Elisabeth De Campos

The Practice of Specialized Translation: A Case Study of an Academic Certificate

Abstract This essay tries to affirm that an academic certificate being a specialized text requires expertise for it to be properly and accurately translated into another language. The translation needs care and good understanding of linguistic, technical and educational issues. Using certificates from Anglophone and Francophone countries, the essay demonstrates how and why the translation should recourse the parallel texts and a mastery of the educational system of given national contexts. Besides the stereotyped language and expressions with their peculiar technical term that feature in certificates, formal and grammatical styles should be mastered. In sum, translation of certificate is not the business of just any bilingual. Keywords: Specialized texts, Academic certificates, parallel texts, translation, grammatical constructions, style, language. Introduction Official documents such as academic certificates are among the most often translated specialized texts because of their extensive public usefulness. They are classified as legal texts Źrałka (2007:76) for at least two reasons. First, they are used for matters connected with law, like proving a subject’s genuine ownership of the certificate or diploma and are prepared most often in the form of sworn translations. Second, they share many typical formal characteristics of other legal documents and, at the same time, specialized texts.

The concise construction of an academic certificate gives a teacher an opportunity to show many typical features of legal texts to future translators in a clear way. That is why it was chosen as a sample to be analysed in this essay. Another motivating factor for this paper is the absence or near absence of articles on this subject in Nigeria in spite of the fact that translations of certificates are widespread due to the presence of many Francophone individuals or even Nigerians with francophone background seeking to attend higher institutions in Nigeria after attaining a certain level of education in Francophone countries. The aim of the article is not only to show the characteristics of academic certificates in French and English, but also to use this comparison to present consecutive steps in the translation process.

CONTEXT: Journal of Social & Cultural Studies, Volume 12, Number 2, December 2009, Pp 10 – 19. ISSN 1119 – 9229. http://contextjournal.wordpress.com/

The Practice of Specialized Translation 11

The primary concern of the essay is to provide guidance for teachers, students and bilingual international workers in their certificate translation tasks. It should be emphasized that correct translation of certificates is crucial as their right or wrong translation could have grave consequences for the individual and the institution in need of it. A candidate could be admitted inappropriately for a study on the basis of a wrong translation, thereby undermining the standard and perhaps the integrity of the institution. On the other hand, a candidate, too, may be wrongly denied the opportunity of the position he or she is qualified for. Criteria for pre-translation text The very first piece of advice the teacher should give the students ahead of any translation process is to identify elements of a particular source text, which seem to be of fundamental significance to the translation of the text. Such identification, through the process of source text analysis, gives the translator an opportunity to produce the best possible translation, as most pitfalls to avoid can be highlighted in that way. In the case of a nonliterary text which surpasses a mere intellectual or academic exercise, the translation requires strict precision to keep the one and only proper meaning of the original message. There will therefore be the need to search for and identify specific translation patterns. A common and very effective method is for the teacher to use parallel texts and call the attention of students to identify the stereotyped similarities and differences.

To give the students an idea of what a specialized text is, the first step the teacher should take is to have the students search for elements that are characteristic of the specialized texts in particular languages and subjects and thus would be particularly important for translation. The students are to situate the passage in the appropriate context as they search for those elements. In translating scientific texts, the students are supposed to carry out a research into basic theories of science. If the text is from literature, the students are supposed to be at home with some literary devices and figurative expressions. An engineering or technological text requires, on the students’ side, a thorough mastery of technology terms. Such knowledge is possible through extensive study and the use of good dictionaries. The teacher may help students find needed clues for constructive analyses in definitions and characteristics of specialized texts given by different authors. On the basis of the definitions presented in the literature that the students have at their disposal, they can build up their knowledge on the issue and try to find the important features in a given text.

Through the literature study, the students will learn that specialized texts use a special kind of language. Such a language of specialized knowledge (in English often referred to as LSP – language for special purposes) has its own technical lexicon, the fundamentals of which are a particular system of terminology, and specific rules of introducing terminological units into a text, namely its own cognitive syntax. The syntax of specialized texts should serve as a means to obtain clarity, univocal character and precision of thought.

