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Article published In: Im/politeness and Stage Translation
Edited by Maria Sidiropoulou
[Translation and Translanguaging in Multilingual Contexts 6:1] 2020
► pp. 26–44

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Blaming, critique and irritation in the family through translation

 | National and Kapodistrian University of Athens
Published online: 17 February 2020
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https://doi.org/10.1075/ttmc.00042.rig
Abstract
This study intends (a) to heighten awareness of how impoliteness scholarship may enlighten translation research and practice, and (b) to broaden the scope of research in impoliteness studies by considering stage translation data. It examines Tennessee Williams’ play The Glass Menagerie (Williams, Tennessee. [1944] 2018. The Glass Menagerie. London: Bloomsbury.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar) and two of its Greek translated versions (by Τεννεσή Ουίλλιαμς. 1946/1987. Γυάλινος Κόσμος. Μεταφρ. Νίκος Σπανιάς [Glass World, translated by Nikos Spanias] Αθήνα: Δωδώνη.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar, Γυάλινος Κόσμος [Glass World] and by . 2001/2014. Ο Γυάλινος Κόσμος. Μεταφρ. Ερρίκος Μπελιές [The Glass World, translated by Errikos Belies]. Αθήνα: Ηριδανός.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar, Ο Γυάλινος Κόσμος [The Glass World]). It attempts an intra-cultural comparison of the two translations to examine how translators rendered impoliteness in family interaction, taking into account their chronological gap. The study takes an emic perspective to the data, designs a questionnaire eliciting respondents’ evaluation of impolite options and uses Garcia-Pastor, Maria D. 2008. “Political Campaign Debates as Zero-sum Games: Impoliteness and Power in Candidates’ Exchanges.” In Impoliteness in Language: Studies on its Interplay with Power in Theory, ed. by Derek Bousfield, and Miriam Locher, 101–123. Berlin: Walter de Gruyter.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar model of face-aggravating strategies to account for the findings. Findings show that the second translation conveys the conflict between the main characters in more concrete terms, exploiting more face-aggravating strategies in relation to the first translation. The study also shows that the respondents seem to favour more impolite renderings by considering the characters’ intimate relationships, confirming the connection between intimacy and impoliteness. The significance of the research lies in the fact that it broadens the scope of (im)politeness theory and studies to include another field that could provide data for the research of such instances of interaction, namely translation studies and in that it shows the validity of pragmatics in enlightening translation practice.
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.On impoliteness and methodology
  • 3.Presentation of the empirical data
    • 3.1Putting the blame on others
    • 3.2Critique and offensive language
    • 3.3Expressing irritation and indignation
  • 4.Discussion of the results
  • References
  • Texts
References (22)
References
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Texts
Williams, Tennessee. [1944] 2018. The Glass Menagerie. London: Bloomsbury.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Τεννεσή Ουίλλιαμς. 1946/1987. Γυάλινος Κόσμος. Μεταφρ. Νίκος Σπανιάς [Glass World, translated by Nikos Spanias] Αθήνα: Δωδώνη.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. 2001/2014. Ο Γυάλινος Κόσμος. Μεταφρ. Ερρίκος Μπελιές [The Glass World, translated by Errikos Belies]. Αθήνα: Ηριδανός.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
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