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Subordination and Coordination in English-Arabic Translation



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Waleed OthmanAbstract

Subordination and coordination are two syntactic features that are employed in writing in both English and Arabic. It is often argued, however, that the two languages differ in their preference for either syntactic relation (Cf. Introduction and Note 3). English, it is said, makes use of more subordination than coordination, while Arabic favors the use of coordination rather than subordination. The present paper aims not to prove or disprove this claim. Its main focus is finding out how these syntactic relations are dealt with in English-Arabic translation in general. To achieve this aim, the research makes use of three types of corpus: Texts originally written in English, texts originally written in Arabic, and texts translated from English into Arabic. The texts surveyed are taken from different disciplines. The reason behind this is that the researcher wants to get to a generalization about the hypothesis above, whether it is proven valid or not. In other words, by varying the texts, the researcher wants to get to general remarks from which several researches could be triggered. In each of the texts at hand, the instances of subordination and coordination  were counted. The number of occurrences were then turned into ratios and the results of the three parts of the corpus were compared so as to know whether the translated texts are more like those originally written in English or those originally written in Arabic. Recommendations conclude the paper.

1. Introduction

1.1 Coordination and Subordination in English

In English, compound sentences (coordination) are used to express related thoughts which are more or less equal and carry approximately the same weight; that is, when both clauses of the sentence are offered as new information; they are usually equal both syntactically and semantically. In other words, it is a paratactic relationship that holds between the clauses (Quirk et al., 1985: 918).

With subordination, unequal ideas are expressed. One clause carries more weight than the other. The subordinate clause is presented as given or known information rather than new (ibid: 919). The relationship at work here is hypotaxis; the superordinate clause and the subordinate clause(s) are in hierarchical hypotactic relationship.

Somewhere else in Quirk's (ibid: 920) it is stated that the second unit in a sequence of coordinated units "gains focal prominence from its position", and that such prominence applies to the final element in a complex sentence. This prominence means higher "communicative dynamism" than there is in the initial part of the information unit (ibid: 1356-7).

This argument does not, however, conflict with the discussion in the previous paragraphs regarding subordination. It is said above that a subordinate clause is semantically subordinate to the main clause, meaning that the information therein is often presupposed as given or known. Consequently, the normal position of a subordinate clause is initial rather than final, since the new information is often presented as we linearly progress along the information unit (i.e. sentence). When the subordinate clause is shifted to a final position, it gains more weight, semantically, than it is assigned by means of its syntactic level.

Quirk et. al. maintain that coordination is used when ease of comprehension is sought, but also hold that a compound sentence, "especially with and, is vague in that it leaves the specific logical relationship to the interference of the speaker" (ibid.:1040-1). In a complex sentence, on the other hand, the sentence may be difficult to understand since the "content of the sentence may presuppose knowledge that is not generally available" (ibid.: 987).

In general, it is argued that the use of subordination, rather than coordination, will immensely help in making one's  writing more mature, sophisticated, interesting and effective. This tendency is very clearly noticed in English writing textbooks. Oshima (1991: 165) gives an example paragraph with too many compound sentences. She says that "the overuse of coordination makes it both boring to read and difficult to focus on the ideas expressed". Oshima then gives another version of the same paragraph, which she considers "more effective because the sentences have been combined through he use of subordination as well as coordination". The two cited paragraphs are given below:

Version (1)
John F. Kennedy was the thirty-fifth President of the United States, and he was born in Brookline, Massachusetts in 1917. His father was Ambassador to England, so he was exposed to politics at an early age. Kennedy decided to enter the political arena, so he ran for Congress from Massachusetts, and he was elected to the Senate in 1953. His term ended in 1960, for he was elected President that same year at the age of 43. He was the first Roman Catholic, and he was the youngest man ever to occupy the presidency. He had planned to run again in the 1964 election year, but he was assassinated on November 22, 1963, in Dallas, Texas. Kennedy served America for such a short time, but he inspired people all over the free world because of his youth, his spirit, and his style.
(From Oshima, 1991: 165)
Version (2)
John F. Kennedy, who was the thirty-fifth President of the United States, was born in Brookline, Massachusetts in 1917. Because his father was Ambassador to England,  he was exposed to politics early in life. Deciding to enter the political arena, he ran for Congress from Massachusetts and was elected to the Senate in 1953. His term ended in 1960, when he was elected President that same year at the age of 43. He was not only the first Roman Catholic but also the youngest man ever to occupy the presidency. He had planned to run again in the 1964 election year, but he was assassinated on November 22, 1963, in Dallas, Texas. Although Kennedy served America for such a short time, he inspired people all over the free world because of his youth, his spirit, and his style.
( from Oshima, 1991: 165)

 In another writing textbook (O'donnell, 1986: 48-49), the same tendency (i.e. favoring subordination over coordination as a method of writing) is obvious even in an exercise where the students are supposed to fill in the blanks with coordinators. To give yet another example, consider the following sentence, which is one of so many instances of subordination taken from a textbook meant for students preparing for the Cambridge First Certificate in English Examination:

"When a section of rain-sodden ground fell into Mount Etna in 1979, blocking the flow of lava, pressure built up so much that when it was released the huge explosion killed nine tourists who were peering inside."
 (from Haines, 1996: 152)

 To sum up, subordination as well as coordination are both used in English writing. Subordination, however, is preferred to coordination, and it is considered a sign of mature writing. A piece of writing with too many coordinators is seen as immature and requires rewriting.

