Hacettepe University Graduate School Of Social Sciences Department of Translation and Interpreting A RELEVANCE THEORETIC PERSPECTIVE ON THE TRANSLATION OF CULTURE-SPECIFIC RELIGIOUS ITEMS: AN ANALYSIS OF THE ENGLISH TRANSLATION OF LATİFE TEKİN’S SEVGİLİ ARSIZ ÖLÜM AND İSKENDER PALA’S KATRE-İ MATEM Emine KARABULUT Master's Thesis Ankara, 2017 A RELEVANCE THEORETIC PERSPECTIVE ON THE TRANSLATION OF CULTURE-SPECIFIC RELIGIOUS ITEMS: AN ANALYSIS OF THE ENGLISH TRANSLATION OF LATĠFE TEKĠN‟S SEVGİLİ ARSIZ ÖLÜM AND ĠSKENDER PALA‟S KATRE-İ MATEM Emine KARABULUT Hacettepe University Graduate School Of Social Sciences Department of Translation and Interpreting Master's Thesis Ankara, 2017 DECLARATION I promise that my thesis/report is completely my own work and that I have provided a source for every quotation and citation. I give permission for paper and digital copies of my thesis/report to be kept in Hacettepe University‟s Graduate School of Social Sciences‟ archives under the conditions indicated below: My thesis/Report can be accessed in full from any location. My thesis/Report can only be accessed from Hacettepe University premises. I do not want my thesis/report to be accessed until 1 year later. After this amount of time if I have not applied to an extension of time, my thesis/report can be accessed in full from any location. 16.06.2017 Emine KARABULUT YAYIMLAMA VE FİKRİ MÜLKİYET HAKLARI BEYANI Enstitü tarafından onaylanan lisansüstü tezimin/raporumun tamamını veya herhangi bir kısmını, basılı (kâğıt) ve elektronik formatta arĢivleme ve aĢağıda verilen koĢullarla kullanıma açma iznini Hacettepe Üniversitesine verdiğimi bildiririm. Bu izinle Üniversiteye verilen kullanım hakları dıĢındaki tüm fikri mülkiyet haklarım bende kalacak, tezimin tamamının ya da bir bölümünün gelecekteki çalıĢmalarda (makale, kitap, lisans ve patent vb.) kullanım hakları bana ait olacaktır. Tezin kendi orijinal çalıĢmam olduğunu, baĢkalarının haklarını ihlal etmediğimi ve tezimin tek yetkili sahibi olduğumu beyan ve taahhüt ederim. Tezimde yer alan telif hakkı bulunan ve sahiplerinden yazılı izin alınarak kullanılması zorunlu metinlerin yazılı izin alınarak kullandığımı ve istenildiğinde suretlerini Üniversiteye teslim etmeyi taahhüt ederim. oTezimin/Raporumun tamamı dünya çapında erişime açılabilir ve bir kısmı veya tamamının fotokopisi alınabilir. (Bu seçenekle teziniz arama motorlarında indekslenebilecek, daha sonra tezinizin eriĢim statüsünün değiĢtirilmesini talep etseniz ve kütüphane bu talebinizi yerine getirse bile, teziniz arama motorlarının önbelleklerinde kalmaya devam edebilecektir) oTezimin/Raporumun 16.06.2018 tarihine kadar erişime açılmasını ve fotokopi alınmasını (İç Kapak, Özet, İçindekiler ve Kaynakça hariç) istemiyorum. (Bu sürenin sonunda uzatma için baĢvuruda bulunmadığım takdirde, tezimin/raporumun tamamı her yerden eriĢime açılabilir, kaynak gösterilmek Ģartıyla bir kısmı veya tamamının fotokopisi alınabilir) oTezimin/Raporumun……………..tarihine kadar erişime açılmasını istemiyorum ancak kaynak gösterilmek şartıyla bir kısmı veya tamamının fotokopisinin alınmasını onaylıyorum. o Serbest Seçenek/Yazarın Seçimi 16 /06/2017 Emine KARABULUT ETİK BEYAN Bu çalıĢmadaki bütün bilgi ve belgeleri akademik kurallar çerçevesinde elde ettiğimi, görsel, iĢitsel ve yazılı tüm bilgi ve sonuçları bilimsel ahlak kurallarına uygun olarak sunduğumu, kullandığım verilerde herhangi bir tahrifat yapmadığımı, yararlandığım kaynaklara bilimsel normlara uygun olarak atıfta bulunduğumu, tezimin kaynak gösterilen durumlar dıĢında özgün olduğunu, Tez DanıĢmanının Yard. Doç. Dr. Hilal ERKAZANCI DURMUġ danıĢmanlığında tarafımdan üretildiğini ve Hacettepe Üniversitesi Sosyal Bilimler Enstitüsü Tez Yazım Yönergesine göre yazıldığını beyan ederim. Emine KARABULUT v ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS Firstly, I would like to express my graditute to Assist. Prof. Dr. Hilal ERKAZANCI DURMUġ for her great encouragement and support in the process of writing this thesis. I feel much indebted to her for her precious guidance and kind assistance which enabled me to take a further step in the completion of this present thesis. Her very deep knowledge in translation studies has always inspired me and contributed to me a lot in order to do my best in this thesis. I would like to thank at first Prof. Dr. Asalet ERTEN and all other distinguished assistant professors in the department of Translation Studies for providing me invaluable information to improve myself in my field. I am grateful to my husband, Turgut KARABULUT who always relieved my mind, motivated me in a positive way and shared his experiences so as to encourage me. Besides, I would like to thank my colleagues in School of Foreign Languages at Erzincan University for their worthwhile suggestions and big support. Finally, I express my gratitude towards my dear parents, Ġsmail KARAMAN, ġerife KARAMAN and my little sisters ġeymanur and Beyza KARAMAN who have always given a back in my life and made their best wishes. vi ABSTRACT KARABULUT, Emine. A Relevance Theoretic Perspective on The Translation of Culture-Specific Religious Items: An Analysis of the English Translation of Latife Tekin’s Sevgili Arsız Ölüm and İskender Pala’s Katre-i Matem, Master's Thesis, Ankara, 2017. The role of culture is undeniable in translation studies. Culture-specific items pose a great challenge for the translator in many cases because culture is a very extensive concept, and it encompasses beliefs, traditions, customs, perceptions, religion, a way of life, and a way of thinking. Since culture-specific items are different in each culture, translators need to pay attention to their translations in order to transmit the message produced by the source-text author. This study aims at analyzing the culture-specific items in Latife Tekin‟s Sevgili Arsız Ölüm (2013), which is translated by Saliha Paker and Mel Kenne in 2008, and Ġskender Pala‟s Katre-i Matem (2009), which is translated by Ruth Whitehouse in 2014, focusing on the translation strategies proposed by Javier Franco Aixelá (1996) within the framework of a relevance-theoretic approach to translation which is proposed by Ernest August Gutt (1991). The translation strategies proposed by Aixelá will be used as the micro strategies, and Gutt‟s direct and indirect translation concepts will be used as the macro strategies in this thesis. This study focuses on the relevance-theoretic perspective on the translation of culture-specific items since the contextual effects of the culture-specific items and the strategies used by the translators to convey those contextual effects can be dealt within the framework of relevance theory, which is a context-based theory that explains the creation of a context through the presence of certain clues (that is, ostensive stimuli) such as culture-specific items. This study also aims at illustrating how the context of a target text may differ from the context of its source text in direct translation and in indirect translation. Keywords: culture-specific items, relevance theory, direct translation, indirect translation, translation strategies, context, contextual effect. vii ÖZET KARABULUT, Emine. Dini Kültürel Öğelerin Çevirisi Üzerine Bağıntı Kuramı Yaklaşımı: Latife Tekin’in Sevgili Arsız Ölüm ve İskender Pala’nın Katre-i Matem Romanlarının İngilizce Çevirilerinin Analizi, Yüksek Lisans Tezi, Ankara, 2017. Çeviribilimde kültürün rolü yadsınamaz. Kültür çok geniĢ bir kavram olup bir milletin inançları, gelenekleri, görenekleri, algıları, dini, yaĢam Ģekli ve düĢünme biçimini kapsar. Kültürel öğeler, her kültürde farklı olduğundan, çevirmenler bu öğelerdeki yazar tarafından üretilen mesajı iletmek için kültürel öğelerin çevirisine özen göstermelidir. Bu çalıĢma, Javier Franco Aixelá (1966) tarafından öne sürülen çeviri stratejilerine göre ve Ernest August Gutt (1991) tarafından öne sürülen çeviriye bağıntı kuramı yaklaĢımı çerçevesinde Latife Tekin‟in 2008 yılında Saliha Paker ve Mel Kenne tarafından çevrilmiĢ Sevgili Arsız Ölüm (2013) romanı ve Ġskender Pala‟nın 2014 yılında Ruth Whitehouse tarafından çevrilmiĢ Katre-i Matem (2009) romanındaki kültürel öğeleri analiz etmeyi amaçlamaktadır. Aixelá‟nın öne sürdüğü çeviri stratejileri bu tezde mikro stratejiler ve Gutt‟un öne sürdüğü doğrudan (direct) ve dolaylı (indirect) çeviri kavramları ise makro stratejiler olarak kullanılacaktır. Bu çalıĢma, kültürel öğelerin çevirisini bağıntı kuramı perspektifinden incelemektedir, çünkü kültürel öğelerin bağlamsal etkisi (contextual effect) ve bu öğeleri hedef okuyucuya iletmek için çevirmenler tarafından kullanılan stratejiler, kültürel öğeler gibi bazı ipuçları (ostensive stimuli) aracılığıyla bağlam (context) oluĢumunu açıklayan bağlama dayalı bir kuram olan bağıntı kuramı çerçevesinde ele alınabilir. Ayrıca, bu tez, doğrudan çeviri ve dolaylı çeviri yönteminde, hedef metnin bağlamının kaynak metin bağlamından nasıl farklılaĢtığını açıklamayı da amaçlamaktadır. Anahtar Sözcükler: kültürel öğeler, bağıntı kuramı, doğrudan ve dolaylı çeviri yaklaĢımları, çeviri statejileri, bağlam, bağlamsal etki. viii TABLE OF CONTENT ACCEPTANCE AND APPROVAL ............................................................................... i DECLARATION .......................................................................................................... viii YAYIMLAMA VE FİKRİ MÜLKİYET HAKLARI BEYANI................................. vi ETİK BEYAN ............................................................................................................. viiiv ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ............................................................................................ v ABSTRACT .................................................................................................................... vi ÖZET .............................................................................................................................. vii TABLE OF CONTENT ............................................................................................. .viii LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS ....................................................................................... xi LIST OF TABLES ........................................................................................................ xii LIST OF FIGURES ..................................................................................................... xiii INTRODUCTION ........................................................................................................... 1 I. GENERAL FRAMEWORK OF THE THESIS............................................. 1 II. PURPOSE OF THE THESIS .......................................................................... 7 III. RESEARCH QUESTIONS .............................................................................. 8 IV. TEXT CHOICE ................................................................................................ 9 V. METHODOLOGY ........................................................................................... 9 VI. LIMITATIONS ............................................................................................... 11 VII. OUTLINE OF THE THESIS ......................................................................... 11 CHAPTER 1: CULTURE-SPECIFIC ITEMS .......................................................... 13 1.1. THE EMERGENCE OF CULTURAL TURN IN TRANSLATION STUDIES ......................................................................................................................................... 13 1.2. THE CONCEPT OF CULTURE-SPECIFIC ITEMS ........................................ 15 1.3 THE PROBLEMS IN THE TRANSLATION OF CULTURE- SPECIFIC ITEMS ............................................................................................................................ 19 1.4. THE STRATEGIES FOR THE TRANSLATION OF CULTURE- SPECIFIC ITEMS ............................................................................................................................ 22 1.4.1. Conservation Strategies ..................................................................................... 24 1.4.1.1. Repetition .................................................................................................... 24 1.4.1.2. Orthographic Adaptation ............................................................................ 25 ii iii …iv ix 1.4.1.3. Linguistic (non-cultural) Translation .......................................................... 26 1.4.1.4. Extratextual Gloss ....................................................................................... 27 1.4.1.5. Intratextual Gloss ........................................................................................ 28 1.4.2. Substitution Strategies ....................................................................................... 29 1.4.2.1. Synonymy ................................................................................................... 29 1.4.2.2. Limited Universalization ............................................................................ 30 1.4.2.3. Absolute Universalization........................................................................... 31 1.4.2.4. Naturalization.............................................................................................. 32 1.4.2.5. Deletion ....................................................................................................... 33 1.4.2.6. Autonomous Creation ................................................................................. 34 1.4.2.7. Attenuation.................................................................................................. 35 CHAPTER 2: RELEVANCE THEORY AND TRANSLATION ............................ 39 2.1. RELEVANCE THEORY ...................................................................................... 39 2.1.1. Context and Contextual Effect .......................................................................... 48 2.3. RELEVANCE THEORETIC PERSPECTIVES ON TRANSLATION ........... 54 2.3.1. Direct Translation and Indirect Translation ...................................................... 61 2.3.2. Relevance Theory For The Translation of Culture- Specific Items .................. 68 2.3.3. Categorization of Strategies For The Translation of Culture-Specific Items Within The Scope of Direct And Indirect Translation ................................................ 72 CHAPTER 3: CASE STUDIES ................................................................................... 75 3.1. SEVGİLİ ARSIZ ÖLÜM ...................................................................................... 75 3.1.1. About The Author, Novel and Translators ........................................................ 75 3.1.1.1. Latife Tekin................................................................................................. 75 3.1.1.2. The Plot Summary and The Language of The Novel ................................. 77 3.1.1.3. The Translators ........................................................................................... 80 3.1.2. The Analysis of The Culture-Specific Items In Sevgili Arsız Ölüm In The Light of Relevance Theory ................................................................................................... 83 3.1.2.1. Repetition .................................................................................................... 83 3.1.2.2. Linguistic Translation ................................................................................. 89 3.1.2.3. Orthographic Adaptation .......................................................................... 100 3.2. KATRE-İ MATEM .............................................................................................. 103 x 3.2.1. About The Author, Novel and Translator ....................................................... 103 3.2.1.1. Ġskender Pala ............................................................................................. 103 3.2.1.2. The Plot Summary and The Language of The Novel ............................... 103 3.2.1.3. The Translator ........................................................................................... 105 3.2.2. The Analysis of The Culture-Specific Items In Katre-i Matem In The Light of Relevance Theory ...................................................................................................... 106 3.2.2.1. Intratextual Gloss ...................................................................................... 106 3.2.2.2. Absolute Universalization......................................................................... 115 3.2.2.3. Naturalization............................................................................................ 117 3.2.2.4. Extratextual Gloss ..................................................................................... 118 3.2.2.5. Attenuation................................................................................................ 120 3.2.2.6. Limited Universalization .......................................................................... 121 3.2.2.7. Deletion ..................................................................................................... 122 3.3. DISCUSSION ....................................................................................................... 123 CONCLUSION ............................................................................................................ 