ROMAN JAKOBSON AND CRITICIZING TRANSLATED TEXTS

1. ROMAN JAKOBSON AND CRITICIZING TRANSLATED TEXTS BY SEYYED YAHYA BARKHORDAR

2. (1)-INTRODUCTION Roman OsipovichJakobson born in Moscow on October 10th 1896 and died on July 18th 1982 in Cambridge Massachusetts was a Russian based U.S linguist and literary theorist. He was born in Russia to a well-to-do family of Jewish descent, and he developed a fascination with language at a very young age. He studied at the Lazarev institute of oriental languages and then in the historical-philological faculty of Moscow university.

3. As a student he was a leading figure of the Moscow’s linguistic circle and took part in Moscow’s active world of avant-garde art and poetry. The linguistics of the time was overwhelmingly neogrammarian and insisted that the only scientific study of language was to study the history and development of words across time (the diachronic approach, in Saussure’s terms). Jakobson, on the other hand, had come into contact with the work of Ferdinand De Saussure, and developed an approach which focused on the way in which language’s structure served its basic function (synchronic approach).

4. 1920 was a year of political fights in Russia, and Jakobson relocated to Prague as a member of the Soviet diplomatic mission to continue his doctoral studies. He immursed himself both into the academic and cultural life of pre-war Czechoslovakia and established close relationships with a number of Czech poets and literary figures. He became professor at Masryk university in Brno since 1933. He also made an impression on Czech academics with his studies of Czech verse. In 1926, together with VilmMathesius, Nicolai Trubetzkoi, Rene Wellek, and Jan Mukoravsky he became one of the founders of the Prague school of linguistic theory.

5. Jakobson escaped from Prague at the beginning of war daringly via Berlin for Denmark, where he was associated with the Copenhagen linguistic circle, and such intellectuals as Louis Hjelmslev. As the war advanced west, he fled to Norway, then was smuggled in a coffin by the Norwegian underground (with his wife, Czech anthropologist SvatavaPirkova, disguised as a peasant woman) over the boarder to Sweden, where he continued his work at the Karolinska hospital (with works on aphasia and language competence).

6. When Swedish colleagues feared for a possible German occupation, he managed to leave on a cargo ship, together with Ernst Cassirer (the former rector of Hamburg university) to New York City to become part of the wider community of intellectual émigrés who fled there.

7. In New York, he began teaching at The New School, still closely associated with the Czech émigré community during that period. He made acquaintance of many American linguists and anthropologists, such as Franz Boas, Benjamin Whorf, and Leonard Bloomfield. When the American authorities considered “repatriating” him to Europe, it was Franz Boas who actually saved his life. After the war, he became a consultant to the International Auxiliary Language.

8. In 1949 Jakobson moved to Harvard University, where he remained until retirement. In his last decade he maintained an office at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, where he was an honorary professor emeritus. In the early 1960s Jakobson shifted his emphasis to a more comprehensive view of language and began writing about communication sciences as a whole.

9. (2)-APPROACHES, ATTITUDES, AND VIEWPOINTS Influenced by the Organon-Model written by Karl Buhler, Jakobson distinguishes six communication functions, each associated with a dimension or factor of communication process which are: 1-referential (: contextual information). 2-aesthetic/poetic (: auto-reflection). 3-emotive (: self-expression). 4-conative (: vocative or imperative addressing of receiver). 5-phatic (: checking channel working). 6-metalingual (: checking code working).

10. One of the six functions is always the dominant function in a text and usually related to the type of text. In poetry, the dominant function is the poetic function: the focus is on the message itself. For Jakobson, poetry successfully combines and integrates form and function, and poetry turns the poetry of grammar into the grammar of poetry, so to speak.

