Volume 14 Issue 2, 2020

Translation has been mandatory for global communication and Translation Studies (TS) as a distinct discipline has been of paramount importance in the current context of linguistic and cultural hybridity elsewhere. TS has been introduced as a teaching subject at different Universities of Nepal. Therefore, it is the right time to evaluate the tendency of the major stakeholders, i.e. students towards the discipline. In this context, this study aimed to observe the students' attitudes towards it. For obtaining this, a survey research design was used. The tool for collecting data was a close-ended questionnaire consisting of fifteen statements, which represented cognitive, affective, and behavioural attitudes. The subjects were 105 students who had already passed B. Ed., majoring TS course. The findings indicated that the subjects had positive attitudes towards the TS course. The results also proved that TS resources and materials should be student-friendly, informative, interesting, and accessible to the students.
Keywords: Affective, Attitude, Behavioural, Cognitive, Translation Studies.

In the contemporary times, the horizons of knowledge are no more confined to a singular language but encompass a variety of knowledge systems; existing in the form of different literature(s), languages, and the cultures represented through them. “Knowledge has become plural now”, notes A K Singh, and translation is increasingly perceived as an essential facilitator to access this multitude of knowledge(s). Translation, then, is shouldered with a two-fold responsibility of representing the source language/culture and of introducing new concepts and ideas to the target language readers. In that case, it becomes extremely important to explore and understand the crucial role played by Translation Criticism in the negotiations of literature(s), cultures, and ideas between two languages through translation. Going beyond the rather limiting ideas of evaluation and analysis, Translation Criticism attempts to discuss a translation essentially as a translation. Considering the above arguments, this paper sets out to explore the complex relationship of Translation, Translation Criticism, and the Translation Critic. Furthermore, it also attempts to fathom the ways in which Translation Criticism enriches translation by initiating a constructive discourse around it and vice versa. The paper also addresses various issues surrounding Translation Criticism especially in the context of Gujarati-English Translation. The last part of the paper consists of a holistic critique of a Gujarati short story in English translation. The short story selected for the critique is titled “Nā Kauṁs maaṁ, Nā Kauṁs Bahār” by Saroj Pathak and translated into English as “Neither Within Parantheses Nor Without” by Rita Kothari.
Keywords: Translation Criticism, Translation Studies, Indian Literature in English Translation, Gujarati Literature in English Translation.

The paper will explore the products and processes in intersemiotic transfers to start with. These instances in ‘Transculturation’ become interesting as they give rise to further theoretical debates. For example, one could raise another question as to whether the ‘Feminist Film Theories’ of the West could be applicable in the context of a different culture where textual translations happen from the verbal to the visual forms. For instance, one could test if the propositions espoused by the likes of Laura Mulvey (1975), Teresa de Lauretis (1987), and Kaja Silverman (1988) as under a feminist approach would be applicable while studying the trajectory of Indian movies. Intercultural translations being perhaps most prevalent and readily evident in the commercial films today, have numerous examples in Bollywood movies, art-house parallel movies, and the low-budget new Indian movies. The other category presents a blend of the two polarities, borrowing features of commercial and art-house films, yet, not strictly confined to either. The only thing common among them is making a text fit into another cultural context or any other culture. The facilitation of viewing a film text in any or many languages (on multiple platforms) has thrown up a new kind of challenge to those engaged in the intersemiotic transfer. We argue here that a discourse on intersemiotic translation has much to draw from feminist film theories. Translating a critical approach that originates in one culture and to let it gain entry into another culture is a challenge in praxis. In the process, we offer a few observations on how the degrading standards of commercial Indian movies could change if we can implement some universally acceptable positions on gender equity.
Keywords: Intersemiotic Translation, Feminist Film Theory, Gender Equity, Transculturation.

The translation is essentially a cultural activity. The instrument of translation is language and a language can’t be dissociated from its culture. The inter-language translation poses various challenges to a translator especially when it is a literary translation. The chief among these is locating cultural equivalence in the target language. Another significant challenge is to select a proper approach to translation, that is, translation strategies. The present paper attempts a critical assessment of the English translation of Satish Alekar’s trendsetting play Mahanirvan (1974) (The Dread Departure) in terms of the cultural issues in translation. For this purpose, the concepts in Translation Studies such as equivalence, literal and liberal translation, domestication, and foreignization have been critically used as these terms essentially focus on the cultural dimensions of the translation process. The focus of the article, however, is on the experiences of a reader of reading the text in its source language, that is, Marathi, and its target language, that is, English.
Keywords: Language, Culture, Translation, Equivalence, Domestication, Foreignization.

