Article,
Culture in translation: The example of J.P. Clark's The Ozidi Saga
Babel: Revue internationale de la traduction/International Journal of Translation, (2007)
Abstract
This paper reviews the criticism of J.P. Clark's IjoûEnglish translation The Ozidi Saga and observes that no adequate investigation has been made of this work from a linguistic angle. It notes that culture-bound concepts constitute a problematic area in Clark's translation as a result of the difference in the culture sub-systems between Ijo and English. Specifically, elements of Ijo culture, namely natural objects, marriage system and maternity, art and dance, kinship terms and the notion of God have been inconsistently and sometimes unfaithfully translated as a result of the adoption of free translation. This gives a confusing or inaccurate impression of certain Ijo cultural traits to the reader of the English text.The paper recommends that culture-bound concepts can hardly be represented adequately through free translation and proposes that such concepts should either be left untranslated as loan words into the target language or given literal or loan translations and then be paraphrased in glossaries or annotations.
