constructing pathways to translation - Higher Education Commission

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described procedures are always available to the translator, but he may decide that this
might cost him more, communicatively, than it could contribute to the faithfulness of
translation.
VII. Addition:
Addition of cultural information may turn out to be a necessary procedure in translation
of the implicit elements of culture. The original sender, addressing a group of receivers
with whom he shares particular cultural knowledge, leaves something unsaid. The
translator addresses an out group, which lacks that knowledge and requires explicit
cultural information, through the use of brackets or dots or italicized added information,
which enables the receivers of the translation to grasp the original sender’s intended
communication. Without its use, communication would be impossible or at best
defective.
Cultural Transmission is thus a mater of compensation and compromises, which have to
be met at certain levels and in systematic way.
2.6.7.2 COMPROMISE AND COMPENSATION
Translation is fraught with compromise. This means reconciling oneself to the fact that,
while one would like to do full justice to the ‘richness’ of the ST. one’s TT suffers from
various translation losses. Compromise should be the result of deliberate decisions taken
in the light, not only of what latitudes are allowed by the SL and TL, but also of all the
factors that can play a determining role in translation. They include: the nature of ST, its
relationship to the SL audiences, to purpose of the TT, its putative audience, and so forth.
Only then can the translator have a firm grasp of which aspects of the ST can be
sacrificed, with the least detriment to the effectiveness of the TT, both as a rendering of
the ST and as a TL text in its own right.
It is when faced with apparently unsuitable and unacceptable compromises, that
translators may feel the need to resort to techniques referred to as Compensation. They
are the techniques of making up for the loss of important ST features through replicating
ST effects, approximately in the TT by means other than those used in the ST. For
methodological purposes, it is useful to distinguish between four aspects of
compensation.