Abstracts
Abstract
This essay represents a preliminary attempt to devise a method for examining words and their apparently equivalent translations as they appear in the news media. Taking Walter Benjamin’s essay on the task of the translator as a starting point and drawing on Edmund Husserl’s phenomenology and Antoine Culioli’s and Paul Laurendeau’s enunciative linguistics, the author argues that this appearance of equivalence is deceptive, for at least two reasons: first, because differing, culturally specific assumptions underlie the interpretations of these words and their translations; and second, because as the implications of these words and their translations are reported upon and contested (by political actors, by reporters, by editorialists), their meanings effectively change.
Keywords/Mots-Clés:
- news media,
- translator’s task,
- phenomenology,
- enunciative linguistics
Résumé
Cet essai représente une tentative préliminaire de formuler une approche pour examiner des mots et leurs traductions qui sont employés dans les médias journalistiques et qui, selon toute apparence, sont équivalents. En prenant comme point de départ l’essai sur la tâche du traducteur de Walter Benjamin et en se servant de la phénoménologie d’Edmund Husserl et de la linguistique énonciative d’Antoine Culioli et de Paul Laurendeau, l’auteur soutient que cette équivalence apparente est trompeuse, et ce pour au moins deux raisons : d’abord parce que des présuppositions culturelles différentes sous-tendent l’interprétation de ces mots et de leurs traductions; ensuite au fur et à mesure que les implications de ces mots et de leurs traductions sont transmises et contestées (par des acteurs politiques, des reporters, des équipes de rédaction), leurs sens sont en fait transformés.
Download the article in PDF to read it.
Download
Appendices
References
- ABDEL-HAFIZ, A.-S. (2002): “Translating English Journalistic Texts into Arabic: Examples from the Arabic Version of Newsweek”, International Journal of Translation 14-1, p. 79-103.
- AL-AMRI, W. (2002): “Semiotics, Translation and the Press”, doctoral dissertation, University of Manchester Institute of Science and Technology.
- ANDERS, G. (1999): “The Crucible”, American Journalism Review, p. 22-31.
- ANDERS, G. (2000): “Talking the Talk”, American Journalism Review 53, p. 30-36.
- BAKHTIN, M.M. (1981): “Discourse in the Novel”, in HOLQUIST, M. (ed.): The Dialogic Imagination, translated by EMERSON, C. and M. HOLQUIST, Austin, University of Texas Press, p. 259-422.
- BAKHTIN, M.M. (1986): “From Notes Made in 1970-71”, in EMERSON, C. and M. HOLQUIST (eds.): Speech Genres and Other Late Essays, translated by MCGEE, V. W., Austin, University of Texas Press, p. 132-158.
- BECKERMAN, G. (2004): “In Their Skin”, Columbia Journalism Review, p. 40-43.
- BENJAMIN, W. (1997): “The Translator’s Task”, translated by RENDALL, S., TTR: traduction, terminologie, rédaction 10-2, p. 151-165.
- BJØRGE, A. K. (2003): “The Explicitation of Proper Names in Expository News Texts”, International Journal of Applied Linguistics 13-1, p. 115-138.
- CONWAY, K. (2002-2003): « Les Interprétations multiples de société distincte lors de l’accord Meech: une lecture du Toronto Star et de La Presse de Montréal », Journal of Canadian Studies 37-4, p. 112-130.
- CULIOLI, A. (1981): « Sur le concept de notion », Bulletin de linguistique générale et appliquée 8, p. 62-79.
- CULIOLI, A. (1995): Cognition and Representation in Linguistic Theory, in LIDDLE, M. (ed.): translated by STONHAM, J., Philadelphia, John Benjamins.
- DE MAN, P. (1986): “Conclusions: Walter Benjamin’s ’The Task of the Translator’”, in The Resistance to Theory, Minneapolis, University of Minnesota Press, p. 73-105.
- DE MICHIEL, M. (1999): “Mikhail M. Bakhtin: Prolegomena to a Theory of Translation”, European Journal for Semiotic Studies 11-4, p. 687-698.
- EL-NAWAWY, M. and A. ISKANDAR (2003): Al-Jazeera: The Story of the Network That Is Rattling Governments and Redefining Modern Journalism, updated ed., Cambridge (MA), Westview Press.
- EMERSON, C. (1983): “Translating Bakhtin: Does His Theory of Discourse Contain a Theory of Translation? ”, Revue de l’université d’Ottawa 53-1, p. 23-33.
- FISETTE, D. (2000): « Husserl et la logique des signes », Recherches sémiotiques 20-1/2/3, p. 145-185.
- HUSSERL, E. (1970): The Crisis of European Sciences and Transcendental Phenomenology, translated by CARR, D., Evanston (IL), Northwestern University Press.
- LAURENDEAU, P. (1997): « De la ‘déformabilité’ des notions en discours », Langage et Société 82, p. 27-47.
- LEVENSON, J. (2004): “The War on What, Exactly?”, Columbia Journalism Review, p. 9-11.
- MICHAUD, G. (1998): « La Mémoire des mots: une lecture de l’accent dans quelques textes de Jacques Ferron », Recherches sémiotiques 18-1/2, p. 81-100.
- SAID, E. (2000): “Islam as News”, in BAYOUMI, M. and A. RUBIN (eds.): The Edward Said Reader, New York, Vintage Books, p. 169-194.
- STEINER, G. (1998): “The Hermeneutic Motion”, in After Babel: Aspects of Language and Translation, 3rd ed., New York, Oxford University Press, p. 312-435.
- WILKE, J. and B. ROSENBERGER (1994): “Importing Foreign News: A Case Study of the German Service of the Associated Press”, Journalism Quarterly 71-2, p. 421-432.