Linguistic Analysis of English into Arabic Translation of International Political Electronic News Related to the Middle East Crises in 2015

Abstract

The present thesis attempteda study and analysis of translated online news articles related to the crises of the Middle East as exemplified by selected examples taken from electronic news websites in 2015. The examples are analyzed using the linguistic model of the theorists Vinay and Darbelnet as being the most appropriate theoretical framework as model for such an analysis. The news articles selected for this thesis were taken from the following websites: BBC, CNN, Euronews, Skynews and France24. In chapter one, the significance of translation in all domains in general and in the media and press in particular is discussed. The vital role which translation plays in marketing and transferring news in different languages as an intercultural mediator is stated as well as the significance, objectives, and limitations of the study. In the theoretical part, Vinay and Darbelnet’s framework and their two types of translation strategies, namely direct and oblique translation strategies are presented in detail. Furthermore, the techniques of the direct translation strategy (borrowing, calque, and literal) as well as the techniques of the oblique translation strategy (transposition, modulation, equivalence, and adaptation) are tackled.

Chapter two presents literature review and sheds light on the importance of news translation particularly political news. The characteristics of political texts and political news translation problems were reviewed, and political euphemism definition and functions were also discussed. In chapters three, translated selected articles, in the CNN, BBC and Euro News are analyzed using direct translation procedures: borrowing, calque, and literal translation techniques. The examples showed that the borrowing technique was used in adopting proper names, cultural concepts, technological and scientific terms emerging as a result of the gap in the target language which is often metalinguistic one. Moreover, it can be used for preserving the linguistic and cultural local color of the source text with the intention of creating specific stylistic effects supporting the fact that Arabicization is more effective in dealing with the newly emerging technical and scientific terms. These borrowed forms function ideally in the usual grammatical processes, conform with traditional usage and become more morphologically convenient. Similarly, the calque technique fills a gap if the target language has no equivalent means of expression, and often regarded as highly productive linguistic mechanism for creating newly- introduced terms by coining them in the vocabulary of a language whereby to convey a new foreign concept. Also, the calque demonstrates the ability of the language to accommodate non-native concepts and modes of expression by allowing the source language meaning to be expressed through the use of the target language elements making the terms go natural. The last direct technique is the literal translation; and it is a default translation technique and an old part of the translation process itself. It is usually used in the linguistic context purposefully with an established idea that a translation should be a faithful representation of the source text contexts producing mechanical translation.