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Untypical patterns in translations 103
2. Synonyms and the study of translations
2.1 Earlier studies on synonymity in translations
The study of synonymity and synonymous words have many aspects in common
with studies of translations and translated language – that is the case especially
in pre-corpus analyses of translation equivalents, but also recently in
corpus-based studies of translation universals. Before machine-readable translational
corpora were available, Blum-Kulka and Levenston (1983:119, 130–
131) suggested that the use of common-level or familiar synonyms might account
for lexical simplification in translations. In the 90’s, at least two scholars
shared their viewpoint: both Kohn (1996:48) and Laviosa-Braithwaite
(1997:533) claim that the limited use of synonyms may be a sign of lexical
simplificationintranslations.
The first corpus-based study that concentrates on both synonymity and
simplification is Jantunen (2001a). In that study it was reported, contrary to
earlier findings, that the range of synonymous words (amplifiers) is not narrower
in translations; in some cases the range of synonymous degree modifiers
is even wider in translations. Furthermore, it came out that translators do not
tend to favour the most frequent synonym(s) at the expense of the other members
of a group of synonyms. Mauranen (2000), however, has discovered that
one of the synonymous expressions was overrepresented in translations, while
another was favoured in non-translations. It seems that “a number of the differences
between translations and originals [non-translations] involved different
preferences in choosing between near-synonyms” (ibid. 138). These results are
an interesting basis for further investigations because they seem to show quite
opposite tendencies.
Synonyms can also be considered appropriate items in the analysis of
untypical patterns in translation. It is claimed that each member of a group of
synonymous words has distinct contexts in which they are used, and that this
trait differentiates the word from its synonyms. Thus, we can analyse, firstly,
what kind of contextual restrictions synonymous words have in language A,
and secondly, whether the same restrictions and usage of synonyms are present
in translations into the same language. In the next section, I shall describe some
of the inherent characteristics of synonyms in more detail.