FIXED EXPRESSIONS AND IDIOMS IN TRANSLATION

1. FIXED EXPRESSIONS AND IDIOMS IN TRANSLATION

2. FIXED EXPRESSIONS • a general term used to refer to variousphraseological units: ”Fixed expression is a very general butconvenient term [...] used to cover several kinds of phrasal lexeme, phraseological unit, or multi-word lexical item: that is, holistic units of two or more words. These include frozen collocations, grammatically ill-formed collocations, proverbs, routine formulae, sayings, similes. Fixed expression also subsumes idioms [...] Fixed expression, like idiom is unsatisfactory as a term since [...] many fixed expressions of these types are not actually fixed...” (Moon 1998: 2)

3. FIXED EXPRESSIONS • include different types of word combinations (Fiedler 2007, Cowie 1998, Moon 1998, Gläser 1998) FROMbilexemic combinations (e.g. blue joke)TOplurilexemic expressions rendered by:  simple sentences (e.g.The coat does not make the gentleman)  complex sentences (e.g. Make hay while the sun shines, Do as you would be done by) microtexts (e.g. the famous quotation from Shaw He who can does. He who cannot, teaches). • are first and foremost characterized by fixedness at the grammatical and semantic levels, which is their ”key property” (Moon 1998: 120).

4. HALLIDAY’ S MODEL OF TEXT COMPONENTS

5. FUNCTIONS OF FEIs: • INFORMATIONAL – to state propositions and convey information: e.g. in the long run • EVALUATIVE – to convey the speaker’s evaluation and attitude: e.g. another pair of shoes • SITUATIONAL – to relate to the extralinguistic context, to respond to a certain situation: e.g. tell it to the Marines • MODALIZING – to convey truth values, advice, requests, etc.: e.g. to all intents and purposes • ORGANIZATIONAL – organizing text: e.g. by way of illustration (Moon 1998: 217-218)

6. FUNCTIONS OF PROVERBS • GENERALIZING – to convey general truths of a proverbial nature, coming from other people’s experiences: e.g. Out of sight, out of mind. Old birds are not to be caught with chaff. No smoke without fire. Make hay while the sun shines. • SITUATIONAL – when they are responses to or occasioned by the extralinguistic context: e.g. It is the last straw that breaks the camel’s back. • EVALUATIVE – when they express the speaker’s attitude towards a situation and evaluation on some reality, event or happening: e.g. Blood is thicker than water. • MODALIZING – when proverbs are used as or with modalizers, most often epistemic: e.g. Every could has a silver lining. A stitch in time saves nine

7. PROVERBS AND SYNONYMY • MISLEADING SYNONYMY: e.g. a) Truth and oil are ever above. b) It takes many shovelfuls of earth to bury the truth. a) Adevărul iese întotdeauna la suprafaţă. b) Adevărul iese deasupra ca untdelemnul. c) Adevărul şi undelemnul ies întotdeauna deasupra. d) Dreptatea întotdeauna ca untedelemnul pluteşte deasupra apei. e) Dreptatea iese ca untdelemnul deasupra apei.

8. PROVERBS AND SYNONYMY • MISINTERPRETATIONS e.g. a) He makes a rod for his own back. b) He that mischief hatcheth, mischief catcheth. c) Who spits against the wind, reap the whirlwind. a) Cine sapă groapa altuia, cade în ea. b) Cine scuipă în sus, îi vine/cade scuipatul pe obraz. c) Dacă scuipi în sus, îţi vine în ochi. d) Cine seamănă vânt culege furtună.

9. PROVERBS AND SYNONYMY • SEMANTIC CONTAMINATION e.g. a) The dogs bark, but the caravan goes on. a) Câinii latră, caravana trece. b) Câinii latră, vântul bate. c) Câinii latră, ursul merge. d) Câinii latră, bivolul paşte. e) Apa trece, pietrele rămân.

10. SYNTACTIC ASPECTS • NO SYNTACTIC PARALLELISM e.g. a) Good finds good. a) Bine faci, bine găseşti. b) Dacă faci bine, (bine) găseşti (bine). c) Bine faci, prin (ca) urmare/ aşadar/ deci bine găseşti.

11. SYNTACTIC ASPECTS • PARTIAL SYNTACTIC PARALLELISM e.g. a) Do well and have well. • REDUCTION VS. EXTENSION OF PROVERBS e.g. a) Good finds good. Bine faci, bine găseşti. b) Do well and have well. Binele cu bine se răsplăteşte.

12. MODALIZATION OF PROVERBS e.g. If there should be a slip between the cup and the lip, he was to take sides with Jack.

13. TEXT SAMPLES

34. References • Agha, A. 2001. “ Register” in A. Duranti (ed.) Key Terms in Language and Culture. Oxford: Blackwell Publishing. • Avădanei, C. 2000.Construcţii idiomatice în limbile română şi engleză. Iasi: Editura Universităţii Alexandru Ioan Cuza. • Cacciari C. and S. Glucksberg 1991. “Understanding idiomatic expressions: The contribution of word meanings” in G. B. Simpson (ed.) Understanding word and sentence. Amsterdam: Elsevier, pp. 217 -240. • Duranti, A. 2001 Key Terms in Language and Culture. Oxford: Blackwell Publishing. • Errington, J. 2001. “Ideology” in A. Duranti (ed.) Key Terms in Language and Culture. Oxford: Blackwell Publishing. • Gheorghe, G. 1986. Proverbele româneşti şi proverbele lumii romanice. Bucureşti: Editura Albatros. • Halliday, M.A.K. 1978. Language as Social Semiotic. London: Edward Arnold. • Lefter, V. 1978. Dicţionar de proverbe roman-englez. Bucureşti: Editura Ştiinţifică şi Enciclopedică. • Moon, R. 1998. Fixed Expressions and Idioms in English. A Corpus-Based Approach. Oxford: Clarendon Press. • Nunberg, G., I. A. Sag and Th. Wasow 1994. “Idioms” in Language. 70/3, pp. 491 – 538. • Obelkevich, J. 1987. “Proverbs in social history” in P. Burke and R. Poter (eds.) The Social History of Language. Cambridge: CUP. • Titone, D. and C. Connine 1999. “On the compositional and noncompositional nature of idiomatic expressions” in Journal of Pragmatics, 31/3, pp. 1655-1674. • Vega- Moreno, R. E. 2001. Representing and processing Idioms, UCL Working Papers in Linguistics. 13, pp. 73-107. • Yankah, K. 2001. “Proverbs” in A. Duranti (ed.)Key Terms in Language and Culture. Oxford: Blackwell Publishing.