11. One of the first, and most representative, linguists who approached translation as a “science” and not simply as an “art” was Roman Jakobson, unanimously reputed as the (father) of contemporary translation theory and practice. Jakobson’s classification of translation types is also noteworthy. In his 1959 essay (On Linguistic Aspects Of Translation), he distinguishes three types of translation. These definitions draw on semiotics, the general science of communication through signs and sign systems.

12. Intralingual translation or rewording: Interpretation of verbal signs by means of other signs of the same language. It is also defined as rewording or paraphrasing, summarizing, expanding or commenting within a language. An example for this type can be paraphrase.

13. Interlingual translation or translation proper: Interpretation of verbal signs by means of signs of another language. In other words, it means the traditional concept of translation from st to tt or the shifting of meaning from one language to another. This is the type by which we normally refer to as translation.

14. Intersemiotic translation or transmutation: Interpretation of verbal signs by means of signs of non-verbal system such as film, music, painting, and etc, or in other words, the changing of a written text into a different form, such as art or dance. In this case, when we look at a picture, watch a film, or listen to a music made of a text written by someone, we’re actually using an intersemiotic translation.

15. With interlingual referring to translation between two different written languages, Jakobson goes on to examine key issues of this type of translation, notably linguistic meaning and equivalence.

16. Jakobson follows the relation set out by Saussure between the signifier (the spoken and written signal) and the signified (the concept signified). Together, the signifier and signified form the linguistic sign, but that sign is arbitrary or unmotivated. Jakobson stresses that it is possible to understand what is signified by a word, even if we have never seen or experienced the concept or thing in real life.

17. Jakobson states that meaning of a word is a linguistic phenomenon. He remarks that there is no “signatum” (meaning) without a “signum” (a linguistic sign). Using semiotics, Jakobson believes that meaning lies with the signifier and not in the signified. Thus it is the linguistic verbal sign that gives an object its meaning.

18. Jakobson then moves on to consider the thorny problem of equivalence in meaning between words in different languages. He points out that there is no filled equivalence between code units. In Jakobson’s description, interlingual translation involves substituting messages in one language not for separate code units but for entire messages in some other language.

19. The translator records and transmits a message received from another source, thus translation involves two equivalent messages in two different codes. For the message to be equivalent in st and tt, the code units will be different since they belong to two different sign systems which partition reality differently.

20. Jakobson says” (Equivalence in difference is the cardinal problem of language and the pivotal concern of linguistics). In Jakobson’s discussion, the problem of meaning and equivalence just focuses on differences in the structure and terminology of languages rather than on any inability of one language to render a message that has been written in another verbal language.

21. For Jakobson, cross-linguistic differences center around obligatory grammatical and lexical forms. Languages differ essentially in what they must convey and not in what they may convey. Only poetry, where form expresses sense, where phonemic similarity is sensed as semantic relationship is considered untranslatable by Jakobson and requires creative transposition.

22. He says that “the faculty of speaking a given language implies a faculty of talking this language. Such a ‘metalinguistic’ operation permits revision and redefinition of the vocabulary used.” If we apply this sentence to translation, it is important to look at the source text in both ways:

23. first through the perspective of how our own language works (metalinguistic approach) and then of how the “other” language works (interlinguistic approach). The better we know our own language, the better we can translate (that’s why writers are usually good translators).

24. Roman Jakobson uses the term “mutual translatability” and states that when any two languages are being compared, the foremost thing that needs to be taken into consideration is whether they can be translated into one another or not.

25. Roman Jakobson also deals with the problem of ‘deficiency’ in a particular language. Jakobson believes that all cognitive experiences can be expressed in language and while translating whenever there is a lack or ‘deficiency’ of words, ‘loan words’, ‘neologisms’ and ‘circumlocutions’ can be used to fill in this gap.

26. Reinforcing the fact that one of the factors that translation has to take care of is the grammatical structure of the target language, Jakobson believes that it becomes tedious to try and maintain fidelity to the source text when the target language has a rigid grammatical framework which is missing in the source language.