12 De Campose As for the terminology, it is always based on specific terms, relevant to a

particular field. In general, a term is one word or a few words taken together, an abbreviation, or combination of (a) word(s) and symbol(s) that express different notions. Sufficient frequency of using a lexical unit in relation to a given notion has a decisive role in constituting a term. Terms are not charged emotionally. That is why diminutive or augmentative suffixes are not typical of specialized vocabulary in languages in which they are generally accepted. Multi-word and international terms (often with Greek or Latin roots), the same as neologisms, are also used.

As for the importance of terms in specialized texts, opinions are divided. Newmark states (2004: 5) that “terms usually consist of not more than 5% of the text’s vocabulary”. But, according to Arsentyeva (2003: 170-171); terms constitute 20-30% of the whole vocabulary of such texts […]. Terms generally tend to be used in their primary logical meaning, as they indicate with precision a particular scientific concept and particular objects. Hence no problem of polysemy arises (with only some exceptions). Neutral words constitute the majority of the vocabulary of scientific style (60-70%) with some proportion of common literary vocabulary, including such learned words as: approximately, respectively, indicate, in consequences of, etc. (about 10%). Academic science and technology are also characterized by a high degree of nominalization, which finds its expression in the abundant use of nominal groups. Nominalisation of scientific texts may be explained as the predominance of nouns and adjectives over verbs and adverbs and prepositions over conjunctions (Górnicz 2003:115). The following attestation of success corroborates this idea: UNIVERSITE DE KARA Présidence Secrétariat Général Direction des Affaires Académique, de la Scolarité De la Recherche Scientifique ATTESTATION DE REUSSITE Le Secrétaire Général de l’Université de Kara, soussigné, atteste que Monsieur BOUROUNA Bialabana, étudiant de nationalité Togolaise, né le 03 Juin 1975 à Soumdina haut, a été déclaré admis à la licence de Géographie à la faculté des Lettres et Sciences Humaines (FLESH), session de septembre 2006 avec la mention passable. En foi de quoi, la présente attestation lui est délivrée pour servir et valoir ce que de droit. English version UNIVERSITY OF KARA OFFICE OF THE PRESIDENT

The Practice of Specialized Translation 13GENERAL SECRETARIAT Directorate of Academic Affairs Studies and Scientific Research ATTESTATION OF SUCCESS The General Secretary of the University of Kara, undersigned, certifies that Mr. BOUROUNA Bialabana, student of Togolese nationality, born on 3 June, 1975 at Upper Soumdina, has been declared admitted into the Bachelor degree in Geography in the Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences in the session of September, 2006 with a pass grade. This attestation is issued to enable the holder enjoy every right attached to it. The supremacy of nouns over the verbs can be observed in the certificate just translated. Only few verbs were used.

An important feature of specialized texts is creating overt meanings of text units without undertones (lack of polysemy), realised through consistent repetitions of once used terms, which always refer to the same notions. Another major characteristic of certificates is their syntactic conciseness, often resulting in the introduction into a text of a symbol rather than terms repeated in extenso. A typical feature of specialized texts is the extensive use of some grammatical structures, such as the passive voice with the verbs: suppose, assume, conclude, infer etc. (Arsentyeva 2003:171). This is frequent in both French and English Languages e.g. in our attestation we have (a été déclaré admis = has been declared admitted; est délivrée = is issued). It reflects the impersonal style of specialized texts. Participle structures, the use of the third person singular or plural, frequent performatives, such as: declare, confirm, commit, or consent verbs, like: permit and authorize are typical of legal texts especially. The same is true of the extensive use of modal verbs characteristic of contracts, as they regulate obligations, rights and prohibitions. On the other hand, some grammatical constructions, like imperatives, are not typical of specialized texts.

