Translation issues: bridging meaning in

politically sensitive text

Language, Literature, Meaning – Faculty of Philosophy, Nis, 24-25 April 2015

Jasmina Djordjevic
Faculty of Philosophy
University of Nis
djordjevic.jasmina@gmail.com
Summary
A politically sensitive text is a piece of discourse reflecting the
sensitivity of people regarding attitudes, ideologies, religious
beliefs, identity issues, etc.

Research problem:
The speakers of a target language cannot be assumed to
recognize political sensitivity in the same manner it has been
expressed in the source language. How does a translator
express political sensitivity in a respective target language?

Research questions:
1. Do translators of a politically sensitive text have to resort to
“bridging” the meaning rather than “translating” it?
2. How much do they have to focus on prominent cognitive and
cultural aspects of the source language speakers?
Research aim, method and corpus
Aim:
Identify the aspects of political sensitivity expressed in texts
demanding “bridging” meaning rather than “translating” it to make
both text and meaning understandable to particular target language
speakers.

Method:
A comparative analysis on a corpus of newspaper article headlines
containing politically sensitive text.

Corpus:
News headlines with identical topics published in three diffferent
languages in a three-month period.
Introduction
1. “Media reports about political events are always forms of
recontextualisation, and any recontextualisation involves
transformations… determined by goals, values and interests” (Schäffner
& Bassnett, 2010: 2)

2. In her presentation “Bridging the polytical abyss” Schäffner

identifies the following strategies of recontextualisation:
• selection of information (omissions, additions)
• restructuring, re-ordering, rearrangement of information
• transformation of genre (e.g. interview into report on interview)
• incorporation of (selected) information in a new text, including syntactic
(and stylistic) adaptation (Schäffner, 2013)

3. Corpus-based content analysis: “standardised hermeneutic

procedure of text interpretation... [based on]… abstract categories
[assigned] to propositional contents… [categories do not correspond to the
‘observable’ (linguistic) characteristics of the text, but to hypotheses
derived from social theory... [whereby]... the necessary validity and
reliability of assignment (coding) is assured by a classification system”
(Kutter & Kanter, 2012: 7)
Research in detail
100 news headlines in Serbian (increased by the
Corpus respective number of translations into English and
German) published from 1 October to 31 December 2014

Sources of the The Serbian Politika, the British edition of The Guardian
corpus and the German Der Spiegel

Qualitative comparative analysis based on

Method corpus-based content analysis (Kutter & Kanter,
2012)
Assessment tool Identification of recontextualisation based on three
(Schäffner ) criteria
1. Identical key words referring to one and the same
news item appearing in the three corpus sources.
Criteria (Kutter & 2. Publication date as an indication of how current the
Kanter) issue presented was.
3. Selection, restructuring, adaptation of information
as an indication of a particular focus.
Example 1: Different publication
dates – more or less the same focus
Politika The Guardian Der Spiegel Focus
6 16 9 Angst vor
Oct
Zapad Oct
The Oct
The fear of
zastrašen problem Ebola: diseases
Afrikanischer
ebolom with the present
Nationalspiele
west's r verlässt sein everywhere
Ebola Team
response is
still fear of
a black
patient
 Example 2: Same publication date –
slightly different focus
Politika The Guardian Der Spiegel Focus
17 Amerika 17 17 Serbia: focus on
Dec Dec Barack Dec USA und
ukida Obama Kuba: Eine the lifting of the
poluvekovni embargo
embargo
announces Feindschaft Britain: focus on
prema Kubi thaw in US- geht in Rente potentially looser
Cuba political
relations Annäherung relationships
zwischen den Germany: focus
USA und on Obama’s
innitiative as a
Kuba: Obama
first step towards
und Castro the possibility of
schreiben lifting the
Geschichte embargo
 Example 3: Same publication dates –
completely different focus
Politika The Guardian Der Spiegel Focus
9 Četvrt veka od 9 Nov A city 9 Das deutsche
Nov Nov
Serbia: focus on
pada berlinskog undivided: the Jahrhundertereignis history and
zida fall of the Berlin implications for
Istorija ipak nije Wall the entire
sahranjena commemorated
Eastern block
Nemačka
25 years on
najviše Britain: focus
profitirala
on the historical
Televizijski fact
prenos istorije
Uspeh ostvarile Germany: news
samo Albanija, glorify the event
Poljska i
Estonija
Conclusions
1. Politically sensitive texts are not translated – they
are recontextualised!
2. Recontextualisation is determined by purpose,
practice, policies, time, ideologies – culture and
cognition of the target nation.
3. Meaning is transferred to the target language
readers so as to fit the culture and the cognition
of the target language speakers.
4. Almost all strategies determined by Schäffner can
be identified.
Politically sensitive texts “bridge” sensitive
issues.
References
1. Kutter, A., C. Kanter. 2012. Corpus-based Content Analysis: a
Method for Investigating News Coverage on War and
Intervention. International Relations Online Working Paper,
Stuttgart: Stuttgart University.
2. Schäffner, C. (2004). Political Discourse Analysis from the
point of view of Translation Studies. Journal of Language
and Politics 3:1, 117-150.
3. Schäffner, C. (2013). Bridging the ideological abyss –
translation strategies in politically sensitive texts
4. Schäffner, C. & S. Bassnett (Eds.) (2010). Political
Discourse, Media and Translation. Cambridge Scholars
Publishing: UK.
Thank you!
Jasmina Djordjevic
Faculty of Philosophy
University of Nis
djordjevic.jasmina@gmail.com