QUANG NAM PROVINCIAL PEOPLE’S COMMITTEE QUANG NAM UNIVERSITY DEPARTMENT OF FOREIGN LANGUAGE TAN THI MY VUONG A STUDY OF CHANGES IN THE VIETNAMESE TRANSLATIONS OF PREPOSITION PHRASES IN VANITY FAIR BY WILLIAM MAKEPEACE THACKERAY GRADUATION PAPER Quang Nam, May 2018 QUANG NAM PROVINCIAL PEOPLE’S COMMITTEE QUANG NAM UNIVERSITY DEPARTMENT OF FOREIGN LANGUAGE GRADUATION PAPER A STUDY OF CHANGES IN THE VIETNAMESE TRANSLATIONS OF PREPOSITION PHRASES IN VANITY FAIR BY WILLIAM MAKEPEACE THACKERAY RESEARCHER TAN THI MY VUONG STUDENT CODE: 2114020851 MAJOR:ENGLISH ACADEMIC COURSE: 2014-2018 SUPERVISOR: DOAN PHAN ANH TRUC, M.A Quang Nam, May 2018 ACKNOWLEDGE Firstly and foremost, I would like to express my gratitude to all those who gave me the possibility to complete this study. I want to thank the Foreign Language Department of Quang Nam University for giving me the permission to commence this study in the first instance and to do the necessary research work. I also would like to show my profound gratitude to my supervisor, Mrs. Doan Phan Anh Truc, M.A, whose reference materials, support, stimulation, suggestions and encouragement help me in all stages of this research for and writing of this study.
Besides, I am deeply indebted to my beloved family for their wholehearted support and encouragement. I also would like to dedicate my special thanks to my classmates from English class DT14TAN02 , who have supported, cooperated and provided me with valuable suggestions. Finally, I cannot fully express my gratitude to all people whose direct and indirect support assisted me to accomplish my study in time. ABSTRACT The research paper examines some types of translation shifts : class shifts, unit/ rank shifts, structure shifts on the basic of 200 samples taken from " Vanity Fair".
We will discuss and point out translation shifts in Vietnamese translations as well as give recommendation to employ translation shifts for translation skill. The study is to help learners realize how preposition phrases of place are translated into Vietnamese so that they would be able to use shifts effectively. ABBREVIATIONS NP: Noun phrase VP: Verb phrase AP: Adjective phrase PP: Preposition phrase P: Preposition N: Noun V: Verb SL: Source language TL: Target language LIST OF THE TABLES AND FIGURES Table 2. The word order of noun phrases in Vietnamese.
The word order of verb phrases in Vietnamese. The word order of adjective phrases. Distribution of structure shifts in English Table 4. The changes of preposition phrases when preposition phrases have function as post modifiers in verb phrases.Occurences of structure shifts of preposition phrases of place when preposition phrases play the roles as post modifiers in noun phrases.
Structure shifts used in the novel " Vanity Fair" Figure 4. Structure shifts of preposition phrases of place when preposition phrase of place play the roles as post modifiers in verb phrases. Structure shifts of preposition phrases of place when preposition phrases play the role as post modifiers in noun phrases. TABLE OF CONTENTS ACKNOWLEDGE.
Significance of the Study. Scope of the Study. Aims and Objectives of the Study. Aims of the Study.
Objectives of the Study. Organization of the Study. 4 LITERATURE REVIEW AND THEORETICAL BACKGROUND. Concept of translation.
Main translation methods. Preposition phrases in English. Concept of Preposition phrases of Place. Types of preposition phrases of place.
Phrases in Vietnamese. Phrases in Vietnamese. Preposition phrases in Vietnamese. 20 METHOD AND PROCEDURE.
Validity and Reliability. 22 FINDING AND DISCUSSION. Preposition phrases of place play the roles as post modifiers in verb phrases .Preposition phrases have function as post modifiers in noun phrases. The frequency of Structure shifts in the Vietnamese translations of Preposition phrase of Place.
Discussions of the Findings. Pedagogical implications for translation shifts of Preposition phrase of Place. Implication for translation learning. Implications for translation teaching.
Recommendation for teaching. Recommendation for learning. Recommendation for further study. Rationale Translation can be considered an indispensable part in the fields of not only literature, culture and religion but also commercial advertisements, popular entertainment, public administration, and education, etc.
Translation plays a key role in the universalization of human knowledge. It helps improve international understanding, socio-cultural awareness, professional communicative activities, implements of technologies, and so on. Translation is an core subject for the English major students at Quang Nam University. It exploits our knowledge on different fields so we are required to equip not only specified knowledge and vocabulary but also translation theory.
For example, learners need to know how changes occur when they translate a noun phrase, a verb phrase or a preposition phrase into English. To do this, it is obligatory for us to grasp the theory of shifts in translation. Translation is a multi- skilled process so it causes a lot of difficulties for leaners in choosing correct methods and using equivalents in the target text. Especially it is also difficult for learners to translate preposition phrases of place because they are not confident to use necessary changes instead of using the word-for-word technique very often.
Specifically learners do not understand of shifts in translation so it is not easy for them to apply them to target translated versions. As a result, they can mistranslate or convey wrong meanings. Up to now, there has not been any study of shifts in the Vietnamese translations of English preposition phrases of place. Therefore, we choose the topic ― A study of changes in the Vietnamese translation of preposition phrases in Vanity Fair by William Makepeace Thackeray”.
