Serving Two Masters: Determining the Difference between a Translator and a Bilingual
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2013
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Swarthmore College. Dept. of Linguistics
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Thesis (B.A.)
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Abstract
Wei (2007) claims that natural bilinguals have difficulty translating. This paper explores
the reasons for this difficulty by comparing the demands placed on translators with the day-today
experiences of being bilingual. According to Romaine (1989) and De Bot (1992), bilinguals
are not typically required to keep their speech free of influence from other languages they speak,
and can mix elements from various languages unconsciously. Like monolinguals, bilinguals
produce their language automatically, as described by Levelt (1989). Translators, however, work
for an audience that has a low tolerance for deviations from the monolingual norm. This external
pressure causes translators to monitor their speech production more closely, which they are able
to do because translation does not require speech to be produced in real time. The present work
covers translation, not interpretation - work with written texts, not speech. Taking examples of
translations and mistranslations from Russian, Chinese, and English, I will outline the forms of
interference often faced by translators in terms of morpho syntactic structure and lexical items.
By choosing translation examples that are as unambiguous as possible, I will intentionally avoid
many of the traditional concerns of translation theory, such as audience and authorial intent.
Functional structures from Lexical-Functional Grammar are provided for sentential examples to
illustrate in a formal, organized way how a good translation keeps meaning and grammatical
relations constant and faithful during the transfer from one language to another. The conclusions
of this paper will aid aspiring translators in understanding the demands of translation and any
.. 1 necessary trammg.