chesterman
(2016), information change means either the
addition of new (non-inferrable) information or
the omission of information that is regarded to
be irrelevant, (4) Interpersonal change strategy
which runs at the level of the whole style of
the text. Chesterman (2016) states that “it
alters the formality level, the degree of
emotiveness and involvement, the level of
technical lexis and the like”, on other words,
this strategy has anything to do with a change
in the relationship between text/author and
reader, (5) Illocutionary change which is the
changes in the speech act, it is applied when
the translator changes the mood of the verb
from indicative to imperative. (6) Partial
translation which is according to Chesterman
(2016), this strategy covers “any kind of partial
translation, such as summary translation,
transcription, translation of the sounds only,
and the like”, (7) Visibility change which has
to do with the authorial or translational
presence, this strategy is including the
presence of the translator is no longer invisible
or “transparent” by adding footnotes or
bracketed comments (to explain puns, for
example), and last (9) trans-editing which is
applied when the translator has to deal with
badly written original texts, Chesterman
(2016), “it includes drastic re-ordering,
rewriting, at a more general level than the
kinds of changes covered by the strategies so
far mentioned.”
METHODS
This study is conducted in a descriptive
qualitative approach. According to Moleong as
cited in Astuti (2017, p. 42), qualitative is a
research which does not included any
calculation or numeration because the datums
are produced in the form of word. This
research is intended to find out the translation
strategies of Information Technology (IT) were: (1) loan, (2) calque, (3) unit shift and (4)
terms in the manual book. The data sources information change. The frequencies of the
had been chosen by the researcher, they are: 1) translation strategies is shown on the table
Manual books of iPhone 12 Pro and 2) Manual below:
Books of Samsung S20FE. Those objects are Table 1: Translation Strategies Frequency
chosen because according to
http://www.mobilecellphonerepairing.com, No. Translation Strategies Amount
Samsung and Apple is the top 2 mobile phone
manufacturers in the world. Additionally, 1. Loan 35
iPhone 12 pro and Samsung S20 FE was
2. Calque 11
chosen because it is the lastest product of the
phone cells in Apple and Samsung in 2020. 3. Unit shift 13
In selecting the data to be analyzed, the 4. Information change 1
researcher using purposive sampling
technique. This technique is used to select Total 60
which data is in accordance with the research There were 60 of total data; Manual Book of
objectives so that it can be selected and iPhone 12Pro (10 data) and Manual Book of
sampled, and leaving data that is not in Samsung S20FE (50 data). From the table
accordance with the purpose of the research. above, it can be seen that there were 35
The data from this study were collected from occurrences of translation strategy loan, 11
the text in the user manual book of iPhone 12 data for calque, 13 data for unit shift and 1 data
belongs to information change. Some of the
Pro and Samsung S20FE. The researcher read
discussion analysis are shown below:
all the manual books and their translation
thoroughly, then collected words, phrases and Table 2 Datum 1
clauses related to Information Technology (IT) Source Text Target Text: loan
terms. The next step, the researcher classifies
and identifies the data found in the translation Selfie colour tone: Rona warna selfie:
strategy using Chesterman's theory. Set a tone to apply Mengatur gaya yang
when you take akan digunakan saat
RESULTS AND DISCUSSION selfies. mengambil foto selfie.
Chesterman (2016) classified translation Datum 1: Loan—In the example above “…
strategies into three main groups, namely selfie…” in English is translated into “…
syntactic strategies (literal, loan, calque, selfie…” in Indonesia. According to Online
transposition, unit shift, phrase structure Oxford Advanced Learner’s Dictionary, selfie
change, clause structure change, sentence means a photo of yourself that you take,
structure change, cohesion change, level shift, typically with a smartphone or webcam, and
scheme change), semantic strategies usually put in your social media. The word “…
(synonymy, antonymy, hyponymy, converses, selfie” is a loan word in the Indonesian target
abstraction change, emphasis change, text. The equivalent word of “…selfie” in
paraphrase, trope change) and pragmatic Indonesian is swafoto. According to Kamus
strategies (cultural filtering, explicitness Besar Bahasa Indonesia, swafoto is potret diri
change, information change, interpersonal yang diambil sendiri dengan menggunakan
change, illocutionary change). The research kamera ponsel atau kamera digital, biasanya
findings, from the total 60 data there were only untuk diunggah ke media sosial. The definition
four translation strategies in manual book: of selfie in Online Oxford Advanced Learner’s
iPhone 12 Pro and Samsung S20 FE. There

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Dictionary and swafoto in Kamus Besar and injury. menyebabkan baterai
Bahasa Indonesia is same. menjadi terlalu panas,
terbakar dan mencederai
Table 3 Datum 2
Anda.

