In the Company of Words in Translation: Conventionalisation of Collocations in Croatian Translations from English

master's thesis

• Title (croatian): U društvu prevedenih riječi: konvencionalizacija kolokacija u hrvatskim prijevodima s engleskog
• Author: Patrik Posedi
• Mentor: Nataša Pavlović (mentor)
• Committee member: Mateusz-Milan Stanojević (predsjednik povjerenstva)
• Committee member: Snježana Veselica Majhut (član povjerenstva)
• Granter: University of Zagreb; Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences; (Department of English language and literature); Zagreb
• Defense date and country: 2024-09-18, Croatia
• Scientific / art field, discipline and subdiscipline: HUMANISTIC SCIENCES; Philology; Anglistics

Abstract

The controversial notion of translation universals, described initially as absolute generalities of translation, is nowadays understood more along the lines of probabilistic claims about different subsets of translations. One such universal – conventionalisation – is in the focus of this study. Conventionalisation is described as a feature of translations according to which translations conform to the typical patterns of the target language, even to the degree of exaggerating them, meaning that unconventional source elements become conventional in the target. This universal is studied here by researching three conventional and three unconventional English collocations and their Croatian renderings. The aim is to determine if collocations become conventionalised through translation, with respect to genre (literary vs. popular scientific) and with respect to participants’ perception of a source collocation’s conventionality. The study combines an experiment, where participants are asked to translate two texts and answer questions about the collocations’ conventionality, and a corpus-based analysis, aimed at assessing conventionality. The results of this small-scale study show evidence of conventionalisation, more prominently in the translations of the popular scientific text, while the participants’ perception of a particular collocation also seems to have played a role. This study offers new insights into Croatian translations from English with respect to collocations and conventionalisation, as well as showing that translation universals can still be a fruitful topic of research.

Abstract (croatian)

Kontroverzni pojam prijevodnih univerzalija, koje su prvobitno opisane kao apsolutne zakonitosti u prijevodima, danas je shvaćen više kao koncept koji opisuje probabilističke tvrdnje o različitim podskupovima prijevoda. Jedna takva univerzalija – konvencionalizacija – u fokusu je ovog istraživanja. Konvencionalizacija se opisuje kao karakteristika prijevoda prema kojoj se oni prilagođavaju tipičnim obrascima ciljnog jezika, čak do razine pretjerivanja, pa elementi koji su u izvorniku nekonvencionalni postaju konvencionalnima u prijevodu. Ta se prijevodna univerzalija ovdje istražuje s pomoću triju konvencionalnih i triju nekonvencionalnih engleskih kolokacija i njihovih prijevoda na hrvatski. Cilj je saznati postaju
li kolokacije zaista konvencionalnijima u prijevodima te postoji li razlika s obzirom na žanr (književni u odnosu na popularnoznanstveni tekst) i percepciju ispitanika/ispitanica o konvencionalnosti izvorne kolokacije. U ovom se istraživanju kombinira eksperiment, u kojem ispitanici/ispitanice prevode dva teksta i odgovaraju na pitanja o konvencionalnosti kolokacija, te analiza temeljena na korpusnom istraživanju čiji je cilj procijeniti konvencionalnost određene kolokacije. Rezultati ovog istraživanja manjeg opsega upućuju na postojanje konvencionalizacije, koja je istaknutija u prijevodima popularnoznanstvenog teksta, dok percepcije ispitanika/ispitanica također pokazuju značajnu ulogu u konvencionalizaciji. Ovim se istraživanje pružaju nova saznanja o hrvatskim prijevodima s engleskog jezika s obzirom na kolokacije i konvencionalizaciju te pokazuje da su prijevodne univerzalije još uvijek vrijedne istraživanja.

• Keywords: translation universals; conventionalisation; collocations; genre; English-Croatian language pair
• Keywords (croatian): prijevodne univerzalije; konvencionalizacija; kolokacije; žanr; englesko-hrvatski jezični par
• Language: english
• URN:NBN: urn:nbn:hr:131:043051
• Study programme: Title: English Language and Literature (double major); specializations in: Linguistics, Literature and Culture, Translation, TEFL; Course: Translation; Study programme type: university; Study level: graduate; Academic / professional title: magistar/magistra engleskog jezika i književnosti (magistar/magistra engleskog jezika i književnosti)
• Type of resource: Text
• File origin: Born digital
• Access conditions: Open access
• Created on: 2024-09-22 18:57:08