Comparative Grammar of English and Ukrainian

Comparative Grammar of English and Ukrainian

The best translation does not sound like a translation

(Eugene Nida)
 Grammar Is Meaningful

 John hit Bill vs. Bill hit John

 Naturally he did it. vs He did it naturally.
 Did you go? vs You did go.
Grammatical Transformations

are the changes of the grammatical

elements of a sentence structure
according to the requirements of the
target language norm.
 Gender Issues in Translation
 A literary device of personification:

`Who are YOU?' said the Caterpillar.

Alice replied, rather shyly, `I--I hardly know, sir, just at present-- at least I know who I WAS
when I got up this morning, but I think I must have been changed several times since then.'
- Ти хто?
- Я?.. Я, пані, й сама вже не знаю... - ледь зніяковіла Аліса. - Знаю хіба, ким була
сьогодні зранку, але відтоді я, по-моєму, кілька разів мінялася.
(Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland)

“Well,” said Harris, reaching his hand out for his glass, “we have had a pleasant trip, and my
hearty thanks for it to old Father Thames —but I think we did well to chuck it when we did.
Ну що ж, — сказав Гарріс, простягаючи руку до келиха. — Ми непогано поплавали, і я
від щирого серця дякую старенькій матінці Темзі,— але гадаю, що ми добре зробили,
розпрощавшися з нею.
(“Three Men in a Boat” by Jerome K. Jerome )
 Special attention

 Names of countries are treated as ‘it’ when they are referred to as

geographical units:
Look at Ukraine. It is one of the largest countries in Europe.
As political/economic units the countries may be referred as ‘she’ :
Ukraine managed to increase her exports.
Personification of nations has been frequently employed in wartime
propaganda, with male personifications later arriving, such as Uncle
Sam for the United States and John Bull for England.
 Vehicles, including ships, trains, and cars may be treated as ‘she’ if
the speaker is proud of them:
Here is the Titanic. Is not she beautiful!
My new car! She’s terrific!
 Hurricanes
Meteorologists began naming hurricanes in the Atlantic
Basin with female-only names in 1953. In the news,
hurricanes were referred to as she and her:
Celia wasn’t as big as some of her older sisters.
In the 1970s feminists pressured the field to change its
practices and, starting with Hurricane Bob in 1979,
hurricanes are now given alternating feminine and
masculine names and are referred to as it.
 The Moon is referred to as ‘she ’ and the Sun – as ‘he’.
The sun was shining on the sea,
Shining with all his might:
He did his very best to make
The billows smooth and bright–
And this was odd, because it was
The middle of the night.
The moon was shining sulkily,
Because she thought the sun
Had got no business to be there
After the day was done–
“It’s very rude of him," she said,
“To come and spoil the fun!”
(from Lewis Carroll's The Walrus and the Carpenter)
The masculine gender is often applied to lifeless objects known for
strength or violence. Examples are: sun, summer, winter, time, death etc.
The feminine gender is often applied to lifeless objects known for beauty or
gracefulness. Examples are: moon, earth, spring, autumn, nature, liberty,
 Category of Number
Changes may be caused by
communicative traditions of English and Ukrainian
speakers:
The word passed quickly.
Ці слова враз стали відомими всьому місту.
We know the eye and the moustache.
Ми впізнаємо і ці очі, і ці вуса.
(Cabbages and Kings by O. Henry)
 Change of the Part of Speech
Ways of rendering of the article by means of the Ukrainian
language:
1. Pronoun
- demonstrative pronoun
Can you manage the cipher?
Чи розберете ви цей шифр?
It would have been a miracle under the circumstances.
Це було б дивно за таких обставин.
- Indefinite pronoun
There is a woman waiting for you!
Там якась жінка чекає на вас!
2. Numeral
The etymology of the indefinite article goes back to
the numeral ‘one’.
A moment! – Одну хвилинку!
(indirect request that has conventional forms in English
and Ukrainian)
3. Adjective
You go back and take your medicine like a man!
Повертайся назад і мужньо, як годиться справжньому
мужчині, проковтни свою піґулку.
Special attention should be paid to translation of terms:
e.g. method of the moment – метод поточного моменту
4. Particle
I don’t know the who, where, why, when, or how, but
honest to God, honey, I think I know the what.
Не знаю, як, де й коли з нею оте сталося, й хто до
цього доклався, але, здається, я знаю, що саме з нею
трапилося, їй-богу, моя рибко.
5. Noun
The Johnsons – подружжя Джонсонів
 Change of the Word Order
is a change in the order of linguistic elements, which is
most often connected with the notions of theme and
rheme:
A young woman’s body has been found in a rental cabin
on a beach in Maui.
В орендованому будиночку для відпочивальників на
Мауї було знайдено тіло молодої жінки.