1.2 Coordination and Subordination in Arabic

A compound sentence in Arabic consists of "more than one simple sentence conjoined by one of a closed set of conjunctive particles (Holes, 1995:215). These conjunctive particles are wa , fa, θumma, ?aw, ?am, bal and  la:kin.(1) The wa is the most common connective device in Arabic. It is used to connect words, phrases, clauses, and sentences. Unlike the English and, the Arabic wa is repeated before every item coordinated with the one before, no matter how many items are listed. But the fact of the matter is that the Arabic wa is not one but several particles, each having a different function. It may be used as a coordinator or as an adverbial. It could be used to express oaths or accompaniment and many other usages.(2)

A complex sentence, on the other hand, is one in which one or more of the non-verbal slots (subject, object, adverb, adjective) in a simple sentence is filled by a clause which, if taken out, makes a free-standing simple sentence (ibid: 215). There are four types of dependent clauses in Arabic. These are listed in the following table together with the particles used in each type:

Table no. (1): Dependent Clauses in Arabic and the particles used in each (3)

Subordinate Clause

Particles

Nominal

?anna /?an/ ?in/ ?iða/ law/ ma:

Adjectival

Allati:/ allaði:/ allaði:na/ allaða:n/ etc.

Adverbial

( 1)Time Particles:

?ið/ ?iða/ munðu/ ħatta:/ lamma: / badama:/ indama:

(2) Purpose; Result and Reason Particles:

li/ li?an/ li?alla:/ ħatta:/ li?anna/  (li)kay/ (li)Kayla/

(3) Concessive; Exceptive Particles:

maa ?anna/ birraġmi (min) ?anna/ ala:rraġmi (min) ?anna/

ala ?: anna/ ?illa: ?anna/ bayda ?anna/ ġayra ?anna

Conditional

?in/ ?iða:/ law

Arabic, as already mentioned, and as it has frequently been claimed by researchers, both Arabs and non-Arabs, is a language that favors coordination at the expense of subordination. In a study by Joy Reid (Reid, 1992), a computer text analysis was applied to essays by both native English speakers and non-native speakers from Arabic, Spanish, and Chinese language backgrounds. The results found that Arabic writers use more coordinate conjunctions of any other language background. The tendency to do so was ascribed to first language transfer. Along similar lines, Ostler (1987) found that long sentences conjoined with coordinating conjunctions are typical of Arabic Writing. Much earlier, in 1967, Kaplan compared rhetorical and syntactic styles of English and Arabic and found that in English subordination is considered more elegant than, and hence preferable to, parallelism, while the opposite holds for Arabic. (4)

Some Arab scholars adopted this point and defended it. Aziz ( 1989: 214 -5) states that Arabic opts for coordination when English would use other devices, especially subordination.

Whether in coordination or in subordination, it is just the normal way of thinking in Arabic to start the sentence with the known entity "followed by the clause which describes what is informationally new" (Holes, 1995: 215). Holes also noted that "placing the lengthy dependent clause first offends against the rhythmic principle which requires that the main break in the sentence comes no later than about halfway through, and hence, that the heavier' elements come later in the sentence" (ibid: 215-6). This does not mean that a subordinate clause never starts a sentence. When it does, it is presupposed as old information or shared knowledge (between the speaker and the recipient(s). When it is shifted forward in the sentence, it is thus assigned more importance.

2. Description of Corpus

The research corpus consists of three parts: Texts originally written in English, texts originally written in Arabic and texts translated from English into Arabic. Due to the limited scope of the paper, only short parts of the texts were studied (one page long in most cases). The researcher does not wish to focus on a certain text type. This is why the texts were randomly taken from different text types. Again, each type could make the corpus of a separate study. In this paper, the researcher is only after a generalization.

The method of analysis followed in studying the texts at hand was simple, but, the researcher believes, very direct and straightforward: The researcher counted every instance of subordination and coordination in the texts. Then a ratio of coordination to subordination was figured out.