Source Text Target Text: loan

Datum 4: Calque—In the example above, the
The device contains a Perangkat English word “…battery…” is translated into
built-in NFC antenna. mengandung antenna “…baterai…” in Indonesian target text.
NFC internal
Battery according to Online Oxford Advanced
Learner’s Dictionary is a device that is placed
Datum 2: Loan—The English source text “… inside of electrical things that produces
NFC…” according to Online Oxford electricity which makes the things work. While
Advanced Learner’s Dictionary is an Kamus Besar Bahasa Indonesia defines
abbreviation which stands for Near Field baterai as alat untuk menghitung dan
Communication (NFC), it is a type of membangkitkan aliran listrik. Baterai is
technology that allows communication over Indonesian calque words since its part of the
short distances between mobile phones and word are from another language (English).
other electronic devices in order to make
payments, etc. In the example above, the word Table 6 Datum 5
“…NFC..” in the Indonesian target text is a Source Text Target Text: calque
loan words which delivers from English “…
The device may Perangkat mungkin
NFC…”. require a connection memerlukan koneksi ke
Table 4 Datum 3 to a Wi-Fi or mobile Wi-Fi atau jaringan
network when using
seluler saat
Source Text Target Text: loan some application or
features. menggunakan beberapa
If the lower part of the Jika bagian bawah aplikasi atau fitur.
device overheats, it perangkat terlalu panas,
could be because the hal ini dapat terjadi
connected USB cable is karena kabel USB yang
Datum 5: Calque—The English word “…
damages. terhubung rusak. application…” is translated into Indonesian
“…aplikasi…”. Online Oxford Advanced
Datum 3: Loan—Online Oxford Advanced Learner’s Dictionary, “…application…” or
Learner’s Dictionary defines USB as an can be abbreviate as app is a program designed
abbreviation which stands for universal serial to do a particular job; a piece of software. It is
bus, it is the system for connecting other pieces translated into “…aplikasi…” in Indonesia by
of equipment to a computer. It is translated conforming its pronunciation and grammatical
into “…USB…” in Indonesian target text and norms.
kind of loan words which derives from English Table 7 Datum 6
“…USB…”.
Source Text Target Text: unit shift
Table 5 Datum 4
During wireless Selama pengisian daya
Source Text Target Text: calque charging or fast tanpa kabel atau
charging, the device pengisian cepat,
Don’t attempt to Jangan mencoba may feel hotter to the perangkat mungkin
replace the iPhone mengganti baterai touch. terasa panas saat
battery yourself—you iPhone sendiri—Anda disentuh.
may damage the
dapat merusak baterai,
battery, which could
cause overheating, fire yang dapat

6
 Datum 6: Unit Shift—In the example above,
the English source text “…wireless..” is
translated into “…tanpa kabel…” in
Indonesian target text. According to Online
Oxford Advanced Learner’s Dictionary,
wireless is any system of sending electronic
information, such as internet, phone, signals
without using wires for the receiving
equipment. It is translated correctly into “…
tanpa kabel…” in Indonesian. Hence there is a
change of unit form word “…wireless…” into
a phrase “…tanpa kabel…” this translation is
called unit shift.
Table 8 Datum 7
Source Text Target Text: information
change
When you are roaming Ketika anda dalam mode
jelajah (roaming)
Datum 7: Information Change—According to
Online Oxford Advanced Learner’s Dictionary,
“…roaming” is using a mobile phone by
connecting to a different company’s network,
for example when you are in a different country.
The word “…roaming” is translated into “…
mode jelajah (roaming)” in Indonesian target
text. There is an additional of information in the
Indonesian target text “…mode jelajah…”, thus
this translation is called information change.
CONCLUSION
After analyzing the data, the research shows
that from 30 all strategies proposed by
Chesterman, from loan to other pragmatic
strategies, four of them are used in the
translation of Information Technology (IT)
terms on iPhone 12 Pro’s manual book and
Samsung S20 FE’s manual book. The four
strategies are 35 data of loan, 11 data of
calque, 13 data of unit shift and 1 data belongs
to information change. The most frequently
used strategy is loan and the least used strategy
is information change. Information
Technology (IT) terms found in the iPhone 12
Pro’s manual book and Samsung S20 FE’s
manual book are translated by manipulating
the form with syntactic strategies. Syntactic
strategies are functional in bringing changes in
the target language structure of the target
language.
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