127 BIBLIOGRAPHY ....................................................................................................... 136 APPENDIX 1. Originality Report ............................................................................. 154 APPENDIX 2. Ethics Board Waiver Form............................................................... 158 xi LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS Culture-specific item: CSI xii LIST OF TABLES Table 1. Macro-translation strategies Table 2. The translation strategies put forward by Aixelà for the translation of culture- specific items Table 3. Categorization of Aixelá 's strategies for culture-specific items on the basis of direct and indirect translation Table 4: Typology of intercultural manipulation by Aixelá Table 5: Categorization of Aixelá‟s translation strategies under Gutt‟s approaches Table 6: The result of the analysis of the translation of culture-specific items in Sevgili Arsız Ölüm Table 7: The result of the analysis of the translation of culture-specific items in Katre-i Matem xiii LIST OF FIGURES Figure 1: The analysis of translation strategies of Aixelà according to the translation approaches put forward by Gutt in Sevgili Arsız Ölüm Figure 2: The analysis of translation strategies proposed by Aixelà according to the translation approaches of Gutt in Katre-i Matem Figure 3: The analysis of direct and indirect translation approaches in Sevgili Arsız Ölüm and Katre-i Matem 1 INTRODUCTION I. GENERAL FRAMEWORK OF THE THESIS Culture is embedded in language, traditions, customs, behaviors, values, and religion of the society. Katan (1999) defines culture as “a shared system for interpreting reality and organizing experience” (p. 17). And Aixelá (1996) notes that “in a language everything is culturally produced, beginning with the language itself” (p. 57). Thus, the transference of the cultural concepts produced in a particular language by a society may be troublesome for the translator in translation process because these concepts reflect the habits, values, customs, and beliefs of that society, which in fact make up the culture of that society. These concepts are related to the “culture-specific artefacts, institutions and traditions” (Davies, 2003, p. 68), and Aixelá (1966) sees them as “culture-specific items” (p. 52). According to Robinson (1997), culture-specific items are “words and phrases that are so heavily and exclusively grounded in one culture that they are almost impossible to translate into the terms-verbal or otherwise-of another” (p. 222). As for Aixelá (1966), [c]ulture-specific items are usually expressed in a text by means of objects and of systems of classification and measurement whose use is restricted to the source culture, or by means of the transcription of opinions and the description of habits equally alien to the receiving culture. (p. 56) The translation of culture is hard. Hence, the translators are expected to be aware of the culture-specific items which may probably seem foreign to the target language readers. Relevance Theory put forward by Sperber and Wilson (1986, 1995) sheds a light on the difficulty of translation of culture-specific items since relevance theory is a cognitive- pragmatic theory that explains how the cross-cultural communication carries out between people from different languages and cultures (Martinez, 1988, p. 171). This study uses relevance theory as a theorical framework because it attaches great importance to the context and contextual effects. Sperber and Wilson (1987) define 2 context as "a psychological construct, a subset of the hearer's [reader‟s] assumptions about the world" (p. 698): [It] is not limited to information about the immediate physical environment or the immediately preceding utterances: expectations about the future, scientific hypotheses or religious beliefs, anecdotal memories, general cultural assumptions, beliefs about the mental state of the speaker, may all play a role in interpretation. (Sperber and Wilson, 1995, pp. 15-16) Obviously, context does not only refer to the physical environment of a text in relevance theory. The definition of context in relevance theory is so extensive that it also refers to the mental state of the reader (be it the source-text reader or the target-text reader) as well as the historical and sociocultural background of the reader. About this point, Gutt (2000a) states that, [c]ontext does not refer to some part of the external environment of the communication partners, be it the text preceding or following an utterance, situational circumstances, cultural factors, etc.; it rather refers to part of their “assumptions about the world” or cognitive environment, as it is called. (p. 27) It is absolutely crucial for the translator to cope with obstacles to interpretation and comprehension arising from the differences in context of source and target culture- specific items (Gutt, 2000a, p. 79). Then, it is substantial for the translator to make the message in culture-specific items explicit since the source language and culture author and readers‟ background information is not shared by the target language readers (Larson, 1984, p. 42). The recreation of the culture-specific items may lead to an unintended interpretation and comprehension on the part of the target-text reader owing to the different context of the readers (Gutt, 2000a, p. 99), and there may occur a risk for the readers to misinterpret and misapprehend the message carried by these culture- specific items due to the cross cultural differences. Hence, Gutt (2000a) states the fact that a message may be transferred to any reader irrespective of its context is not true (p. 101). If target readers are not familiar with the message of culture-specific items, it may be difficult for the translator to transfer the message underlying culture-specific items produced by the author. The translator may need to provide the necessary context which 3 is required for the target reader to comprehend the message. Hence, how translators produce the message produced by the author through culture-specific items has a vital importance. Relevance theory is chosen as the theoretical background of this thesis because it throws light on the translation of the culture-specific items providing an understanding of how the translator of culture-specific items recreate the source-text context through certain strategies and how the target reader grasps the message recreated by the translation message. Relevance theory forms a perspective in understanding the culture- specific items in this thesis. This thesis aims to reveal two macro strategies (namely, direct and indirect translation) that are used in the translation of culture-specific items in literary texts, and the study seeks to highlight the role of these two different strategies in creating a context for the target text reader. To that end, the strategies adopted by Gutt (1989) through his application of relevance theory to translation studies will be used as an umbrella term, in other words, macro-strategies of this study. Gutt’s Relevance-Theoretic Categorization of Translation Direct Translation Indirect Translation Table 1: Macro-translation strategies Direct translation is like direct quotation, and indirect translation is like indirect quotation in intralingual communication (Gutt, 1989, p. 197). Smith (2002) states that “Just as direct quotation endeavours to convey exactly what someone else said, so direct translation endeavours to convey all the assumptions conveyed by the source text” (p. 109). In direct quotation, the source text is reproduced in an effort to reproduce the linguistic properties (Gutt, 1989, p. 198). In direct translation, the translator transmits all the communicative clues of the culture-specific items by creating the same effect on the interpretation of the sentence when processed with the same background information. (Gutt, 1989, p. 253). Smith (2002) says that “a direct translation should create the impression of reading the receptor language in the source context. The idiom should be 4 natural to the receptor language, but inferences that the original audience would have drawn from contextual rather than linguistic clues should not be explicated in the translation” (p. 111). By this way he/she conveys the message of the source-text author who produces meaning through culture-specific items, but he/she makes the translation by considering the context envisaged by the source text author. As can be seen, “direct translation corresponds to the idea that translation should convey the same meaning as the original. It requires the receptors to familiarise themselves with the context envisaged for the original text” (Gutt, 1990, p. 135). In that way, direct translation resembles the strategy of foreignization of Lawrence Venuti (1995): “translating in a transparent, fluent, invisible style in order to minimize the foreignness of the TT (target- text)” (paranthesis added by me) (Munday, 2001, p. 146). Hence, comprehensibility of the culture-specific message translated through direct translation gets more difficult for the target-text readers. In the words of Gutt (1989), [a] receptor language utterance is a direct translation of a source language utterance if and only if it purports to interpretively resemble the original completely in the cognitive environment envisaged for the original. (p. 254) However, in indirect translation, the translator does not provide all the communicative clues. As for Gutt (1990), “indirect translation involves looser degrees of resemblance” (p. 135). Malmkjar (1992) states that “it does not focus on the way in which something was said, but rather on what was said, rather like indirect quotations do” (p. 31). Smith (2002) states that “as indirect quotation may settle for conveying only part of the original message, so indirect translation may settle for conveying only those assumptions of the original text that are most relevant to the target audience” (pp. 109- 110). Accordingly, he/she gives the reader solely the relevant part of the utterance which provides a sociocultural and historical context about the culture-specific item. The translation is made by taking the context of target readers into account. Thus, the readers do not have to familiarize themselves with the source-text context, since translator takes the target-text reader‟s context into account. (Gutt, 2006, p. 417). This approach is used to make the culture-specific message more comprehensible for the target readers. Thus, it is possible to say that indirect translation resembles the strategy of domestication of Venuti. Yang (2010) states that “domestication designates the type 5 of translation in which a transparent, fluent style is adopted to minimize the strangeness of the foreign text for target language readers” (p. 77) From this point of view, culture-specific items could be scrutinized in the light of these two approaches regarding the importance of context in the translation of culture-specific items. The translation strategies for culture-specific items put forward by Aixelà (1996) will be used as micro-strategies in this study. These strategies are repetition, orthographic adaptation, linguistic (non cultural) translation, intratextual gloss, extratextual gloss, absolute universalization, naturalization, attenuation, synonymy, limited universalization, deletion, and autonomous creation. These strategies are gathered under two headings: conservative and substitution. Aixelà (1996) defines conservation as "acceptance of the difference by means of reproduction of the cultural signs in the source-text” and substitution as “transformation of the other into a cultural replica” (p.54). As shown in Table 2, the strategies of repetition, orthographic adaptation, linguistic (non cultural) translation, extratextual gloss, and intratextual gloss fall under the heading of conservative. The strategies of absolute universalization, limited universalization, naturalization, attenuation, autonomous creation, synonmy, and deletion fall under the heading of substitution. 6 Conservative Substitution Repetition absolute universalization orthographic adaptation limited universalization linguistic (non cultural) translation Naturalization extratextual gloss Attenuation intratextual gloss autonomous creation Synonmy Deletion Table 2: The translation strategies put forward by Aixelà for the translation of culture- specific items Considering that relevance theory attaches utmost importance to context, we can analyze Aixelà‟s strategies under the broader relevance-theoretic concepts of Gutt‟s (1989) direct and indirect translation: 7 Direct Translation Indirect Translation Repetition Intratextual Gloss Linguistic (non-cultural) Translation Extratextual Gloss Orthographic Adaptation Absolute Universalization Limited Universalization Naturalization Synonymy Autonomous Creation Attenuation Deletion Table 3: Categorization of Aixelá's strategies for culture-specific items on the basis of direct and indirect translation Through an initial observation, the study has found out that culture-specific items in the English translation of Sevgili Arsız Ölüm and Katre-i Matem have been dealt with the direct and indirect translation approaches of Gutt. II. PURPOSE OF THE THESIS The aim of this thesis is to uncover how the context of a target text may differ from the context of its source text in direct translation, and to reveal how the context of a target text may differ from the context of its source text in indirect translation. For the purposes of this thesis, it is important to choose a source text, which is heavily laden with culture-specific items and translated through direct translation approach; and it is also significant to choose a source text that is laden with culture-specific items and translated through indirect translation method. The first case study, the culture-specific items in Sevgili Arsız Ölüm are translated through direct translation. It seems that the translator considers the context envisaged by the source text author. However, the culture-specific items in Katre-i Matem are translated through indirect translation since 8 the translator transmits the culture-specific message by making certain rearrangements in the translation in line with the cognitive environment of the target readers to enable them to comprehend the message created by the author. III. RESEARCH QUESTIONS The research questions of this thesis are as follows: Macro Research Questions: 1. How does the context of a target text differ from the context of a source text in cases where the translator adopts direct translation approach to the translation of culture-specific items? 2. How does the context of a target text differ from the context of a source text in cases where the translator adopts indirect translation approach to the translation of culture-specific items? Micro Research Questions: 1. Which strategies are used for the translation of culture-specific items in the English translation of Latife Tekin‟s Sevgili Arsız Ölüm and Ġskender Pala‟s Katre-i Matem? 2.a. How does the context of the English translation of Sevgili Arsız Ölüm differ from the context of its source text? 2. b. What is the role of direct translation in the recreation of Sevgili Arsız Ölüm‟s context through translation? 3. a. How does the context of the English translation of Katre-i Matem differ from the context of its source text? 3.b. What is the role of direct translation in the recreation of Katre-i Matem‟s context through translation? 9 IV. TEXT CHOICE In order to answer these questions above, this thesis chooses two different source texts (Sevgili Arsız Ölüm and Katre-i Matem), the translations of which are different from each other in terms of the translational approach to the transmission of the source text culture-specific items to the target reader. The translations of Sevgili Arsız Ölüm and Katre-i Matem will be used as the case studies of this thesis for the reasons listed below: 1. Both works are loaded with too many culture-specific items which are related to the social life, customs, beliefs, traditions, and history of the Turkish people. 2. The context of both works are created through the religious expressions. 3. Given that the aim of this thesis is to reveal how the context of the target text differs from that of the source text in direct translation and indirect translation, it is of vital importance to choose a source text which is translated through direct translation method and a text which is translated through indirect translation method. It is significant to underline here that this study chooses the English translation of Sevgili Arsız Ölüm as an example of direct translation method, and the translation of Katre-i Matem as an example of indirect translation method. V. METHODOLOGY In order to analyze the translation of culture-specific items in the light of relevance theory, a descriptive and qualitative method will be used. The translations of Sevgili Arsız Ölüm and Katre-i Matem will not be compared to each other. On the contrary, the translations of the works will be dealt with a means of illustrating the two different approaches (direct and indirect translation approach of Gutt) by paying attention to the context of the works. The first case study is based on the following steps: 10 1. The culture-specific items in Latife Tekin‟s Sevgili Arsız Ölüm and its translation will be identified. 