Translation Studies

... TRANSLATION STUDIES INTRODUCTION 1 CENTRAL ISSUES Language and culture The first step towards an examination of the process of translation must be to accept that although translation has a central core of linguistic activity, it belongs most properly to semiotics, the science that studies sign systems or structures, sign processes and sign functions (Hawkes, Structuralism and Semiotics, London, 1977). Beyond the notion stressed by the narrowly linguistic approach, that translation involves the transfer of 'meaning' contained in one set of language signs through competent use of the dictionary and grammar, the process involves a whole set of extra-linguistic criteria also. Edward Sapir claims that 'language is a guide to social reality' and that human beings are at the mercy of the language that has become the medium of expression for their society. Experience, he asserts, is largely determined by the language habits of the community, and each separate structure

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