Cultural Equivalent Effect

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It has been frequently said that the translation’s ultimate purpose is to evoke the same effect on the target readership as was received by the readership of the original. That principle is called equivalent effect, Nida named it dynamic equivalence. From Newmark’s (1988: 48) point of view it is more result than the aim of translation that might stumble upon certain constraints:
- ‘If the purpose of the SL text is to affect and the TL translation is to inform (of vice versa); - if there is a pronounced cultural gap between the SL and the TL text’ (Newmark (1988:
48).
Additionally, Nida divides texts on the basis of the translator’s desire to achieve equivalent effect. For instance in communicative translation the equivalent effect is essential, …show more content…

Equivalent effect seems to be a complex concept which can be applied to different types of texts in a certain degree. In audiovisual translation, which is going to be the subject later on, equivalent effect plays a very important role and is essential to be achieved in order to produce the same response in target audience as it does in source audience.
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1.1.4. Cultural equivalence
Cultural equivalence appears to be another applicable concept to be explained, as it is strongly connected to intertextuality, the main topic of this paper. When talking of cultural equivalence one cannot omit the notion of ‘untranslatability’. According to Bassnett (1980:38) such an issue occurs because ‘sameness cannot exist between two languages’. She claims that it is particularly visible when the translator is faced with some terms or concepts existing only in one language or culture. Bassnett, to prove that, also displays certain examples of those differences, like: ‘The large number of terms in Finnish for variations of snow, in Arabic for aspects of camel behaviour, in English for light and water, in French for types of bread.’
(Bassnett 1980:38)
Catford claims that boundaries between translatability and untranslatability are rather fuzzy, …show more content…

Catford distinguishes two types of untranslatability – linguistic and cultural. ‘In linguistic untranslatability the functionally relevant features include some which are in fact formal features of the language of the SL text. If the TL has no formally corresponding feature, the text, or the item, is (relatively) untranslatable’(1965: 94). As far as cultural untranslatability is concerned ‘what appears to be a quite different problem arises, however, when a situational feature, functionally relevant for the SL text, is completely absent in the culture of which the
TL is a part’(Catford 1965: 99) .
Newmark (1988: 83) wrote that it is possible to find the closest equivalent, but impossible to fully translate cultural phrases. He claimed that:
“Their translation uses are limited, since they are not accurate, but they can be used in general texts, publicity and propaganda, as well as for brief explanation to readers who are ignorant of the relevant
SL culture. They have a greater pragmatic impact than culturally neutral terms. Occasionally,

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