2. Aixelà‟s strategies for the translation of culture-specific items (namely, the repetition, orthographic adaptation, linguistic (non- cultural) translation, extratextual gloss, intratextual gloss, absolute universalization, limited universalization, naturalization, attenuation, autonomous creation, and synonymy and deletion) will be determined in the examples of culture-specific items in the English translation. 3. Then, the study will focus on why the translator‟s choice of certain strategies gives rise to a direct translation. 4. The context in Latife Tekin‟s work and its English translation will be analyzed, and how the context of target text differs from that of source text will be explained. The second case study is based on the following steps: 1. The culture-specific items in Ġskender Pala‟s Katre-i Matem and its translation will be identified. 2. Aixelà‟s strategies for the translation of culture-specific items (namely, the repetition, orthographic adaptation, linguistic (non-cultural) translation, extratextual gloss, intratextual gloss, absolute universalization, limited universalization, naturalization, attenuation, autonomous creation, synonymy, and deletion will be determined in the examples of culture-specific items in the English translation. 3. Then, the study will focus on why the translator‟s choice of certain strategies gives rise to an indirect translation. 4. The context in Ġskender Pala‟s work and its English translation will be analyzed, and how the context of target text differs from that of source text will be explained. 11 VI. LIMITATIONS This study is limited to the English translations of Sevgili Arsız Ölüm and Katre-i Matem, the works of Latife Tekin and Ġskender Pala respectively. Each novel has only one translation. If it were possible to compare and contrast two different translations of the same novel, one created with direct translation and the other created by indirect translation approach, the number of variables would be decreased. However, even the single translations of Tekin‟s and Pala‟s works are fruitful to shed light on the different contextual effects created by direct and indirect translation approaches to culture- specific items. Moreover, this study mostly concentrates on the culture-specific religious items, it has been encountered non-religious other items which belong to culture. VII. OUTLINE OF THE THESIS In Chapter 1, the cultural turn in translation studies will be explained in order to highlight the importance of culture in translation. Then, the concept of culture-specific items will be given to establish background for the analysis of the case studies. The strategies to translate culture-specific items will be explained through the examples selected from different literary works so as to illustrate the strategies. Chapter 2 will focus on relevance theory. Specific attention will paid to the concepts of context and contextual effects. Then, the bridge between the translation of culture- specific items and relevance theory will be built so as to demonstrate the importance of context in translation. The strategies for the translation of culture-specific items will be categorized within the framework of direct and indirect translation approaches in the light of relevance theory. Chapter 3 aims at analyzing the English translations of the two different literary works, namely Sevgili Arsız Ölüm and Katre-i Matem, in the light of relevance theoretic perspective. The main focus will be on the analysis of the culture-specific items to show that context plays a very substansive role in comprehension of the source text message 12 presumed to have been created by the author. In line with the analysis made in this chapter, a summary of the analysis will be given in the Discussion part. In the Conclusion part, the findings obtained from Chapter 3 will be discussed in relation to the research questions presented in the Introduction part. 13 CHAPTER 1: CULTURE-SPECIFIC ITEMS This chapter will focus on the culture-specific items. At first, the emergence of cultural turn in translation studies will be dealt to identify the importance of culture in translation act. Then, the concept of culture and definitions of it will be explained in detail; and the bridge between the culture-specific items, culture, and translation will be built. In the following part, the problems faced by the translators in the process of translation of culture-specific items will be examined. Finally, the categorization of culture-specific items of Aixelá will be provided with illustrating examples from different literary works to make a basis for the case studies in this thesis and will be dealt under the strategies of Venuti, as well. In a nut shell, this chapter, at first, gives a detailed information on the concept of culture and the features of culture-specific items, and then discusses the strategies to translate them in literary texts. 1.1. THE EMERGENCE OF CULTURAL TURN IN TRANSLATION STUDIES Vernay (1974) defines translation as "... an act which transfers information given in language A into a language B in such a way that the amount of relevant information received in language B will be identical with that in language A" (trans. by Gutt, 2000, pp. 119-237). Besides, according to McArthur (2005), translation is the "restatement of the forms of one language in another" (p. 678). Furthermore, Reiss (2000) defines translation "a bilingual mediated process of communication, which ordinarily aims at the production of a TL text that is functionally equivalent to a Source Language text" (p. 160). Moreover, as for Toury (2000), translation is “a kind of activity which inevitably involves at least two languages and two cultural traditions” (p. 200). As for Venuti (1995), translation is "a process by which the chain of signifiers that constitutes the source-language text is replaced by a chain of signifiers in the target language which the translator provides on the strength of an interpretation" (p. 17). All the definitions of translation were based on finding the suitable equivalents and transferring meanings to another language. However, they neglected the important role of culture and the interdependent relationship of culture and translation. Upon this lack, 14 cultural turn came into being with Zohar (1978) and Toury (1980) (Mahmoud 2015, p. 2). As a result of the contributions of these scholars, the "culture oriented translation studies" (Leppihalme, 1997, p.1) has been on the agenda since 1980s. With this new paradigm, “linguistic theories of translation have been sidelined and attention has centered on translation as cultural transfer and the interface of translation with other growing disciplines within cultural studies” (Munday, 2006, p. 141). Cultural Turn was defined by Munday (2001) as "the move towards the analysis of translation from a cultural studies angle” (p. 126). According to Pym (2010), cultural turn is “a term proposed by Snell-Hornby and legitimated by Lefevere and Bassnett, whereby translation studies should focus on the cultural effects of translation” (p. 149). With the emergence of this turn in translation studies, cultural dimension of translation and cultural references have been foregrounded by scholars. The said references are the ones specific to a culture. The scholars have interested in these references because of the fact that they are not easy to understand for the target culture readers. The scholars of this turn object to linguistic theories of translation (Fahim and Mazaheri, 2013, p. 65). Rather, they concentrate on the relationship between the culture and translation. (Mizani, 2009, p. 50). Therefore, this turn could be defined as "the move from translation as a text to translation as culture" (Snell-Hornby, 1990, p. 42). Bassnett and Levefere (1998) also describe the cultural turn as follows: a way of understanding how complex manipulative textual processes take place: how a text is selected for translation, for example, what role the translator plays in that selection, what role an editor, a publisher or patron plays, what criteria determine the strategies that will be employed by the translator, how a text might be received in the target system. (p. 123) Nida and Taber (1969/1982) state about cultural translation that it is "a translation in which the content of the message is changed to conform to the receptor culture in some way, and/or in which information is introduced which is not linguistically implicit in the original" (p. 199). Nida (1964) gave importance on culture and stated that cultural differences lead to more problems than the linguistic ones (Mahmoud 2015, p. 2). Every community has its own value judgements, habits, classification systems; and they are occasionally similar or 15 completely different from the ones of another community. This creates a necessity for the translator to take the cultures into account (Aixelá, 1996, p. 53). There arises the