27. (3)-ANALYSIS CHAPTER 1

28. 1-1.ENGLISH TEXT Beasts of England, beasts of Ireland, Beasts of every land and clime, Hearken to my joyful tidings Of the golden future time.

29. Soon or late the day is coming, Tyrant Man shall be overthrown, And the fruitful fields of England Shall be trode by beasts alone. Rings shall vanish from our noses, And the harness from our back, Bit and spur shall rust forever, Cruel whips no more shall crack. Page 6 bottom of the page

30. 1-2.ترجمه امیرشاهی حیوان سراسر گیتی همه خاموش چشم و گوش به من می دهم مژده ای مسرت بخش خوشتر از این نبود و نیست سخن هان به امید آنچنان روزی کین بشر محو گردد و نابود وین همه دشتهای سبز جهان خاصه ما شود چه دیر و چه زود یوقها دور گردد از گردن حلقه ها باز گردد از بینی بر سر ما وحوش دگر نکند رنج بار سنگینی ص.14

31. 1-3.ترجمه صالح حسینی به گوش ای وحوش ایرلند و انگلیس شما ای ستوران این سرزمین نوید رهایی نثار شما ز ایام زرین بدین سرزمین ز طاغوت انسان رها می شوید رهایی سرانجام بخت شماست چمنهای سرسبز این سرزمین لگدکوب سمهای سخت شماست نه یوقی به گردن نه زینی به پشت عنان از دهانهایتان دور باد و شلاق انسان بیرحم و پست همی تا ابد خوار و منفور باد ص.14

32. 1-4.COMMENTS As it was mentioned, Roman Jakobson has suggested three types of translations including (intralingual, interlingual, and intersemiotic translation). So, the translation from George Orwell's original to each of these texts is considered as interlingual translation, and each of the two target texts can also be considered, to some extent, as an intralingual one.

33. Reviewing Jakobson's theories, it can be concluded that since st was translated to two tts, and each of the two tts can be interpreted to the other one, we can compare st with tt, and each of the two target texts with the other one.

34. Roman Jakobson's suggestion to translate poetry has been (creative transposition) consisting of two parts. (creative) means producing a poem in the receptor language. (transposition), on the other hand, means the content and message which should be transferred in to the target language.

35. It can be said that creativity has been observed, since the poem was translated into two Persian poems. Let's check whether transposition has also been observed. In translating the first section, Mr. Amirshahi has translated in a more general manner, while the second translator has translated such concepts as (England), (Ireland), and (the golden future time) obviously.

36. However, in the second section, Mr. Amirshahi has obviously brought translation of (Soon or late the day is coming,), while it is not seen in the other target text. Both translators translated (back) in the third section with different equivalents in Persian.

37. CHAPTER 2

38. 2-1.ENGLISH TEXT Napoleon was a large, rather fierce looking Berkshire boar, the only Berkshire on the farm, not much of a talker, but with a reputation for getting his own way. Snowball was a more vivacious pig than Napoleon, quicker in speech and more inventive, but was not considered to have the same depth of character. page.9/paragraph.1/line.4

39. These three had elaborated old Major's teachings into a complete system of thought, to which they gave the name of Animalism. page.9/paragraph.2/line.1

40. 2-2.ترجمه امیرشاهی ناپلئون هیکلی درشت داشت و قیافه اش تاحدی خشن و سبع بود و در این مزرعه تنها موجود برکشایری بود. در سخنوری دستی نداشت ولی معروف بود که حرفش را به کرسی می نشاند. سنوبال خوک پرهیجانتری بود. بلیغتر و مبتکرتر بود ولی استقامت رای او را نداشت. این سه تعلیمات میجر را به صورت یک دستگاه فکری کامل بست داده بودند و بر آن نام حیوانگری گذاشته بودند. ص.17