The layout of specialized texts is always made in units. Such text division is most characteristic of the so-called codified texts (e.g. a contract of employment, business contract, medical diagnosis, petition etc.), among which an academic certificate should also be placed. Codified texts are characterized by an officially stated and organised structure of their components. (See Zmarzer 2003:28). Each component is obligatory. Such components give the text the status of an official document and, at the same time, introduce the contents through the accepted vocabulary.

A specialized language will be recognized in the scientific-technological style, mainly because of its professionally restricted range of vocabulary. But the language will be specialized not only because of the lexical layer, but also because of syntactic elements or grammatical constructions mentioned, characteristic of scientific style. On the basis of the enumerated characteristics, elicited from the students in the didactic process, they should come to the conclusion that the parallel text analyses should be performed according to the following criteria: • layout (text division, content of information, formulas),

14 De Campose • vocabulary (terminology, morphological features of typical vocabulary), • grammar (typical grammatical structures, syntax), • register (vocabulary and grammatical constructions used, communication strategies, overall – the stylistic features). Analysis of parallel texts as a source of information on their patterns and common features Having discussed what criteria are relevant for analyses of specialized texts like certificates, the next step to take with the students should be carrying out the best possible analyses of both – a source text and a parallel text in a language into which we want to translate. The effect of those analyses will be the discovery of a set of features common for both texts, which can be used as the model for an adequate translation.

Comparing a French academic certificate, a standardised document entitled “Attestation de réussite” and an English academic certificate (from the University of Ibadan, Ibadan, Nigeria); the students should easily notice that, as far as the layout is concerned, they are quite similar in the aspect of the division of the texts into units by the data within them, using different sections of statement, bold font, capital letters, logos. The translator is likely to come across such data as: 1) in the French certificate (from Togo) • the name of the country and motto • the school emblem • the names of the various offices according to which registration is performed • the seat of a registrar’s office • the number of the certificate • the title of the certificate • the statement of the type of degree acquired (with full information on the student: nationality, date and place of birth) • information concerning the degree, the faculty, the session and the grade. • a legal statement • date • signature (of the general secretary or the registrar or another certifier and an informant) with the official phraseology used in certification. • official stamp. 2) in the English certificate (from the University of Ibadan, Nigeria) • the name of the university • the school emblem • the student’s name • the statement of confirmation of the success of the student • the title of the degree

The Practice of Specialized Translation 15 • the grade • the signatures of the Vice-Chancellor and the registrar • date

Having found the common and divergent elements, within the areas specified above, in both texts, a source text and a text in a target language into which the translator is going to translate, it is reasonable to imitate whatever can be imitated in the translation, using the patterns of the target language, matching the information from the source text. But to do it, the translator has to be precise and, apart from observing the presence of similar information, analyze the specifics of vocabulary used, grammar structures and stylistic features of a target text in order to create a good translation.

From the analyses of vocabulary in the certificates, there are some obvious traits, like the vocabulary used for personal data or details (where proper names appear, such as for official names of countries or institutions, they should be checked against reference sources –encyclopedias, dictionaries, glossaries and other patterns gathered from comparable corpora etc.). But there will also be some vocabulary of a more technical character (especially legal statements e.g. En foi de quoi, la présente attestation lui est délivrée pour servir et valoir ce que de droit = This attestation is issued to enable the holder enjoy every right attached to it). Having parallel texts at one’s disposal is really invaluable. The translator’s task in this respect is to find the terms that can prove troublesome in providing their equivalent versions in the target language.

When translating an academic certificate from French into English such problematic terms could be: En foi de quoi, la présente attestation lui est délivrée pour servir et valoir ce que de droit as they have more than one meaning, and the translator must be careful and consult the parallel texts and other sources to choose proper equivalents. The translator should also choose the right vocabulary, bearing in mind the technical nature of the literature of specialized texts. The technical terms should be established on the basis of the parallel texts as far as possible. Terms in French, the meanings of which the translator should master in order to perform a good translation of a certificate, would be in the sample certificate of this paper: Né(e) à or né(e) le (meaning born in or on) ; Département (Local Government); a été jugé digne de or a été jugé digne du grade (has been admitted to the degree); Série (section); Avec mention (assessment or class); voir au dos avis important (important information at the back); vu le decret (according to the decree); vu l’arrêté ( according to the article); vu le certificat en date (according to the certificate of ….date). The problematic English expressions which may appear in certificates are also worth memorizing. e. g. having fulfill all the requirements.