question "What is culture and why is it so crucial in translation?" The enthonologist Ward H. Goodenough defines culture as below: .....we should note that culture is not a material phenomenon; it does not consist of things, people, behaviour or emotions. It is rather an organization of these things. It is the forms of things that people have in mind, their models for perceiving, relating and otherwise interpreting them. (as cited in Mary Snell-Hornby, 1988, p. 40) What's more, George Simmel defined the culture as “the cultivation of individuals through the agency of external forms which have been objectified in the course of history” (as cited in Levine, 1971, p. 6). Larson (1984) defined it as “a complex of beliefs, attitudes, values, and rules which a group of people share” (p. 431). He also states that the translator is required to comprehend the beliefs, values, rules of the source language readers so as to understand the source text and translate it successfully to another reader who is different in the aspects specified above (Larson, 1984, p. 431). And for Davies (2014), culture is “the set of values, attitudes and behaviors shared by a group and passed on by learning” (p. 68). She adds that the author pertaining to a specific culture possesses the norms and customs of that culture and the referents of this culture is obvious to a greater or lesser extent in his/her work (Davies, 2014, p. 68). In fact, the differences arising out of culture create much serious problems for the translator than the differences arising out of the linguistic structure (Nida, 1964, p. 30). 1.2. THE CONCEPT OF CULTURE-SPECIFIC ITEMS “Language is the life-blood of culture and that culture is the track along which language forms and develops” (Hongwei, 1999, p. 121). As very clear, there is a close relationship between language and culture. Language is comprised of culture. It is a different aspect of culture. By considering that culture is specific to a community, it is simple to guess that something which is very clear for the source-text readers could be very ambigious for the target readers due to the fact that they do not share the same 16 experience and culture (Petrulione, 2012, p. 44). The reason of this point is well described by Sapir (1956): No two languages are ever sufficiently similar to be considered as representing the same social reality. The worlds in which different socities live are distinct worlds, not merely the same world with different labels attached. (p. 69) There is a close relationship between culture and translation as well. It is very clear to see that translation is very related to culture, and absolutely requires cross cultural communication for the reason that it goes beyond borders and makes people engaged in intercultural exchange and comprehension. Thus, translators are required to possess literacy, communicative language, and cross culture competences because they need to interpret the social cultural meaning in cross cultural concept (Calvo, 2010, p. 2). Nevertheless, translation appears troublesome since the culture-specific items (hereinafter referred to as CSI) belong to a specific cultural context (Enikő, 2011, p. 13). Especially, the translation of CSIs in literary texts creates significant problems. To cope with the problems faced, the translators should be well aware of the CSIs. About the relationship between culture, translation, and language, House (2009) states that: Translation is not only a linguistic act, it is also a cultural one, an act of communication across cultures. Translation always involves both language and culture simply because the two cannot really be separated. Language is culturally embedded: it both expresses and shapes cultural reality, and the meanings of linguistic items, be they words or larger segments of text, can only be understood when considered together with the cultural context in which these linguistic items are used. (p. 11) Florin (1993) makes use of the term "realia" for CSIs and states that; Realia (from the Latin realis) are words and combinations of words denoting objects and concepts characteristic of the way of life, the culture, the social and historical development of one nation and alien to another. Since they express local and/or historical color they have no exact equivalents in other languages. They cannot be translated in a conventional way and they require a special approach. (p. 123) According to Schwarz (2003), culture-bound terms are the “concepts in any language that are unique to that language or to the culture associated with that language and create a cultural gap between speakers of different languages” (p. 14). Baker (1992) 17 states that “cultural concept” could be "abstract or concrete, it may relate to a religious belief, a social custom, or even a type of food." Baker then, calls such concepts "culture-specific items" (p. 21). Davies (2003) uses the terms “culture-specific items” and “cultural concepts” (as cited Petrulione, 2012, p. 44). Furthermore, Nord makes use of "cultureme" for CSIs. Nord (1997) states that it is "a cultural phenomenon that is present in culture X but not present (in the same way) in culture Y" (p. 34). Aixelá (1996) calls cultureme as “culture-specific items” (CSIs) and defines them as follows: Those textually actualized items whose function and connotation in a source text involve a translation problem in their transference to a target text, wheneverthis problem is a product of the nonexistence of the referred item or of its different intertextual status in the cultural system of the readers of the target text. (p.58) Mailhac (1996) calls CSIs as "cultural reference" and adds that Suffice it to say that by CR [cultural reference] we mean any reference to a cultural entity which, due to its distance from the target culture, is characterized by a sufficient degree of opacity for the target reader to constitute a problem. (p. 134). Aixelá (1996) talks about the "intercultural gap" (p. 57) which arises because of the different cultures of source and target reader, and says that it occurs in two levels: In translation a CSI does not exist of itself, but as the result of a conflict arising from any linguistically represented reference in a source text which, when transferred to a target language, poses a translation problem due to the nonexistence or to the different value (whether determined by ideology, usage, frequency, etc.) of the given item in the target language culture. (p. 57) (emphasis added by me) To have better understanding, take the example of Bible translation. The translation of the image "lamb" into the languages which do not possess a culture where this animal does not have any connotations such as innocence, helplessness and etc. Therefore, the translation of lamb into Eskimo languages will be regarded in terms of CSI and be a problem in translation. However, its translation into Spanish or English will not be regarded in terms of a CSI for the reason that in these languages it is a pure and sacrificial animal. Therefore, the language pairs in translations play a crucial role in the 18 creation of translation problem of CSIs. It is seen that owing to the intercultural gap between language pairs, any word could be regarded as a CSI. That is to say, any linguistic item could be a CSI according to how it is perceived in the target culture (Aixelá, 1996, pp. 57-58). This unfixed fact, that is to say, the perception of CSIs differently makes their literal translation challenging. Therefore, Nida says translators should pay more attention to the relation between cultures because words gain their meanings based on a certain culture (Mahmoud, 2015, p. 5). However, as a bilingual or multilingual cross cultural mediator of culture, the translator should do it as much faithfully and correctly as possible (Gerding-Salas, 2000, p. 2). It is inevitable for a literary work to seperate from culture as the writer of a literary work belongs to a specific culture, a specific moment in time; and his/her writing has the reflections of race, age, gender, stylistic, and idiosyncratic characteristics of the writer (Bassnett, 1998, p. 136). Lefevere (1992) explains this as follows: [Texts] are produced (…) within the confines of a given literature, which has its own generic and stylistic features and which is, in its turn, embedded in a whole culture. (p. 13) From the explanation, it is clear that the work of a writer is a reflection of that writer's culture. Therefore, people from different cultures may interpret the literary work differently "on the basis of varying cultural assumptions and interpretive choices, in specific social situations, in different historical periods" (Venuti, 1995, p. 18). To cope with the difficulty stemming from culture, it plays a crucial