2.1 The English Corpus (5)

These are five English texts taken from different fields of study. The following table shows the number of subordination and coordination instances in each text. Only compound, complex and compound-complex sentences are considered. Simple sentences are not included in the count. The bottom row of the table shows the ratio of coordination to subordination in each of the texts. For this purpose, compound-complex sentences are regarded as instances of subordination rather than coordination:

Table no. 2 number of subordination & coordination instances in the English Corpus

Sentence type

Text 1

Text 2

Text 3

Text 4

Text 5

Total

Compound

11

1

2

6

15

43

Complex

11

24

18

11

18

97

Compound-complex

1

3

7

7

4

24

Ratio (rough) Coordination: Subordination

1 : 1

.03 : 1

0.08 : 1

0.33 : 1

0.68 : 1

0.35:1

In all of the texts of this part of the corpus (except for text no. 1, which is an abridged and simplified reader meant for students of English as a foreign language, and for reluctant native readers) the number of subordination instances exceeds those of coordination. In text no. 2 ( a paper on literary criticism), only one compound sentence is found. The rest are either complex or compound-complex. The ratio, as the table shows, is 0.03 : 1, which is surely for the favor of subordination.

 Text no. 3 ( a study conducted by the Center for Contemporary Arab Studies at Georgetown University, USA) was prepared and written by native speakers of English and meant not for the layman but for the educated elite. In the part of the study that was analyzed, complex and compound-complex sentences account for 25 instances altogether, while compound sentences are only two, a ratio of 0.08 : 1.

 Text no. 4 is an anthology with which students of English literature are familiar: The Norton Anthology of English Literature. Not only the audience, but also the genre of this text make it imperative that the language used be "perfect". Subordination here, again, is much more prevalent than coordination. There are six instances of coordination against eighteen of subordination. This makes the ratio 0.33:1.

 The last English text is a part of a file on the Gulf States, published by the Economist. As it is the case with most newspapers and magazines, this one is targeted at audiences of different walks of life and levels of education. In the part under survey, there are more simple sentences than any other type of sentence. Still, complex and compound-complex sentences amount to 22, compound sentences 15.

 It is obvious then that an English text written by native speakers of the language will exhibit more subordination than coordination. This is, as hypothesized at the outset, typical of most English texts, except for those intended for certain types of audiences, especially learners of English at beginning and pre-intermediate levels.

2.2 The Arabic Corpus (6)

 This part of the corpus is taken from works by several Arab writers. Five texts were studied  and instances of coordination and subordination were counted. But counting sentences and classifying them into compound or complex was not an easy a job as it was when working with the English part of the corpus.

For one thing, the punctuation marks in Arabic are not strictly rule-governed as they are in English. The full stop, in particular, is not the only mark that marks the end of a sentence; a comma is more frequently opted for. Some Arab writers are beginning to use a full stop at the end of every sentence, though. Another reason that adds to the difficulty of counting subordination and coordination instances in Arabic is the fact that some Arab writers tend to write very long sentences, some of which could be a paragraph long with one full stop at the end and so many commas in between. In some cases a sentence' would have two or more subordinators, and even more coordinators than that. This abundant use of conjunctive devices adds to the difficulty of categorizing Arabic sentences into compound or complex. The following Arabic text (text no. 1) is an example on such a text:

وعندما يعود في المساء إلى البيت، فانه يستحق الراحة والطعام الهنيء. وفي نهاية الأسبوع، تكون فترة استراحة وأعمال أخرى. ففي بلده، أعلنت البلدية أنها ستبني جسرا جديدا على النهر الذي يخترق البلد. وهذا يعني تمويلا من المواطنين، وجزء منهم لا يريد الجسر لأسباب بيئية، وغيرهم لأسباب أخرى، ولذاك فللمواطنين تجمعاتهم التي يتبادلون فيها الآراء. وتستضيفهم محطات التلفاز والإذاعة. وتفتح الصحف صفحاتها لهذه الآراء المختلفة. وجون سميث، هو أيضا، عضو في عدة جمعيات علمية ومهنية ونقابية، يمارس من خلالها حقوقه العامة، لا يخشى أجهزة الأمن، ولا اتهام أحد له بأنه يعمل ضد النظام، أو ضد الرأس الأكبر، وهو يعيش في دولة القانون والمؤسسات. ويوجد توازن بين السلطات التي تتابع وتراقب وتحاسب، وعنده الانتخابات كل أربع سنوات لتكون كشف حساب لصاحب المنصب، وفرصة للطعن في أعماله وانتخاب غيره، والجميع أمام القوانين سواء. والمال العام محفوظ محترم، وجون يعيش في مدينة نظيفة، في بيت نظيف، له كرامته واحترامه.

 (مجلة أفكار: العدد ،162 ، آذار 2002)

In the paragraph above, twenty coordinating conjunctions (conjoining clauses) are easily spotted. There are also seven subordinators. There are nine full stops, but this is not indicative of the number of sentences.

Given this difficulty in counting coordination and subordinations instances, the researcher took another route to do the job: He counted the number of coordinators between clauses rather than the number of compound sentences. To count subordination instances, subordinate clauses rather than complex sentences were counted.