This essay is primarily an attempt to lay out the intricacies of the process that have been experienced while translating in English what is perhaps the best-known nonsense verse of our country, Abol Tabol (containing fifty-three poems) by Sukumar Ray written in Bengali. This analytical process also reflects upon similar difficulties one may encounter in translating nonsense verse in general. The short Part I of the essay considers the challenges of translation, which critics have always pronounced and which has been experienced by this writer. Part II specifically discusses how these challenges are encountered in translating Abol Tabol. It considers the linguistic eccentricities of Bengali that make the translator’s task difficult, but also rewarding; and it also considers other nuances of verse translations such as the use of rhyme, rhythm, vocabulary, proverbs and idiomatic expressions, word coining, etc. each of which is assessed especially in the context of Abol Tabol translation. This article also presents a few samples of individual pieces of translated poems by this author wherever they help amplifying the points discussed.
Keywords: Translation, Language, Rhyme, Rhythm, Sukumar Ray.

This paper attempts to look at the challenges and problems faced while translating the oral songs of Mavilan tribe into English. Mavilan community, an indigenous group, settled in Kannur and Kasaragod districts of Kerala has unique oral songs that reveal their way of life. These oral songs replete with cultural references are loaded with specific meaning to the tribe. These songs are a cultural tool to study about the tribe. In order to disseminate their rich cultural heritage it is necessary to translate their language. However while translating the songs into English, it is found insufficient to convey the rich cultural meaning intended. Against this backdrop through the analysis of the select oral songs of the tribe, this paper delves into some of the challenges faced during the translation and proposes some possible solutions that might augment the preservation and dissemination of their language.
Keywords: Indigenous Language, Mavilan Tribe, Oral Songs, Translation, Culture.

Children’s Literature has been marginalised because of the reading audience’s age. Translation and Translation Studies suffer from a similar fate due to the concept of authorship and originality that has governed the field of arts and aesthetics. Children’s stories serve not only to enhance the reader’s language skills but also plays a role in the development of empathy and other moral values which has been identified as major didactic role of this genre. Since the reading audience is still learning the language, a word-to-word rendering of the source language will transform the word play, jingles, cultural proverbs and jokes into incomprehensible content. This paper is a working model of translating children’s literature and discusses the problems of translating from English to Hindi. For the present research Roald Dahl’s novel “Fantastic Mr. Fox” was translated from English to Hindi. The author’s official website states that his stories have been translated into 58 languages around the world including Marathi, Tamil and Bengali[1]. Hindi is one of the most spoken languages in India, but since there was no translation of Roald Dahl’s stories available in Hindi (to the author’s best knowledge), the first objective of research was to translate his novels. The paper addresses the debate between foreignization and domestication, between fidelity towards the author and fidelity towards the readers. It also discusses the quality of anthropomorphism which is special to children’s stories but represents the cultural symbolic meaning attached to animals. The questions raised by the study are: how does the translator bridge the gap between the foreign text and his readers? Does domestication strategy do justice to the author’s imagery and topographical descriptions? Is foreignization essential in order to introduce the readers to far off lands?
Keywords: Children’s Literature, Translation, Fidelity, Cultural Symbolism.

Akira Kurosawa the Japanese film director is perhaps one of the most influential of filmmakers in the history of cinema. Rashomon (1950) directed by him is perhaps the best known Japanese film outside Japan. The film is an adaptation of two short stories by Akutagawa, the father of Japanese short story, namely In a Groove and Rashomon. My paper proposes to do a comparative study on how the genre of short story can be translated into a completely different medium of visual expression called the film by analysing the movie Rashomon. Has Kurosawa done a complete makeover with the original short stories? If yes, how far has he deviated from the original? What makes Rashomon such a special film and Kurosawa an ace moviemaker? These will be some of the basic questions under discussion in the paper.
Keywords: Fiction, Film, Intertextuality, Adaptation, Translation.

Like any language that relies on translation for its own enrichment, Urdu also benefitted from translation. In its journey of evolution, Urdu not only witnessed production of great works but also an influx of significant works that were translated from various languages into Urdu every now and then. Besides men who created literary works in Urdu while displaying their talents in various genres, women played their part too and translated many works of fiction and non-fiction. This paper surveys women Urdu translators and their literary contributions in various genres.
Keywords: Women Translators, Urdu Translation, Indian Women Writers.