role to know about the historical, cultural, and sociological background of the literary work (Gutt, 2000b, p. 173). Hence, the translator should pay attention at most to "the reconstitution of the foreign text in accordance with values, beliefs and representations that pre-exist it in the target language" (Venuti, 1995, p. 18). As a consequence, translation of literary works is an effective way to spread culture and translation is a means to help the culture and thoughts to spread around the world (Sasaninejad and Delpazir, 2015, p. 39). The aim of the translator is to draw attention of 19 the target readers in terms of the source language culture and make a translation in such a way that it will replace "the linguistic and cultural difference of the foreign text with a text that will be intelligible to the target language reader" (Venuti, 1995, p. 18). Accordingly, the translation is neither “the restatement of the forms of one language in another” (McArthur, 2005, p. 678) nor the "conversion of a text into a different text in a language (Ambrasas- Sasnava, 1978, p. 8) because as Thriveni (2002) said there is a difference between meanings in the text and meanings to be explained, that is, the cultural meanings are somewhere in the text and the translator should transmit them as well with the linguistic aspects of the text by being aware of source and target culture. The aim of the translation of literary works is to draw attention of the target readers in terms of the source language culture and make a literary translation in such a way that it will replace "the linguistic and cultural difference of the foreign text with a text that will be intelligible to the target language reader" (Venuti, 1995, p. 18). 1.3 THE PROBLEMS IN THE TRANSLATION OF CULTURE-SPECIFIC ITEMS On the problems of translation of CSIs, Aixelá (1996) states that: [e]ach linguistic or national-linguistic community has at its disposal a series of habits, value judgments, classification systems, etc. which sometimes are clearly different and sometimes overlap. This way, cultures create a variability factor the translator will have to take into account. (p. 53) Tobias (2006) states that the CSIs are "linguistic items that cause problems for translation due to differences in cultural understanding" and goes on his saying that CSIs “include proper nouns, customs, objects, institutions, expressions and concepts existing in source language which do not exist in culture of target language readers or would be comprehended in a different way" (p. 27). This demonsrates the requirement of the translator's being careful about the culture. Furthermore, Aixelá supports Tobias and says that since CSIs related to a linguistic system's local institutions, place names, historical figures, personal names, works of art 20 and etc., they cause translation problems (Aixelá, 1996, p. 57). The translators should neatly work on them. As mentioned before, the translation of CSIs is usually tied to the intercultural gaps by the translation scholars. Florin (1993) goes into this problem and states that; No matter how elegant the different strategies proposed to “solve” the problem of realia, that problem remains without any definitive solution in the end: samovars will remain samovars, and never really become transposed kinds of stoves. Realiaconstitute those points in the translated text at which “the translation is showing”, simply because the universe of reference of culture A never totally overlaps with the universe of reference of culture B. (p. 122) As seen clearly, the translation of the CSIs in literary texts are difficult in that they possibly come out as a result of lexical and cognitive gaps between source and target language (Akef and Vakili 2010, p. 159). This is probably the main reason underlying in the difficulty and problems of translating CSIs. Aixelá' s intercultural gap is named by Gambier and et al (2004) as “semantic void or lexical gap” (p. 11). The lexical gaps may be seen in variations of a concept. For instance, Eskimos have a variety of words for the concept snow. However, in Turkey, we do not have as many variations as Eskimos for the concept snow. Thus, it is likely that this could create problems in a probable translation between this language pair (Maasoum and Davtalab, 2011, p. 1768). The cognitive gaps result from the culture. Different cultural assumptions between the source culture and target culture may also cause a cultural gap in the literary text, and the translator has to complete the cultural gap by making a translation which will represent source tradition valuable and interesting (Kazakova, 2004, pp. 102-104). This role of the translator is named by Leppihalme (1997) as a "cultural mediator" and "decision-maker" who is "competent" and "responsible" (p. 19). The first problem of translating CSIs into another language and culture is that the equivalence of a CSI may cause a translation problem in translation because of the nonexistence or the different value of it in the target culture (Aixelá, 1996, p. 57). 21 Another problem of translation of CSIs is that a concept which has synonymous equivalence in target culture language may have different understanding in that language. For instance, "aunt" in English has not distinctions, but in Turkish there are distinctions according to the relationship to father or mother (Sasaninejad and Delpazir, 2015, p. 39). The problems in translating CSIs do not only arise from the linguistic problems but also from the political, economic structure, historical bacground, customs, and traditions (Buıtkıenė, 2013, p. 24). About this point, Snell Hornby states that ...the problems do not depend on the source text itself, but on the significance of the translated text for its readers as members of a certain culture, or of a sub- group within that culture, with the constellation of knowledge, judgement and perception they have developed from it. (as cited in Aixelá, 1996, p. 57) Hence, the literary translator should be able to make some guesses about the target readers he/she is translating for so that the translation fulfills its aim of transmitting the message presumed to be created by the author in compliance with the perceptions, beliefs, values, and in short the culture of the target readers. Then, what are the solutions to these problems mentioned above? The first solution of the translator may be "able to process the translation in a way similar to the way members of the source culture process the source text" (Davies, 2003, p. 68). Secondly, the translator may help the target readers in terms of understanding the content and the intention of the source-text writer by translating not only the languages but also the cultures because the target readers will definitely decode the message presumed to be created by the author in the translation according to their own culture and experience, not to the culture of the source writer and readers. That is to say, the translator may help the receptor audience understand the content and intent of the source document by translating with both cultures in mind (Larson, 1984, pp. 436-437). In this study, CSIs are the words or phrases that are specific to Turkish culture. They include all the references to institutions, social life, traditions and customs, and Islamic religious items as well. As there are a great number of Islamic religious items in the 22 case studies of this thesis, it is also necessary to say a few words on both on them and translation of them. Islamic religious items are also regarded in the scope of culture- specific items. The translator has to pay more attention to them in order to transmit the correct meaning and not to lead to any misunderstandings and interpretation by the target readers (Mahmoud 2015, p. 4). Problems in translation of Islamic religious items are (1) finding out the correct lexical and cultural equivalent, (2) inadequacy of the equivalent in target text to transmit the same meaning referred in the ST equivalence, (3) non-existence of the equivalence in target language and target culture (Mahmoud 2015, pp. 7-8). Therefore, the translator should have a deep knowledge of the religion in question such as beliefs, values, attitudes, and etc. for the successful translation of Islamic religious items (Mahmoud 2015, p. 5). Following the difficulties faced by the translators in the process of translation of CSIs, it is required to mention about the strategies proposed by different scholars in dealing with the translation of CSIs. 1.4. THE STRATEGIES FOR THE TRANSLATION OF CULTURE- SPECIFIC ITEMS There are two ways to translate the CSIs: the first one is to protect the features of the ST as much as possible, and this leads to a strange and exotic effect; and the second one is to adapt according