Idioms, the interpretation and translation of idioms

Plan
I. Introduction……………………………………………………..3
II. The interpretation of idioms…………………………………...4-6
III. The translation of idioms:…………………………………….7-9
III.1. The strategies in the translation of idioms………………….9
III.1.1) Using an idiom of similar meaning and form…………….9-10
IV. Conclusions…………………………………………………...11
V. Bibliography…………………………………………………...12


I. Introduction.
No teacher can begin to implement the Lexical Approach without a clear understanding of lexis; this involves one important theoretical principle, but principally it means a clear view of the essential concepts of Collocation amd Expressions.
Every teacher is familiar with the difficulty when a student asks “Can you say…?” and you reply “Well, you could say that, but you wouldn’t”. The students asks “Why?”, only to receive the apparently unsatisfactory answer “It just doesn’t sound right”. However unsatisfactory that answer and lies at the very heart of a lexical understanding of language. A clear understanding of why this is so is indispensable for all language teachers; it is also helpful if learners themselves gradually develop an understanding of why it is that their apparently simple question receives such a see-mingly unhelpful answer. “You could, but you wouldn’t” could almost be a slogan for the lexical Approach. Why?
The single most fundamental principle of linguistics is the arbitrariness of the sign. The importance of this principle cannot be over-emphasized. A particular thing is called a pen in English, while another thing is called a book, but you cannot usefully ask why these particular words are used for these particular objects. What is conventionally called a pen could be called a book, but then that name would be unlikely to be used in the way we now use it for books, as too much confusion would almost certainly result. Homophones do occur – sole, soul – but the meanings are usually so widely separated that there is little danger of any misunderstanding in context. When they ask “What is the English for…?”, learners are usually content to record the word in their vocabulary notebook; they do not ask “Why is that the word for…?”. But when we consider multi-word items, the classroom becomes more difficult for the teacher unless she has truly internalized the concept of the arbitrariness of the sign. When learners ask why, teachers have an understandable desire and tendency to explain – but that leads to difficulties if the explanation is theoretically unsound.
All lexical items are arbitrary – they are simply the consensus of what has bun institutionalized, the agreed language which a particular group do use, selected from what they could use, actual language as apposed to theoretically possible language. Pat, pet, pit, pot and put are all English words, with totally different meanings; sat, set, sit, sot are also English words, but sut is not a standard item in the lexicon; it could be used as an English word, but it isn’t. Happy Christmas, Merry Christmas, Happy Birthday are all standard but Merry Birthday is not.
Many important linguistic phenomena are arbitrary, for example, irregular plurals (there is nothing wrong with childs but children is standard), or past tenses (went, but we could accept goed). Students frequently ask why the language behaves in a certain way, and are unhappy to be told English is like that, but unfortunately that is only accurate answer.