The last issue with regard to vocabulary, that the translator should be careful about is its character – official, formal, deprived of diminutions and colloquialisms.

As regards grammar, one of the very first observations worthy of mention and mastery is the conciseness of the contents and the rigid organization of grammatical structures, as it is among the characteristics of specialized texts. It is achieved by the predominance of noun structures or participles instead of full sentences. Most data are introduced through noun structures (surname, first name, middle name, maiden surname, occupation of father/mother, date of birth, sex, place of birth, registration district, name

16 De Campose of hospital, signature, residence of informant, relationship, country, city or town, registered number, date etc.). The remaining information is very often given through participial structures. The examples in the French certificate are: a été déclaré admis = has been declared admitted; est délivrée = is issued – ‘Data concerning the person informing of a birth’. There is also an impersonal structure in the following English translation: Le Secrétaire Général….., atteste que (‘The General Secretary certifies that’, which would be best translated as ‘This is to certify’) The English forms are on the one hand more concise than the French one.

Instead of Data concerning the person’s birthday in a French academic certificate, the English certificate indicates the main subject which is the type of degree. Inclusion of such data is completely ignored. In these expressions we can also observe avoidance of grammatical words, such as articles e. g. En foi de quoi, la présente attestation lui est délivrée pour servir et valoir ce que de droit = This attestation is issued to enable the holder enjoy every right attached to it).

Among the most important features of grammar in the analyzed certificates there is the use of imperative structures, untypical of specialized texts. Their use here is justifiable and normal as the texts analyzed are forms, which often need instructions to be included..

One other major point to note is the necessity to appraise the register of the text to be translated. The style and register must be formal. We can observe that the official style on the level of layout is kept by putting the texts into a formalized structure of elements, having, more or less, a comparable pattern in each variant (similar headings etc.).

At the level of vocabulary, we can find no words which would be emotionally marked. There are no diminutive or augmentative suffixes. There is no such situation that two different notions are referred to by the same term, or vice versa, which means that there is no polysemy. The terms are repeated consistently in relation to one and the same notion. Some words are internationalisms (of Latin origin) and are used in official or legal texts frequently (French: Certificat, attestation, déclaré, admis; English: certificate, attestation, declares, admitted). The next feature being typical of official style uses multi-word terms. e.g. French: Ce que de droit, en foi de quoi English: ‘Pass’ Grade. There are also some official fossilized expressions used, like hereby certify… and in French atteste que (‘This is to certify ’). Even such typical information as the date is not expressed straightforwardly, but formally (This 21st day of December). Methodological guidelines on translating official documents as a kind of specialized text Our translation or specialized texts, especially certificates, makes us to make certain observations. One of them is that specialized texts are more ‘prone’ to formal equivalence than dynamic equivalence. This corroborates Pieńkos (2003:64-65) in Źrałka (2007:82) who claims that formal equivalence appears in the translation of specialized texts more often than dynamic equivalence, as the most important elements of them are notions, expressed by terms, that constitute specific contents and must be incorporated into the translation. According to Źrałka (2007:82) Kielar (1991:103) understands formal equivalence as following particular rules concerning the contents, form, style, function

The Practice of Specialized Translation 17 etc. On the one hand it requires retaining the features of the source text, but on the other hand – the translator should be aware of rules governing a target language. Also for Źrałka (2007:82), Kielar (2003:133) claims that what the translator should do is to express a sense of the text written in L1 through grammatical and lexical means of L2. Źrałka also says Pieńkos (2003:268-274) proposes a transpositional model of translation, which retains the sense of a source text and, at the same time, follows the conventions of a target language within grammar, idioms and phrases.