Attention to
- addresses: 27 A Wimpole Street – Вімпол-стріт, 27 а
- date indication: July 2, 2018 – 2 липня 2018
 Addition
Used for explication of information:
Len laughed, apologized, said he'd done his best to squeeze me in – Леонард розсміявся,
вибачився й сказав, що зробив усе можливе, аби втиснути мене у свій і без того
напружений графік .
usually used in the process of translation of proper nouns because of orientation of a
translator on the background knowledge of the target audience:
- Geographical names:
Massachusetts – штат Массачусетс; Woolton – місто Вултон; Fifeshire – графство
Файфшир
- Names of organisations and establishments:
He already was in Attica when I got his case through Civil Liberties.
Він уже сидів у в’язниці в Аттіці, коли мені через організацію «Громадянські свободи»
передали його справу.
- Names of catering companies:
I won’t go to Queens. – До ресторану Квінз не поїду.
- Names of periodicals:
The Crimson – гарвардський журнал «Крімзон»
 Omission
Reasons of usage:
- linguistic – semantic redundancy in the original text:
The explosion was terrible while it lasted. – Вибух був жахливий.
This is a very difficult problem to tackle. – Це дуже складна проблема.
That’s sure and certain. – Це точно.
the right to rest and leisure – право на відпочинок
equality in trade and commerce – рівні права у галузі торгівлі
- extralinguistic – e.g. censorship:
Truman Capote’s novel “In Cold Blood”– український переклад В. Митрофанова
«З холодним серцем» (1965) .
Omissions of episodes depicting everyday life in the US, religious beliefs of the
main characters, and erotic scenes
(ranging from a few words to entire pages)
Total amount of omitted information – 59 pages.
Because of the official propaganda concerning the life in the US it was impossible
in the Soviet Union to print the menu of the last meal of prisoners sentenced to
death:
 Grammatical Compensation
 Close
Me bring other watchy tomorrow.
Мій принесе завтра другий годинника (the speech of a foreigner)
– Can I have this? – May I have this.
– Можна мені візьмити це? – «Узяти», а не «візьмити» (the speech
of a child).
 Distant:
I ain’t dirty.
Я поїду на ваших таксях.
(the speech that reveals the education and social status of a speaker)
 Antonymic Translation
is substitution of an affirmative in sense and structure
source language unit for a corresponding negative unit
of the TL and vice versa.

Keep cheerful! – Не журіться!

Stand still! – Не крутися!
I mean it, Ben! – Я не жартую, Бене!

She wasn’t dead and she wasn’t injured! – Вона була

живою та неушкодженою!
 Partitioning
is a change of a simple sentence into a composite one.
 Inner partitioning is often used when translating English verbal
complexes into Ukrainian:
Come along and see me play one evening.
Приходь коли-небудь увечері – побачиш, як я граю.
 Outer partitioning is out of question in case of translating official legal
or diplomatic documents but is justified in consecutive translation.
There was a real game too, not a party game played in the old school hall
and invented by my eldest brother Herbert, who was always of an
adventurous character until he was changed by the continual and
sometimes shameful failures of his adult life.
Була і справжня, а не салонна гра, у яку ми грали в актовому залі
старої школи. Цю гру вигадав мій старший брат Герберт – людина
винахідлива і схильна до всіляких пригод, доки постійні і часом
ганебні негаразди дорослого життя не змінили його вдачу.
 Integration
 Inner integration is rendering of a composite sentence by means of a
simple one.
The Babylonians and their city state neighbors later developed the
earliest system of economics using a metric of various commodities, that
was fixed in a legal code.
Пізніше вавилоняни та їх пограничні міста-держави удосконалили
первинну систему економіки, застосовуючи метричну систему у
формі різних товарів згідно з законом.
 Outer integration is rendering of two or more simple sentences by
means of one composite sentence.
The final objective is the creation of a 3D dataset. It reproduces the exact
geometrical situation of the normal and pathological tissues.
Кінцева мета полягає у створенні 3-вимірної бази даних, яка
відтворює точну геометричну конфігурацію здорових та
Difficulties in rendering of the tense
forms of the verb
1. Failure to use the Present Perfect tense in
utterances like: Я живу в Києві вже шість
років. – I have lived in Kyiv for 6 years.
2. The use of the Future Indefinite tense in
English in the adverbial clauses of condition
and time after if, when, till, until, before,
after: Якщо ви цього цього не зробите, то
наслідки буде важко передбачити. – If you
don’t do that, it will be difficult to predict the
result.
3. Inability to apply the rules of sequence
of tenses: Вони сказали, що
прийматимуть участь в роботі
семінару. – They said that they would
participate in the workshop.
4. The Past Perfect often requires
addition: His wife had been beautiful. –
Його дружина колись була красунею.
 Transformations can be Rarely Found
in Their Pure Form
e.g. As they leave Washington, the four foreign ministers will be
traveling together by plane.
Всі чотири міністри закордонних справ полетять з
Вашингтона разом.
1. The complex sentence is translated by a simple one (inner
partitioning).
2. The word order is changed.
3. The subordinate clause of time is rendered by an adverbial
modifier of place.
4. The meaning of the definite article is rendered lexically.
 Recommended Literature List

1. Карамишева І.Д. Контрастивна граматика англійської та

української мов. – Львів: НУЛП, 2008. – 300 с.
2. Корунець І. В. Порівняльна типологія англійської та
української мов. – Вінниця: Нова Книга, 2004. – 464 с.
3. Longman Grammar of Spoken and Written English/ Biber D.,
Johansson S., Leech G., Conrad S., Finegan E. – Longman,
1999. – 1204 p.
4. Swan M. Practical English Usage. – Oxford, 1996. – 654 p.