Explication Of Implicatures In The Persian Translation Of Barack Obama’s Selected Speeches
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Date
2015-10
Authors
SANATIFAR, MOHAMMAD SALEH
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Abstract
Translating texts / discourses that contain ample implicatures such as political
speech is one of the most provoking aspects of translation. The reason is that the
translator cannot confidently decide if uncovering implicatures in the translation of such
texts / discourses makes it more relevant to the target readers, to follow Gutt, or makes
it less relevant by putting an extra burden of mental processing on them, to follow
Gutt’s critics. The related literature widely supports the former; however, few empirical
studies support it. This thesis is a cognitive step forward in this area. It seeks to examine
if ‘explication’ in Persian translation of implicatures intended by Obama in his political
speeches would make translation more ‘relevant’ to the Iranians, as the target readers,
and reduce their mental processing demand. Furthermore, the thesis seeks to examine
how the initial cognitive level of the Iranians affect the degree of relevance and finally
what module of translation, non-explicated or explicated, is more acceptable to them.
Sperber and Wilson’s (1986) relevance theory, as an ostensive-inferential theory of
pragmatics and particularly implicatures, combined with Gutt’s application of relevance
theory to translation and van Dijk’s cognitive account of relevance in political discourse
form the theoretical and the analytical model of this research. Methodologically, the
research is of a causal nature and draws on a quantitative-qualitative design to answer
two quantitative and two qualitative research questions. The textual corpus of the study
consists of a selection of Barack Obama’s political speeches delivered between the
years 2008 to 2013. A number of 373 Iranians, as the target population of the study, are
selected and surveyed for their opinions on the ‘degree of explicitness’ before and after
the ‘explication’ of implicatures in a questionnaire. Analysis of the data and the findings
in the first place affirm the applicability of relevance theory in identification of political
implicatures. Second, the findings reveal that ‘explication’, if fulfilled appropriately by
political experts, significantly enhances the ‘relevance’ of translation to the target
readers. It is further shown that explication is an ‘ongoing’ relevance-enhancing
mechanism which stops automatically where the target readers meet the expectation of
relevance. Third, the study concludes a normative relationship between ‘explication’
and ‘acceptability’ in translation of political implicatures. Fourth, through a more indepth
interview and based on the results, the study extracts nine categories and explains
the most possible reasons for the target readers’ reflections in the survey. In this thesis,
the crucial role of ‘cognition’ in pragmatic translation is highlighted, and it is revealed
that translation is truly a triad cognitive interaction between the communicator, the
translator and the receptor.
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Keywords
Explication Of Implicatures In The Persian Translation , Of Barack Obama’s Selected Speeches