In our translation a specialized text, we made the observations as we compare the English and the French versions. These observations are in line with those of Dickel, (2003:143 in Źrałka (2007:82 ): • terms fully correspond to each other (congruence), • notion A or B does not have an equivalent in the target language e. g. ‘birthdays’. • terms A and B are only partially equivalent e. g. ‘pass grade’ According to Dickel, in the last two cases the translator has the possibility of borrowing a term from a source language, coining a new one, or using an equivalent which serves as an explanation of the source language term. Stępnikowska (1998:53) in Źrałka (2007:83) mentions similar solutions in the case of zero equivalence. The translator can: • use an original term and give its literal translation in brackets, • introduce a definition or description of an original term, • use a neologism.

The translator’s knowledge is a means to an end. It covers a wide range of disciplines. The knowledge of the working languages is also very important for the translator and this leads him to the concept of expression. Seleskovitch (1998:75) says:

Restating a message in another language requires constant creativity; here we find ourselves moving imperceptibly from the notion of translation to that of expression. Each time the context shifts, the same word takes on a slightly different meaning which must almost invariably be rendered by a different word in the target language. Therefore, it is no longer a question of knowing the lexical equivalents of words in two different languages that can serve as automatic substitutes for one another, but of finding terms that will express ‘’the same thing’’ regardless of the words used in the original statement.

Expression is an important tool for the translator. The better the translator understands the speaker’s thought, the more it becomes his or her own thought and the more the three steps involved in interpretation, understanding, knowledge and expression become a reality. Translation requires an ability to express oneself clearly, and an excellent command of one’s working languages and the way they are written in order to be able to express oneself appropriately in all situations.

There can be no doubt that this ‘theory’ is necessary. What is important for the text unity and logic is the fact, emphasised by many theorists, that once used, the term should always denote the same notion. When it comes to structural features of a specialized text, Lukszyn (2003:14-16) in Edyta (2007: 83) cites the following features of a good translation:

18 De Campose • retaining semantic unity of the source text in its translated version – by taking care of the so-called semantic dominants (a network of direct connections between central terminological units), • keeping the normalised construction of a text (formally organised in a particular way), • using proper chains of connectors – sequences of particular linguistic devices that keep the text unity, like as a result of, as the consequence of which etc. (in the case of the certificates analysed this is of little importance, as there are few full sentences in them), • minding proper text division by using formal connectors like separate paragraphs, or indexing following steps of argumentation. Dickel (2003:146) in Edyta (2007:83) claims that, when it is justified by the needs of a target language, the translator may change the structure of the text. She also gives some remarks concerning the style of language in specialized translation. According to her, each specialized text is characterized by a different level of technicality, and the translator’s task is to decide if the translation style should be more scientific rather than typical of general language. The translator must take care not to violate the conventions of a chosen style by using vocabulary, or other elements, characteristic of a different style. Conclusion The technical and stereotyped nature of certificates demands an expert knowledge of linguistic, technical and educational factors if translations of texts are to be faithfully done. It is not sufficient to have a degree in a language in order to translate properly. Educational systems differ from one country to another and must be mastered perfectly. Translators are advised to keep many different certificate versions of different countries and study them using a parallel text approach in order to appreciate the linguistic, technical and educational implications involved properly.

The Practice of Specialized Translation 19 References Arsentyeva, Elena (2003). “Scientific and technical texts as an object of study and

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http://www.jostrans.org/issue01/articles/leung.htm

Newmark, Peter (2004). “Non-literary in the Light of Literary Translation.” In The Journal of Specialized Translation, (Issue 1), 8-13.

http://www.jostrans.org/issue01/articles/newmark.htm

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Stępnikowska, Agnieszka (1998). Stand, Probleme und Perspektiven der zweisprachigen juristischen Fachlexikographie. Frankfurt am Main:

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Źrałka, Edyta (2007). “Teaching specialised translation through official documents.” The Journal of Specialised Translation, Issue 7 – January 2007