In the text above, (i.e., text no. 1) the ratio of coordination to subordination would then be 3:1, which is obviously in favor of coordination.

The researcher would mention here that even those subordinate clauses in the text above are conjoined by means of coordinators. Complex sentences, in turn, are conjoined with whatever follows them by means of a coordinator, mostly wa. But the important thing to notice and to highlight in this context is that there is an obvious presence of subordination, but not as obvious as that of coordination.

Text no. 2 is a paragraph taken from a book on socio-politics by Naser el-Deen al-Asad, in which he tries to make clear the meanings of some Islamic concepts. The book, the writer says in the introduction, is meant for the youth, who are not necessarily specialized in Fiqh or Shari'a sciences. The part of the text that the paper studied is a paragraph (page 61) of 120 words. Added to these, there are 14 coordinators (11 instances of wa, and 3 instances of fa ). In contrast, only four subordinate clauses are present. These are underlined in the text below.

وقد شاركت المرأة المسلمة مشاركة واسعة في الحياة السياسية والاجتماعية والعلمية. وحقها في ذلك مثل حق الرجل. فالبيعة والشورى والحرب ورواية الحديث النبوي وتفسير القرآن والتدريس، قام بها الرجال والنساء، وشاركت فيها المرأة جنبا إلى جنب مع الرجل، في مجتمع متكامل متكافل. وبيعة النساء للنبي ورد فيها قرآن، ولها أخبار في كتب السيرة والتفسير. وعدد منهن بايعن مع الرجال في بيعة العقبة، وفي مناسبات أخرى مثل: بيعة الرضوان، ويوم الفتح، وحجة الوداع. وجادلت امرأة النبي في أمر صدر من زوجها فنزل بمجادلتها قرآن وغلب الله رأيها وموقفها. وحين أراد عمر بن الخطاب  وهو أمير المؤمنين أن يقلل من المهور تصدت له امرأة وبينت له أنه ليس له الحق في ذلك واستشهدت بآية من القرآن، فنزل عند رأيها ورجع عن رأيه.

 (ناصر الدين الأسد: "نحن والعصر: مفاهيم ومصطلحات إسلامية")

The orderly use of punctuation utilized in the sample text above is not typical of most Arab writers, though. In text no. 3, for instance, (taken from a novel by Jabra Ibrahim Jabra) the use of the full-stop is not as orderly as it is in text no.2. Therefore, the number of full-stops does not equal the number of sentences. To get to a correct ratio of subordination and coordination, the researcher counted the subordinate clauses first. There are four altogether: one purpose clause, one nominal, and two adverbial clauses. Coordinators, on the other hand, were as follows: 8 instances of wa,  one bal, and one ?aw. This makes the total number 10 coordinators, more than double the number of subordinators.

Text no. 4 (The first page of an article by Dr. Abdulrahman Yagi) has 16 coordinating devices, most of which are instances of wa. Subordinate clauses account for 6 instances, a ratio of 3:1

The following table shows the number of subordination and coordination instances, as well as the ratio of coordination to subordination, in the Arabic texts:

Table no. 3 number of subordination & coordination instances in the Arabic Corpus

Text

Coordination

subordination

Ratio (rough)

Text no.1

20

7

3:1

Text no.2

14

4

3:1

Text no.3

10

4

2:1

Text no.4

16

6

3:1

Text no.5

12

6

2 : 1

Total

72

27

2.5:1

2.3 The translated Corpus(7)

This part of the corpus comprises parts of texts originally written in English and translated into Arabic. It is the Arabic version of the texts that the researcher studied. With this part of the corpus, the same method of analysis used for part two of the corpus was applied; i.e., counting coordinating devices and subordinate clauses.

Text no. (1) is a translation of text no. (2) of the first part of the corpus (i.e. the English corpus), in which the ratio of coordination to subordination was the least: 1:33 (see table no. 2). In the translated version of the same text, 24 subordinate clauses were cited, almost the same number as those in the original text. Coordinators, on the other hand, accounted for 14 instances, most of which are wa, the rest are fa. In fact, these coordinators are not employed to produce compound sentences. They are simply resumptive, not additive. They do not join dependent clauses but preface sentences and paragraphs. If we are to consider them as coordinators, we will have a ratio of 2:1, in favor of subordination. Obviously, this is not a normal feature of Arabic, which favors coordination over subordination.

The following table shows the results of the analysis of the five texts in this part of the corpus.