II. The interpretation of idioms.
Although most idioms resist variation in form, some are more flexible than others. For example, a BBC radio reporter once quoted a conference speaker as saying “There was to much buck passing” (Baker and McCarthy, 1988). The common form of the idiom is pass the buck (refuse to accept responsibility for something). And get, we would not expect to hear There was to much way giving for give way (,allow someone to do something you disapprove of’).
A person’s competence in actively using the idioms and fixed expressions of a foreign language cannot hope to achieve the same sensitivity that native speakers seem to have for judging when and how an idiom can be manipulated. This lends support to the argument that translators should only work into their language of habitual use or mother tongue. The Code of Professional Ethics of the Translators’ Guild of Great Britain states:
“A translator shall work only into the language (in exceptional cases this may include a second language) of which he has native knowledge. ,Native knowledge’ is defined as the ability to speak and write a language so fluently that the expression of thought is structurally, grammatically and idiomatically correct.
(quoted in News, 1981:278; my emphasis)
Assuming that a professional translator would, under normal circumstances, work only into his/her language of habitual use, the difficulties associated with being able to use idioms and fixed expressions correctly in a foreign language need not be addressed here. The main problems that idiomatic and fixed expressions pose in translation relate to too main areas: the ability to recognize and involved in rendering the various aspects of meaning that an idiom or a fixed expression conveys into the target language. These difficulties are much more pronounced in the case of idioms than they are in the case of fixed expressions.
As far as idioms are concerned, the first difficulty that a translator comes across is being able to recognize that she is dealing with an idiomatic expression. This is not always so obvious. There are various types of idioms, some more easily recognizable than others. Those which are easily recognizable include expressions which violate truth conditions, such as It’s raining cats and dogs, throw caution to the winds, storm in a tea cup, jump down someone’s throat and food for thought. They also include expressions which seem ill-formed because they do not follow the grammatical rules of the language, for example trip the light fantastic, blow someone to kingdom come, put paid to, the powers that be, by and large, and the world and his friend. Expressions which start with like (simile-like structures) also tend to suggest that they should not be interpreted literally. These include idioms such as like a bat out of hell and like water off a duck’s back. Generally speaking, the more difficult an expression is to understand and the less sense it makes in a given context, the more likely a translator will recognize it as an idiom. Because they do not make sense if interpreted literally, the highlighted expressions in the following text are easy to recognize as idioms (assuming one is not already familiar with them):
His can only be done, I believe, by a full and frank airing of the issues. I urge you all to speak your minds and not to pull any punches.
(Language and Society, No14 (1985), p.6)
Provided a translator has access to good reference works and monolingual dictionaries of idioms, or, better still, is able to consult native speakers of the language, opaque idioms which do not make sense for one reason or another can actually be a blessing in disguise. The very fact that she cannot make sense of an expression in a particular context will alert the translator to the presence of an idiom of some sort.
There are two cases in which an idiom can be easily misinterpreted is one is not already familiar with it.
(a) Some idioms are, misleading’, they seem transparent because they offer a reasonable literal interpretation and their idiomatic meanings are not necessarily signaled in the surrounding text. A large number of idioms in English, and probably all languages, have both a literal and an idiomatic meaning, for example go out with (,have a romantic or sexual relationship with someone’) and take someone for a ride (,deceive or cheat someone in some way’). Such idioms lend themselves easily to manipulation by speakers and writers who will sometimes play on both their literal and idiomatic meanings. In this case, a translator who is not familiar with the idiom in question may easily accept the literal interpretation and miss the play on idiom. The following example illustrates how easy it is to accept a literal interpretation that seems plausible in a given context. The text from which the extract is taken is quoted in the Translators Guild Newsletter (vol. X, January 1985, 1).
This is an extract from a highly idiomatic passage of Citizen Band (CB) Radio special, trucking talk. Rubber duck is the first trucker in a convoy, grandma lane is the slow lane, and pitstop refers to services or a place where one stops for a rest. In the content of trucks, motorways, and stopping at a services station, a literal interpretation of drain the radiator seems highly plausible. It is, however, a special idiom used by CB driuers and means, to urinate; use the toilet’.
(b) An idiom in the source language may have a very close counterpart in the target language which looks similar on the surface but has a totally or partially different meaning. For example, the idiomatic question Has the cat had/got your tongue? Is used in English to urge someone to answer a question or contribute to a conversation, particularly when they failure to do so becomes annoying. A similar expression is used in French with a totally different meaning: donner sa langue au chat (,to give one’s tongue to the cat’), meaning to give up, for example when asked a riddle. To pull someone’s leg, meaning to tell someone something untrue as a Toke in order to shock them temporarily and amuse them when they find out later that it was a Toke, is identical on the surface to the idiom yishab iylu (,pull his leg’) which is used in several Arabic dialects to mean tricking someone into talking about something she would have rather kept secret. In French, a similar expression: Airer la jamble (,pull the leg’) means to drag one’s steps. Instances of superficially identical or similar idioms which have different meanings in the source and target languages lay easy traps for the unwary translator who is not familiar with the source – language idiom and who may be tempted simply to impose a target-language interpretation on it.
Apart from being alert to the way speakers and writers manipulate certain features of idioms and to the possible confusion which could arise from similarities in form between source and target expressions, a translator must also consider the collocational environment which surrounds any expression whose meaning is not readily accessible. Idiomatic and fixed expressions have individual collocational patterns. They form collocations with other items in the text as single units and enter into lexical sets which are different from those of their individual words. Jake, for instance, the idiom to have cold feet. Cold as a separate item may collocate with words like weather, writer, feel, or country Jeet on its own will perhaps collocate with socks, chilblain, smelly, etc. However having cold feet, in its idiomatic use, has nothing necessarily to do with winter, feet, or chilblains and will therefore generally be used with a different set of collocates.
The ability to distinguish senses by collocation is an invaluable asset to a translator working from a foreign language. It is often subsumed under the general umbrella of, relying on the context to disambiguate meanings, which, among other things, means using our knowledge of collocational patterns to decode the meaning of a word or a stretch of language. Using our knowledge of collocational patterns may not always tell us what an idiom means but it could easily help us in many cases to recognize an idiom, particularly one which has a literal as well as non-literal meaning.


