Translation and sociolinguistics

Language varies depending not only on the individual speaker but also on the specific situation in which speakers find themselves. This means that the language used in a given social envi­ronment may be perfectly translatable into a different language, but the society to which this other language belongs may not recognise the situation described by the first language.

This ­article presents some examples of cultural values which cannot be translated literally (or which, if translated literally, will convey a message not intended in the original language/culture) and reaches the conclusion that, as a result of all this, there cannot be a simple answer to whether language can translate society. In some cases, it will be perfectly possible; in others, the translator will have to adopt a technique which reflects the society he or she is translating for, rather than the society described in the original text.