Table no. 4 number of subordination & coordination instances in the translated Corpus

Text

Coordination

subordination

Ratio (rough)

Text no.1

14

24

0.6:1

Text no. 2

17

17

1:1

Text no. 3

16

21

0.75:1

Text no. 4

11

16

0.66:1

Text no. 5

6

21

0.25:1

Total

64

99

0.6:1

As table no. (4) above clearly shows, the translated corpus are more coordinated than subordinated. This, of course, is not typical of Arabic discourse as proven by the analysis of part (2) of the corpus. This being the case, translators need to take a different approach to dealing with subordination and coordination when translating from English into Arabic. An Arabic text that abounds with complex sentences is by no means Arabic-like, just like an English text with more coordination than subordination. To suggest solutions, we now turn to the following section.

3. From Subordination to Coordination

Translation-wise, the analysis above is very worthy of study. In fact, it is the base of this research's main contribution. As has already been shown and proved in this paper, Arabic and English vary as to the frequency of use of subordination and coordination, with English making more use of subordination, Arabic of coordination. Therefore, getting to a translation that would sound natural in Arabic would entail a higher frequency of coordination than of subordination. But, as also noticed in the analysis of part three of the corpus, this is not a common feature of translated language. Arabic texts translated from English often tend to exhibit an unusually considerable presence of subordination, which is not in line with Arabic fondness for coordination. The result is an unavoidable unnaturalness(8) ascribed to the translation output.

To naturalize Arabic translations, a translator needs to employ coordination more than he does subordination. But, is this possible in light of the issues of information load and focal prominence discussed above. In Quirk et. al. (1985: 1041) ten complex sentences are listed together with their correspondent compound sentences with and, but, or so. The following lists show the subordinators and their correspondent coordinators in Quirk's examples:

Subordinators
Coordinators
Although
but
If
and (then)
Unless
or (else)
When (adverbial)
and (then)
Who (adjectival)
and + subject…
Whereas
and/but (at the same time)
…, as a result of which
and as a result of that
As (adverbial)
and (so)
Participle clause
and (then)

Along the same lines, the researcher would suggest the following:

First. When an English complex sentence sets off with a subordinate clause, which is consequently semantically subordinate and informationally lighter, an Arabic compound sentence could be opted for as a natural rendering. Since the information in the initial English subordinate clause is regarded as the less important or the known entity due not only to syntactic reasons, but also to position in the sentence, we would put this information in an initial position in the Arabic compound sentence. Such a position, as aforementioned, houses the lighter element in the natural Arabic sentence. The following pairs of sentences illustrate the point:

e.g. (3a):

 Subordination: When the ship arrived at Naples, the sailors were given shore leave for twelve hours.

Coordination: The ship arrived at Naples, and the sailors were (then) given shore leave for twelve hours.

 (from Quirk et.al., 1985: 1041)

e.g. (3b):

 Subordination: Although admission was free, few people attended the lecture.

Coordination: Admission was free, but (nevertheless) few people attended the lecture.

 (from Quirk et.al., 1985: 1041)

Second. On the other hand, an English complex sentence with the subordinate clause following the main clause (i.e. final position), and thus gaining a heavier weight than it normally has, could be rendered into either a complex Arabic sentence (which is most often the first resort), or a compound one (which is rarely possible). In the latter option, however, one needs to shift the order of information entities (conjoined parts) so as to assign as much importance to each part as in the original English sentence. This kind of shifting is rarely possible:

e.g. (3c):

Subordination: He feared death more as he grew older.

ازداد خوفه من الموت مع تقدمه في السن.

Coordination: He grew older and (consequently) feared death more.

تقدم في السن فازداد خوفه من الموت.

Closely examining example (3c) above, one would find that the second sentence is by no means a faithful paraphrase of the first and would not, in turn, make a faithful translation. The reason behind this is that the meaning conveyed by as (i.e. simultaneity) in the complex sentence is not the same as that conveyed by and consequently (i.e. result) in the compound sentence.

 This foregoing argument does not hold true in the following pair of sentences:

e.g. (3d):

Subordination: Ali got a scholarship as he was the cleverest student in class.

حصل علي على بعثة دراسية لأنه كان أذكى طالب في صفه.

Coordination: Ali was the cleverest student in class, so he got a scholarship.

كان علي أذكى طالب في صفه فحصل على بعثة دراسية.

The coordinator so in the coordinated version did not fail in encapsulating the meaning realized by the subordinator as in the English sentence; both convey cause/effect meanings.

However, such a rendering of a subordination into a coordination is most frequently unattainable as subordinators don't have a one-to-one correspondent coordinator each. What further adds to the difficulty of changing a complex sentence (with a final subordinate clause) into a compound sentence, and at the same time shifting the order of clauses, is the change in meaning engendered by the use of a coordinator seemingly equivalent to the subordinator as well as the difficulty of maintaining the information weight assigned to each of the two clauses. In example (3c) above, the subordinator as was rendered into and and thus fa in Arabic. The clauses also exchanged positions in a bid to maintain the information weight carried by each. The end result was, however, an inaccurate translation.

 Given this potential difficulty and inaccuracy, it is recommended that complex sentences with final subordinate clauses be rendered into syntactically equivalent sentences in Arabic (i.e. complex sentences with final subordinate clauses), which would also be semantically equivalent.