III. The translation of idioms.
Once an idiom or fixed expression has been recognized and interpreted correctly, the next step is to decide how to translate it into the target language. The difficulties involved in translating an idiom are totally different from those involved in interpreting it. Here, the question is not wether a given idiom is transparent, opaque, or misleading. An opaque expression may be easier to translate than a transparent one. The main difficulties involved in translating idioms and fixed expressions may be summarized as follows:
(a) An idiom or fixed expression may have no equivalent in the target language. The way a language chooses to express, or not express, various meanings cannot be predicted and only occasionally matches the way another language chooses to express the same meanings. One language may express a given meaning by means of a single word, another may express it by means of a transparent fixed expression, a third may express it by means of an idiom, and so on. It is therefore unrealistic to expect to find equivalent idioms and expressions in the target language as a matter of course.
Like single words, idioms and fixed expressions may be culture-specific. Formulae such as Merry Christmas and say when which relate to specific social or religions occasions provide good examples. Basnett-McGuire (1980:21) explains that the expression say when ,is … directly linked to English social behavioral patterns’ and suggests that ,the translator putting the phrase into French or German has to contend with the problem of the non-existence of a similar convention in either TL culture’. Less problematic, but to some extent also culture-specific, are the sort of fixed formulae that are used in formal correspondence, such as Yours faithfully and Yours sincerely in English. These, for instance, have no equivalents in Arabic formal correspondence. Instead, an expression such as watafadaly biqbuul fa’ig al-ihtiraam (literally:, and be kind enough to accept [our] highest respects’) is often used, but it bears no direct relationship to Yours faithfulle or Yours sincerely. The same mismatch occurs in relation to French and several other languages.
Idioms and fixed expressions which contain culture – specific items are not necessarily untranslatable. It is not the specific items an expression contain but rather the meaning it conveys and its association with culture – specific context which can make it untranslatable or difficult to translate. For example, the English expression to carry coals to Newcastle, though culture – specific in the sense that it contains a reference to Newcastle coal and uses it as a measure of abundance, is nevertheless closely paralleled in German by Eulennach Athen tragen (,to carry owls to Athens’). Both expressions convey the same meaning, namely: to supply something to someone who already has plenty of it (Geauberg, 1989). In French, the same meaning can be rendered by the expression porter de l’eau a la riviere, to carry water to the river’. Palmer (1976) explains that in Welsh it rains ,old women and sticks’ rather than ,cats and dogs’, and yet both expressions mean the same thing.
(b) An idiom of fixed expression may have a similar counterpart in the target language, but its context of use may be different; the two expressions may have different connotations, for instance, or they may not be pragmatically transferable. To sing a different tune is an English idiom which means to say or do something that signals a change in opinion because it contradicts what one has said or done before. In Chinese, chang-dui-tairi (,to sing different tunes/to sing a duet’) also normally refers to contradictory points of view, but has quite a different usage. It has strong political connotations and can, in certain context, be interpreted as expressing complementary rather then contradictory points of view.
To go to the dogs (,to lose one’s good qualities’) has a similar counterpart in German, but whereas the English idiom can be used in connection with a person or a place, its German counterpart can only be used in connection with a person and often means to die or perish. Fernando and Flauell (1981) compare to skate on thin ice (,to act unsurely or count danger voluntarily’) with a similar Serbian expression: navuci nekoda na tanak led (,to pull someone onto the thin ice’). The Serbian idiom differs from the English one in that is forcing someone into a dangerous position. Though similar in meaning, the contexts in which the two idioms can be used are obviously different.
(c) An idiom may be used in the source text in both its literal and idiomatic senses at the same time. Unless the target-language idiom corresponds to the source-language idiom both in form and in meaning, the play on idiom cannot be successfully reproduced in the target text. The following extract is from a passage which constituted part of the British Translators’ Guild Intermediate Examinations for all languages (1986):
“In creating Lord Peter Wimsey, Dorothy L Sayers demonstrated all the advantages of the amateur private eye. As a wealthy dilettante he was able to pursue the clues without the boring necessity of earning a living. His title as the younger son of a duke pandered to reader snobbery and to the obsessive fascination of some readers with the lifestyle of the aristocracy, or with what they imagined that lifestyle to be. He had sufficient influence to be able to poke his nose into the private affairs of others where less aristocratic noses might have been speedily bloodied”.
The above play on idiom can only be reproduced in language such as French or German which happen to have an identical idiom or at least an idiom which refers to interfering in other people’s affairs and which has the equivalent of nose in it.
Another example comes from Arab Political Humour by Rishtainy (1985). Although this book was originally written in English, the writer quotes Tokes and anecdotes of Arab origin, so that English is in fact the target language here. The following Toke emerged after the defeat of the Arab forces in 1967, which resulted in the annexation of Arab territory by Israel:
“Egypt’s Commander-in-Chief, Field Marshal Amin, was horrified to see President hasser ordering a tattoo artist to print on his right arm the names of all the Territories seized by Israel like Sinai, Gaza, Sharm al-Shaykh, Jerusalem, the Golan Heights.
“Why are you doing this?”
“Lest I should forget them.”
“But why tattooed? What will you do if we get them back?”
“If we get them back I’ll cut off my right arm.”
(Rishtainy, 1985:157-8; my emphasis)
Unless you are an Arab speaker, you wild fine it difficult to appreciate the humour of the above passage, which relies totally on the manipulation of literal and idiomatic meanings. To cut off one’s arm, or cut off one’s right arm for emphasis, is an idiom which is similar in meaning to pigs might fly in English. It means that something is impossible or at least highly unlikely to happen. Neither this English expression nor any other English idiom with a similar meaning can be used to replace “I’ll cut off my right arm” in the above passage, because the literal meaning of the Arabic expression is as important as its idiomatic meaning in this context. The literal translation that the author gives above is just as ineffective since the non-Arab reader has no access to the idiomatic meaning. This book was translated into Arabic by Al-Yaziji in 1988, not surprisingly, the Tokes work much in the Arabic version.
III.1. The strategies in the translation of idioms.
The way in which an idiom or a fixed expression can be translated into another language depends on many factors. It is not only a question of whether an idiom with a similar meaning is available in the target language. Other factors include, for example, the significance of the specific lexical items which constitute the idiom, i.e. whether they are manipulated elsewhere in the source text, as well as the appropriateness or inappropriateness of using idiomatic language in a given register in the target language. The acceptability or non-acceptability of using any of the strategies described below will therefore depend on the context in which a given idiom is translated. The first strategy described, that of finding an idiom of similar meaning and similar form in the target language, may seem to offer the ideal solution, but that is not necessarily always the case. Questions of style, register, and rhetorical effect must also be taken into consideration. Fernando and Flavell are correct in warning us against the ,strong unconscious urge in most translators to search hard for an idiom in the receptor-language, however inappropriate it may be’. (1981:82)
III.1.1) Using an idiom of similar meaning and form.
This strategy involves using an idiom in the target language which conveys roughly the same meaning as that of the source-language idiom and, in addition, consists of equivalent lexical items. This kind of match can only occasionally be achieved.
Example A.
Source text (A Hero from Zero, p.21):
“The Sultan’s magnificent income was distributed impulsively at his command. The rain fell on the just and on the unjust.
Target text (French, p.21):
“Le revenue fabuleux du Sultan etait distribute sur un simple orolre de sa part. La pluie tombait aussi bien sur les justes que sur les injustes.
Back-translation:
The fantastic income of the Sultan was distributed on a simple order on his part.
The rain was falling on the just as well as on the unjust.
Example B.
Source text (Language and Society, No.16 (1985), p7):
“Five days into what would be the final clash, Pawley ried to force Speaker Jim Walding’s hand into calling a vote with or without the Tories.
Target text (French, p.7):
Au cenquieme jour de ce qui allait se reveler l’affronrement final, M.Pawley tenta de forcer la main au president de la chambue Jim Walding pour qu’il decrete une mise aux voix, avee au sans la participation des conservateurs.
Back translation:
On the fifth day of what was going to prove to be the final confrontation, Mr.Pawley tried to force the hand of the president of the Chamber, Jim Walding, to declare a placement of the vote, with or without the participation of the conservatives.


