Brevik's Interpretation Of Metaphors

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Translation studies as a discipline has been greatly concerned with metaphors especially with respect to their translatability and transfer methods. Linguists have argued that the translation of metaphors can be greatly problematic, since rendering them from one language and culture to another may be hampered by linguistic and cultural differences.

Brevik (2008) explains accurately that “there are several problems related to translating metaphors, the most obvious being, as Dagut(1976:24) points out that ‘since a metaphor in the SL is, by definition, a semantic novelty, it can clearly have no existing “equivalence” in TL’”. She also quotes from Lomheim (1995:132-134), saying that “‘striking metaphors in SL can only be translated equivalently …show more content…

She stresses the reason why metaphors are so difficult to translate by stating that “most words in a language have absorbed cultural aspects and historical experiences”.
According to the previous lines, we can summarize that the difficulty of translating metaphors lies in their “culture-bound” (Brevik:2008) aspect. To illustrate that point, Brevik (2008) gives the example of Anderman (2002)” ‘even the metaphor The world is my oyster, made more or less universal by William Shakespeare, may be difficult to understand in a community which does not have oysters. At other times, the same metaphor might exist with small cultural amendments. In England, pigs can fly; in Spain, donkeys can’”.
It is crystal clear that the only challenge posed by metaphors in finding the appropriate equivalent that has the same effect as the original. Despoina,P (2013) commented that “The concept of equivalence can be said to hold a central position in translation studies. Nevertheless, it has been a rather controversial one, causing many heated debates among translators as to its nature, definition and applicability… The most influential equivalence theories have been proposed by scholars in the field, such as Vinay and Darbelnet (1958), Jakobson (1959), Nida and Taber (1969), Catford (1965), House (1997), Koller (1979), Newmark (1981), Baker (1992), Pym (2010) ... It is concluded that the usefulness …show more content…

Linguists afterwards, criticized this view of equivalence because it assumes that all languages are identical while it is known that Arabic and English (for instance) are both linguistically and culturally incompatible.
In the same regard, Nida maintains that there are two basic types of equivalence: (1) formal equivalence and (2) dynamic equivalence. In particular, Nida argues that in formal equivalence the TT resembles very much the ST in both form and content whereas in dynamic equivalence an effort is made to convey the ST message in the TL as naturally as possible. It could be argued that Nida is in favor of dynamic equivalence since he considers it to be a more effective translation procedure. Nida‟s preference is more clearly stated in Nida and Taber‟s edition (1969) since it is argued that dynamic equivalence in translation goes beyond correct communication of information.
Reinforcing that, Jaber, I.N (2010) says “Nida, a translator of the Bible, favored the dynamic equivalence (a translation principle according to which a translator seeks to translate the meaning of the original in such a way that the TL wording will trigger the same impact on the TT audience as the original wording did upon the ST audience (Leonardi 2000:

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