Summary and Conclusions

This paper, as has been said before, is an attempt to find out how subordination and coordination are commonly tackled in English-Arabic translations. Having analyzed the three parts of the corpus, the researcher arrived at the following conclusions:

n       Subordination is seen as a sign of maturity and sophistication in English writing. It is opted for when two propositions of different weight are expressed. Coordination is also used in English, but less frequently than subordination.

n       In Arabic, there is subordination as well as coordination, but the latter is more frequently employed than the former. Coordinators are present in and around complex sentences. Both coordination and subordination occur in complementary distribution with one another.

n       Arabic preference for coordination is not to be considered a drawback or a sign of immaturity in the Arabic discourse. Coordination is the main key for coherence in Arabic, just like subordination in English.

n       Texts translated from English into Arabic tend to favor subordination over coordination. They follow the norms of the source language rather than the target language, and thus sound more English-like than Arabic-like.

n       The ratio of coordination to subordination in texts originally written in English is different from one text type to another. This is a matter which deserves further research.

n       The audience is a major factor in determining the features of a text, be it in English or in Arabic. An English text meant for an educated readership is expected to be more sophisticated, more subordinated than coordinated.

n       Translators are supposed to take the observations and results of this research paper into consideration when rendering English texts into Arabic. Some English subordination examples (i.e., complex sentences) can be rendered into Arabic compound sentences. A sentence with because in English, can be translated into a sentence with so in Arabic.

n       In longer research projects more extended texts could be surveyed and analyzed through the use of massive amounts of computerized collection of texts that are currently available on the Internet.(9)

Notes

(1) For a discussion of the Arabic conjunctive particles, see Holes, Clives, Modern Arabic: Structure, Functions and Varieties. (London: Longman, 1995), PP.217-225.

 (2) See Hamdan, Jihad and Shehdeh Fareh, "The Translation of Arabic Wa into English: Some Problems and Implications", Dirasat, Human and Social Sciences, Volume 26, No. 2 (1999), PP. 590-601.

(3) Subordinate clauses with a dropped particle were also considered instances of subordination. For example:

  فهو كاتب مقالة من الطراز الأول ومحاضر يمتاز بقدرة خارقة على المحاججة))

(4)   Cf. Mohamed, Ayisha, "A Contrastive Study of Syntactic Relations, Cohesion, and Punctuation as Markers of Rhetorical Organization in Arabic and English Narrative Texts". Unpublished PhD. dissertation, the University of Exeter (1993). See also Thompson-Panos, Karyn and Maria Thomas-Ruzic , "The Least You Should Know about Arabic: Implications for ESL Writing Instructor", TESOL Quarterly, 17.4 (1983), 609-623.

 (5) The English Corpus:

I. Hardy, Thomas, The Mayor of Casterbridge: abridged and simplified by Lewis Jones, (London: Collins, 1979).

II. Brandabur, A. Clare, "Naguib Mahfouz & Thomas Hardy: Stoic Heroism in the Realistic Novels" (in consultation with Ustaz Awni Abu Ghosh). Proceedings of the First International Conference on Arabic-English Contrastive & Comparative Studies, University of Jordan (August 23-28, 1997).

III. Peretz, Don, "America and Jerusalem", 1996 Symposium. Center for contemporary Arab Studies, http://www.georgetown.edu/sfs/programs/ccas/jerusalem/peretz.htm.

IV. M.H. Abrams (ed.), The Norton Anthology of English Literature Vol. 2, (New York: W.W. Norton & Company, 1993).

V. "Time Travelers: A Survey of the Gulf", The Economist, (March 23, 2002).

(6) The Arabic Corpus:

1) أ.د. عبد المجيد نصير، "التكنولوجيا والثقافة والإنسان العربي"، مجلة أفكار، العدد 162، عمان (2002).

2) ناصر الدين الأسد،  نحن والعصر، مفاهيم ومصطلحات إسلامية،  (بيروت: المؤسسة العربية للدراسات والنشر، 1998).

3) جبرا ابراهيم جبرا ، الغرف الأخرى، (بيروت: المؤسسة العربية للدراسات والنشر، 1986).

4) عبد الرحمن ياغي ، "أريد اللغة الأخرى"،  مجلة شؤون استراتيجية، المجلد الأول، العدد الأول (2002).

5) فهمي هويدي ، "شرط إرسال قوات عربية للعراق"، صحيفة العرب اليوم، المجلد 7، العدد 2256 (2003).

(7) The Translated Corpus:

1) كلير براندابور ، "البطولة الرواقية في الروايات الواقعية لتوماس هاردي ونجيب محفوظ"،  ورقة بحث قدمت إلى المؤتمر العالمي للدراسات التقابلية والمقارنة العربية-الإنجليزية، الجامعة الأردنية ( 23-28/8/1997).