IV. Conclusions:
In this work I have come to the following conclusions:
1. There are various types of idioms, some more easily recognizable than others. Those which are easily recognizable include expressions which violate truth conditions. They also include expressions which seem ill-formed because they do not follow the grammatical rules of the language.
2. The first difficulty that a translator comes across is being with an idiomatic expression. Generally speaking, the more difficult an expression is to understand and the less sense it makes in a given context, the more difficult an expression is to understand and the less sense it makes in a given context, the more likely a translator will recognize it as an idiom. Because they do not make sense of interpreted literally, the high-lighted expressions in the following text are easy to recognize as idioms.
3. The way in which an idiom can be translated into another language depends on many factors. It is not only a question on many factors. It is not only a question of whether an idiom with a similar meaning is available in the target language. Other factors include, for example, the significance of the specific lexical items which constitute the idiom, i.e. whether they are manipulated elsewhere in the source text as well as the appropriateness or inappropriateness of using idiomatic language in a given register in the target language.


V. Bibliography:
Bednard Spolsky “Meansured words”, Oxford University Press.
V.Kuznetsova “Notes on English Lexicology”, Київ «Радянська школа», 1966.
Nona Baker “In other words. A coursbook on translation”, London and New York.
N.M.Rayevska “English Lexicology”, Київ «Вища школа», 1979.
A.A.Sankin, R.S.Ginzburg, S.S.Khidekel, G,Y.Knyzeva “A Course in Modern English Lexicology”, Moscow “Higher School Publishing House”, 1966.
И.В.Арнольд “The English Word”, Москва «Высшая школа», 1973.
Н.М.Раєвська “English Lexicology”, Київ 1971.
С.С.Хидекель, Р.З.Гимзбург, Г.Ю.Князева, А.А.Санкин «Английская лексикология в выдержках и извлечениях», Ленинград «Просвещение» 1969.

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