We hope that our research paper will make a contribution to the learners' improvement of translation. Significance of the Study The researchers hope that this study, to some extent, can be useful for English learners in general and translators in particular to identify changes of 1 preposition phrases of place in Vietnamese translations. Moreover, it helps reduce the ambiguity of shifts for English learners as well as reduce mistakes in translation. Especially, the English major students can get a lot of benefits from this study in order to partly improve their translation competence.
In general, the findings of the study can be a potential source for using and translating preposition phrases from English to Vietnamese effectively. Scope of the Study Due to limitation of time, space, knowledge and experience in this paper we just focus on preposition phrases of place and changes in the Vietnamese translation of preposition phrases of place mentioned in Vanity Fair by William Makepeace Thackeray. Aims and Objectives of the Study 1. Aims of the Study This study aims at helping translators be able to understand clearly about changes in structure when translating English preposition phrases into Vietnamese.
Furthermore, the aim is to help English learners translate preposition phrases of place more accurately and partly improve translation skill. Objectives of the Study This study is intended to: Identify changes in the Vietnamese translation of preposition phrases of place showed in Vanity Fair by William Makepeace Thackeray. Give some effective suggestions for translating preposition phrases of place as well as some learning ways to enhance learners’ translation skills. Research Questions The study seeks answers to the retailing research questions: 1.
What are the changes in Vietnamese translations of preposition phrases of place in Vanity Fair by William Makepeace Thackeray? What are some implications of the research on the learning and teaching of translation shifts of preposition phrases of place? 2 What are some suggestions that learners can apply to improve translation skill? 1. Organization of the Study. The research includes 5 chapters as below: Chapter 1 Introduction The chapter is the introduction of our study including rationale, aims and objective of the study, the scope of the study and organization of the study. Chapter 2 Literature Review The chapter consists of two parts -The first part is a review of previous research related to the paper.
-The second part provides the theoretical background for the study. It also involves key terms of the study Chapter 3 Method and Procedure The chapter mentions that the research methodology carried out in the research involving research design, data collection and data analysis and validity and reliability. Chapter 4 Finding and Discussion The chapter presents the results and a discussion of the findings of the analysis conducted in exploring translation shifts in the Vietnamese translation of preposition phrases of place in novel "Vanity Fair" by William Makepeace Thackeray. Chapter 5: Conclusion and Implications The chapter summarizes and concludes what has been done in the research, implications of the study points and limitations of the study as well as some recommendations for further researches.
3 CHAPTER 2 LITERATURE REVIEW AND THEORETICAL BACKGROUND 2. Literature Review Regarding translation shifts, Vinay and Darbelnet's (1958, 2000 : 88-89) mention that shifts as a transposition which " involves replacing one word class with another without changing the meaning of the message " as a modulation which show " a variation of the form of the message, obtained by a change in the point of view". Catford (1965) gives a new opinion to analyze translation shifts. He refers to translation equivalences as a range of difference levels such as phonology, graphology, grammar or lexis and ranks where the equivalence is " sentences to sentence, at another, group - to - group, at another word - to- word".
In Catford's view, there are key differences between formal correspondence and textual equivalence. According to Munday (2001:60), textual equivalence is tied to particular Source language ( SL) - Target languge (TT) pair, while formal equivalence is a more general system - based concept between a pair of languages. Nida and Taber (2003: 12) focus on rendering the meaning of a text, rather than of any single linguistic pair, certain radical departures from the formal structures are not only legitimate but may even be desirable. Chi (2014) defines rank/ unit shifts based on two directions: shifts up the rank which " explicate the implicit message compacted in the nominalized constructions necessitate the tendency to go beyond the rank of the de-verbal noun with new added elements' and shift down the rank which tend to be simpler in the structure, removing any complication in expression if possible to maintain a clear message to the potential readership.
Trang (2016) explores types of translation shift in the Vietnamese translation of nominal group describing nature in the series of " a little House" by Laura Ingalls Wilder and " Wuther height" by Emily Bronte. Truc and Chi (2017) study types of shifts via Vietnamese translation of English Intensifiers. The authors refer translation shifts of intensifiers occurred in the Vietnamese translation including class shifts and unit/rank shifts and structure shifts. 4 As for preposition study, there have been many works on preposition phrases in general.
Quirk et al (1972) shows that Preposition phrase of Place are typical either adjuncts (relating an even or state of affairs to a location) or post - modifiers ( relating some object to a location). According to Collins (2001), adjuncts consisting of a preposition and a noun group, such as ―in a box‖ and ― to the station‖, are called preposition phrases. Tra (2005) studies English preposition of place and analysis of errors made by secondary school students and ― a study on preposition phrase of time in English by Trang (2009)‖ and Dieu (2010) mentions preposition of direction and some errors made by Vietnamese learners. Although many studies of preposition phrases in translation have been carried out, there have been few studies of changes in Vietnamese translations of English preposition phrases.
A study of changes in the Vietnamese translations of preposition phrases in Vanity Fair by William Makepeace Thackeray is completely new. The study is in hope of putting some useful practical suggestions for teaching and learning preposition phrases translation. Concept of translation According to Wikipedia, translation is the interpreting of the meaning of a text and the subsequent production of an equivalent text, likewise called a translation that communicates the same message in another language.