2) تي ترينت غيغاكس وجون باري ، "شؤون أمريكية"، نيوزويك (16 أغسطس 2002).

3) كوامي أنتوني آبيه، ترجمة محمد يونس، "الليبرالية والفردية والهوية"، الثقافة العالمية، العدد 110 (يناير-فبراير 2002).

4) جورج مز غازدا وريموند ج كورسي، نظريات التعلم، دراسة مقارنة، ج 2، ترجمة علي حسين حجاج، (عالم المعرفة، العدد 108، 1986).

5) ماليز رونغن، "ملف خاص عن ادوارد سعيد"، ترجمة الياس سعيد، صحيفة الدستور الأردنية (3/10/2003).

 (8) Nida and Taber (1982:203) contend that a natural text should "use grammatical constructions and combinations of words which do not violate the ordinary pattern of a language". An unnatural text is also pejoratively termed translationese or third language. Cf. Nida, Eugene A. & Charles R. Taber, The Theory and Practice of Translation. (Leiden: E.J.Brill, 1982).

(9) The use of electronic corpora as a source for studying features of translation is a new methodology in translation studies. Several corpora have been built for this purpose. See also Baker, M., "Corpora in Translation Studies: An Overview and Suggestions for Future Research", Target, no. 7. 2 (1995), PP. 223-243.

Works Cited

Aziz, Yowell Y, A Contrastive Grammar of English and Arabic. (Mosul: University of Mosul, 1989).

Haines, Simon and Barbara Stewart, New First Certificate Masterclass: Student's Book. (Oxford: OUP, 1996).

Holes, Clives, Modern Arabic: Structure, Functions and Varieties. (London: Longman, 1995).

Kaplan, Robert B, "Contrastive Rhetoric and the Teaching of Composition", Tesol Quarterly 1.3 (1967), PP. 10-16.

O'donnel, Teresa D. and Judith L. Paiva, Independent Writing. (Illinois: Scott, Foresman and Company, 1986).

Oshima, A. and Ann Houge, Writing Academic English, (London: Longman, 2nd ed., 1991).

Ostler, S., "Academic and Ethnic background as factors affecting writing performance" in A. Purves (Ed.), Writing across Languages and Cultures: Issues in Contrastive Rhetoric, (Newbury Park, CA: Sage, 1987, PP. 261-272).

Quirk et. al., A Comprehensive Grammar of the English Language. (London: Longman, 1985).


Notes

(1) For a discussion of the Arabic conjunctive particles, see Holes, 1995, pp. 217-225.

(2) See Hamdan, Jihad and Shehdeh Fareh. "The Translation of Arabic Wa into English: Some Problems and Implications" in Dirasat, Human and Social Sciences, Volume (26), No. (2), 1999: 590-601.

(3) Subordinate clauses with a dropped particle were also considered instances of subordination. For example:

  فهو كاتب مقالة من الطراز الأول ومحاضر يمتاز بقدرة خارقة على المحاججة))

(4)   Cf. Mohamed, Ayisha (1993). A Contrastive Study of Syntactic Relations, Cohesion, and Punctuation as Markers of Rhetorical Organization in Arabic and English Narrative Texts. Unpublished dissertation, the University of Exeter. See also Thompson-Panos, Karyn and Maria Thomas-Ruzic . "The Least You Should Know about Arabic: Implications for ESL Writing Instructor." In TESOL Quarterly, 17.4 (1983): 609-623.

 (5) The English Corpus:

I. The Mayor of Casterbridge: abridged and simplified by Lewis Jones, London, Collins and Glasgow, 1979.

II. "Naguib Mahfouz & Thomas Hardy: Stoic Heroism in the Realistic Novels": Dr. A. Clare Brandabur (in consultation with Ustaz Awni Abu Ghosh). Proceedings of the First International Conference on Arabic-English Contrastive & Comparative Studies, August 23-28, 1997.

III. "America and Jerusalem": Don Peretz, 1996 Symposium, Center for contemporary Arab Studies. http://www.georgetown.edu/sfs/programs/ccas/jerusalem/peretz.htm.

IV. M.H. Abrams (ed.). The Norton Anthology of English Literature. Vol. 2 New York: W.W. Norton & Company 1993.

V. "Time Travelers: A Survey of the Gulf", The Economist, March 23, 2002.

(6) The Arabic Corpus:

1) "التكنولوجيا والثقافة والإنسان العربي": أ.د. عبد المجيد نصير، مجلة أفكار، العدد 162، عمان 2002.

2) نحن والعصر، مفاهيم ومصطلحات إسلامية: ناصر الدين الأسد، المؤسسة العربية للدراسات والنشر، بيروت، 1998.

3) الغرف الأخرى: جبرا ابراهيم جبرا، المؤسسة العربية للدراسات والنشر، بيروت، 1986.