41. 2-3.ترجمه صالح حسینی ناپلئون خوک بزرگ و باهیبت برکشایری تنها خوک برکشایری در مزرعه بود. از زبان آوری بهره چندانی نداشت منتها شهره به این بود که حرف خود را به کرسی می نشاند. اسنوبال سرزنده تر از ناپلئون بود. از زبان آوری بهره داشت و در نوآوری از ناپلئون سرتر بود ولی به نظر دیگران عمق منش ناپلئون را نداشت. این سه نفر تعالیم میجر پیر را شرح کردند و به نظام فکری کاملی تبدیل کردند و بر آن نام حیوانیت گذاشتند. ص.18

42. 2-4.COMMENTS According to Jakobson, although (Berkshire) is not known in Persian culture, by looking at the signifier, we can recognize what the signified ( the concept signified) is and to which concept the signifier refers, despite the fact that we've never seen or experienced it.

43. As the term (Animalism) is ,to some extent, an ambiguous concept in Persian lexicon, Following Jakobson, both translators have used (neologism) in order to fill in such a lexical gap between the two languages.

44. CHAPTER 3

45. 3-1.ENGLISH TEXT As for the horses, they knew every inch of the field, and in fact understood the business of mowing and raking far better than Jones and his men had ever done. The pigs did not actually work, but directed and supervised the others. With their superior knowledge it was natural that they should assume the leadership.

46. Boxer and Clover would harness themselves to the cutter or the horse-rake (no bits or reins were needed in these days, of course) and tramp steadily round and round the field with a pig walking behind and calling out "Gee up, comrade!" or "Whoa back, comrade!" as the case might be. And every animal down to the humblest worked at turning the hay and gathering it. Even the ducks and hens toiled to and fro all day in the sun, carrying tiny wisps of hay in their beaks. page.16/paragraph.2/line.5

47. 3-2.ترجمه امیرشاهی اسبها که با مزرعه وجب به وجب آشنایی داشتند درحقیقت کار چمنزنی و شنکشی را به مراتب بهتر از جونز و مستخدمینش بلد بودند. خوکها خودشان کار نمی کردند فقط بر کار سایرین نظارت داشتند. طبیعی بود که به علت برتری علمی رهبر و پیشوا باشند.

48. باکسر و کلوور خود را به آلات چمنزنی و شنکشی می بستند (البته این روزها دیگر حاجتی به دهنه و افسار نبود) و دورادور مزرعه قدمهای سنگین و استوار بر می داشتند درحالیکه خوکی دنبال آنها می رفت و برحسب اقتضا "رفیق هین" ویا "رفیق چش" می گفت. همه حیوانات حتی ضعیفترین آنها در کار برگرداندن یونجه و جمع آوری آن سهیم بودند. حتی اردکها و مرغها تمام روز زیر آفتاب زحمت می کشیدند و خرده های یونجه را با منقار جمع آوری می کردند. ص.28

49. 3-3.ترجمه صالح حسینی و اما از اسبها بگوییم که وجب به وجب مزرعه را می شناختند و درواقع خیلی بهتر از جونز و آدمهایش از پس درو و شخم زدن بر می آمدند. راستش خوکها کاری جز راهنمایی و نظارت بر دیگران نداشتند. چون معرفتشان بر دیگران می چربید طبیعی بود که نقش رهبری را به عهده بگیرند.

50. باکسر و کلوور خیش به خود می بستند (البته این روزها دیگر نیازی به دهنه و افسار نبود) و بعد آهسته و پیوسته دورتادور مزرعه را می گشتند درحالیکه خوکی پشت سرشان راه می رفت و هرجا لازم بود صدا می زد "هی رفیق" یا "هش رفیق". همه حیوانات از گنده گنده هایش گرفته تا ریزه میزه های فسقلی برای جمع آوری علوفه حسابی تن به کار می دادند. تازه اردکها و مرغها هم از بام تا شام زیر آفتاب این طرف و آن طرف می رفتند و با خون دل خرده های یونجه را به نوک می گرفتند. ص.30