4) "أريد اللغة الأخرى": د. عبد الرحمن ياغي، مجلة شؤون استراتيجية، المجلد الأول، العدد الأول 2002.

5) "شرط ارسال قوات عربية للعراق": فهمي هويدي، صحيفة العرب اليوم، المجلد 7، العدد 2256، 2003.

(7) The Translated Corpus:

1) "البطولة الرواقية في الروايات الواقعية لتوماس هاردي ونجيب محفوظ": كلير براندابور، ورقة بحث قدمت إلى المؤتمر العالمي للدراسات التقابلية والمقارنة العربية-الانجليزية  المنعقد في الجامعة الأردنية من 23-28/8/1997.

2) "شؤون أمريكية": تي ترينت غيغاكس وجون باري، نيوزويك، 16 أغسطس 2002.

3) "الليبرالية والفردية والهوية": كوامي أنتوني آبيه، ترجمة محمد يونس، الثقافة العالمية، العدد 110، يناير-فبراير 2002.

4) نظريات التعلم، دراسة مقارنة، ج 2: تحرير جورج مز غازدا وريموند ج كورسي، ترجمة علي حسين حجاج، عالم المعرفة، العدد 108، 1986.

5) "ملف خاص عن ادوارد سعيد": ماليز رونغن، ترجمة الياس سعيد، صحيفة الدستور الأردنية، 3/10/2003.

 (8) Nida and Taber (1982:203) contend that a natural text should "use grammatical constructions and combinations of words which do not violate the ordinary pattern of a language". An unnatural text is also pejoratively termed translationese or third language. Cf. Nida, Eugene A. & Charles R. Taber (1982) The Theory and Practice of Translation. Leiden: E.J.Brill

(9) The use of electronic corpora as a source for studying features of translation is a new methodology in translation studies. Several corpora have been built for this purpose. See also Baker, M. (1995). "Corpora in Translation Studies: An Overview and Suggestions for Future Research", in Target, no. 7 (2), pp.223-243.

Works Cited

Aziz, Yowell Y. (1989). A Contrastive Grammar of English and Arabic. Mosul: University of Mosul.

Haines, Simon and Barbara Stewart. (1996). New First Certificate Masterclass: Student's Book.  Oxford: OUP.

Holes, Clives. (1995). Modern Arabic: Structure, Functions and Varieties. London: Longman.

Kaplan, Robert B. "Contrastive Rhetoric and the Teaching of Composition." Tesol Quarterly 1.3 (1967): 10-16.

O'donnel, Teresa D. and Judith L. Paiva. (1986). Independent Writing. Illinois: Scott, Foresman and Company.

Oshima, A. and Ann Houge (1991). Writing Academic English, 2nd ed. London

Ostler, S. (1987). "Academic and Ethnic background as factors affecting writing performance" in A. Purves (Ed.), Writing across Languages and Cultures: Issues in Contrastive Rhetoric (pp. 261-272) Newbury Park, CA: Sage

Quirk et. al. (1985). A Comprehensive Grammar of the English Language. London: Longman.


العطف والإتباع في الترجمة

وليد عثمان

جامعة الإسراء

ملخص:

العطف والإتباع ظاهرتان لغويتان تستخدمان في الكتابة العربية والإنجليزية، غير أنّ اللغتين تختلفان في درجة ميل كل منهما إلى إحدى الظاهرتين دون الأخرى، إذ يقال إن الإنجليزية توظف الإتباع أكثر مما توظف العطف، بينما تنحى العربية منحىً معاكساً. وليس غرض هذا البحث إثبات هذه المقولة أو دحضها، بل التوصل إلى الطريقة المتبعة للتعامل مع العطف والإتباع في الترجمة من الإنجليزية إلى العربية بشكل عام. ولتحقيق هذا الهدف، يستخدم الباحث أنواعاً ثلاثة من النصوص: نصوص مكتوبة بالإنجليزية، ونصوص مكتوبة بالعربية، وأخرى مترجمة من الإنجليزية إلى العربية. وقد استقيت هذه النصوص من ميادين وعلوم مختلفة، ذلك أن الباحث يسعى للوصول إلى تعميم بخصوص الفرضية السابقة - تعميم يمكن أن يشكل انطلاقة لأبحاث متخصصة عدة. وقد اتبع الباحث في دراسته للنصوص أداة بسيطة قامت على حصر أمثلة العطف والإتباع في كل مجموعة من النصوص، ثم تحويل الناتج إلى نسب، ومقارنة النتائج في المجموعات الثلاثة. من خلال ذلك سيتبين إن كانت النصوص المترجمة إلى العربية  تميل في استخدامها للعطف والإتباع إلى تلك النصوص المكتوبة بالعربية، أو إلى النصوص المكتوبة بالإنجليزية.  يختتم البحث بعدد من التوصيات.









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