to the expectations of the target culture readers, and this makes the translation more familiar and attainable for them. These ends of the continuum is called differently by different scholars such as “foreignization and domestication” by Venuti (1995), “adequacy and acceptability” by Toury (1980), and also “conservation and substitution” by Aixelá (1966) (as cited in Davies, 2003, p. 69). On the basis of these ends, the theorists proposed different specific micro strategies to translate culture-specific items. Vladimir Ivir (1987) puts forward seven strategies as “definition, literal translation, substitution, lexical creation, omission, addition, borrowing”. Hervey & Higgins (1992) recommended “cultural transplantation, cultural borrowing, communicative translation, calque, and exoticism” (as cited in Mahmoud 23 2015, p. 10); and Davies proposed seven strategies as “preservation, addition, omission, globalization, localization, transformation, creation” (Davies, 2014). In the detailed analysis of Turkish translation of Katre-i Matem and Sevgili Arsız Ölüm, Aixelá 's strategies will be used because when compared with the other strategies, his strategies offer the most applicable classification to the translation of culture-specific items found in the case books of this thesis. Therefore, here arises a requisite to englighten about Aixelá 's strategies. There are two categories for the CSIs: proper nouns and common expressions (the ones invoving the objects, institutions, habits and opinions which can not be included in the category of proper nouns) (Aixelá, 1996, p. 59). According to Howard, “proper names refer to specific person, place, or thing, and is usually capitalized” (Howard, 2009, p. 1). According to Tymoczko (1999), proper names are “dense signifiers” and she states that they are “the most problematic to translate, in part because their […] significance is often culturally specific and dependent on cultural paradigms” (pp. 223-224). In other words, they may be semantically, geopraphically, historically, culturally loaded. That's why many theorists like Aixelá call them CSI (Jaleniauskienė and Čičelytė, 2009, p. 32). According to Aixelá, the proper nouns are divided into two as "conventional" nouns which mean "unmotivated" and have no meaning and "loaded nouns" which mean "motivated" and have wide range from "suggestive names" to "expressive names", nicknames, fictional names and etc. They have some kind of historical and cultural associations (Aixelá, 1996, p. 59). In translation of conventional names, the tendency is translating them as repeating, transcribing or transliterating; and in translation of loaded names, the tendency is linguistic translation (Aixelá, 1996, pp. 59- 60). Furthermore, he says that Thus, we may distinguish two basic categories from the point of view of the translator: proper names and common expressions (for what better term to cover the world of objects, institutions, habits and opinions restricted to each culture and that cannot be included in the field of proper names). (Aixelá, 1997, p. 59) 24 Aixelá categorizes the CSIs according to the degree of intercultural manipulation. Thus, he divides them into two regarding their nature: conservation and substitution of the original reference (Aixelá, 1996, p. 61). 1.4.1. Conservation Strategies 1.4.1.1. Repetition The aim of the translator is to transmit the original reference as much as possible. Using this strategy, the translator makes use of exotic or achaic character of the CSI; thus, it causes the target reader feel more unfamiliar with the CSIs due to the cultural and linguistic differences (Aixelá, 1996, pp. 61-62). Newmark (1988) calls this strategy as “transference”, Hervey and Higgins (1992) as “cultural borrowing” and Davies (2003) as “preservation” (Davies, 2003, p. 73). For Davies, when there is no “a reference to an entity which has no close equivalent in the target culture”, the translators make use of this strategy (Davies, 2003, pp. 72-73). Example: Majhut (2012) gives the following example to illustrate the strategy of repetition (p. 82). SOURCE TEXT TARGET TEXT I knew there was a new sweet pea as the Daily Mail had told me so that morning. (Christie, 1996, p. 44) Znao sam da postoji neka nova sorta grahorice jer sam jutros pročitao otome nešto u Daily Mailu. (Crnković,1976, p. 41) Back Translation: I knew that there was a new sort of bean as I had read something about it in the Daily Mail this morning. In the example, the translator kept the reference to the newspaper “Daily Mail” and made a small morhopological change in order not to violate the grammar rules of the TL. (Majhut, 2012, p. 82). Daily mail is a British tabloid newspaper. With the 25 preference of the translator in using the repetition strategy, the translation seems exotic and archaic for the Croation readers. Suppose that they do not have any information in their context, the translation of this CSI will be meaningless due to the fact that they do not get the adequate clues to understand it. That is to say, the translator is unsuccessful in creating the context for the target readers. 1.4.1.2. Orthographic Adaptation The procedures such as transliteration and transcription are under the umbrella of this strategy. The ST reference is explained in a different alphabet which is unfamiliar for the target readers (Aixelá, 1996, pp. 61-62). Example: The example below sheds more light into the strategy of orthographic adaptation. SOURCE TEXT TARGET TEXT Bir gece, Ġstanbul'daki Ģık ve zengin bir evin huzurlu ve sessiz oturma odası gibi, yumuĢacık ıĢıklarla aydınlatılmıĢ bir garajda otobüscümüzü beklerken tanıĢtığım üç yedek subay arkadaĢla, onların aralarında geliĢtirdikleri kağıt oyunu Şah Şaşırdı'yı oynadım. (Pamuk, 1994, p. 182) One night, I was waiting for the bus in a terminal that was lit with soft lights as in the peaceful and quiet living room of a fashionable home in Istanbul, sitting there with three reserve officers I had met and playing a card game that they had made up and elborated among themselves which they called Shah Trumped. (Gün, 1997, p. 195) In this example, "Şah Şaşırdı" is a CSI and translated as “Shah Trumped” with the strategy of orthographic adaptation. As explained, it is a card game. The alphabets of languages are different from each other at some points. The Turkish alphabet has some distinct letters that are absent in English alphabet. These letters are "Ģ, ü, ö, ğ, ç". Because of these unfamiliar letters, the target audience feel themselves more foreigned if the translator leaves them same in translation. When they face with a different letter, 26 this prevents them from making a smooth reading of the novel since they do not have such background information in their context. 1.4.1.3. Linguistic (non-cultural) Translation The translator chooses the close reference to the source-text reference denotatively. Units of measures and currencies are examples of it. For instance, dollars as dolares, inch as pulgada in Spanish (Aixelá, 1996, pp. 61-62). Example: The following example given by GümüĢ (2012) clears up the strategy of linguistic translation (p. 125). SOURCE TEXT TARGET TEXT If you were born in the 1820s you were too old: your mind-set was shaped by the pre-Civil War paradigm. (Gladwell, 2008, p. 70) 1820‟lerin sonlarında doğmus olmanız durumunda ise fazla yaslıydınız; düĢüncebiçiminiz Sivil Savaş öncesi paradigmayla biçimlenmiĢ durumdaydı. (Özer, 2009, p. 48) Back Translation: If you were born in the 1820s you were too old: your mind-set was shaped by the pre-Civil War paradigm. The "pre-Civil War paradigm" is a CSI in this example. In fact, the equivalent of this CSI in Turkish is "İç Savaş" (literally Internal War). However, the translator prefers the linguistic translation strategy. It is estimated that the translator makes it use due to the unawareness of the context of the Turkish readers. Self-help books are read by a variety of people, and it is possible that the readers may not have such a term in their context. The literal translation made without considering the meaning of the CSI in the source culture leads the target readers to make a mistake. Since they do not have this information in their context, it is not easy for Turkish readers to understand it with little effort and such a translation that gets more unfamiliar astonishes them. 27 1.4.1.4. Extratextual Gloss With the use of one of the strategies above, the translator thinks that it is required to give some more explanation of the meaning and implications of the CSIs. The translator carries out it by a footnote, endnote, glossary, commentary/translation in brackets, in italics or etc (Aixelá, 1996, p. 62). However, this may be dangerous in translation because the readers may get tried of pausing and reading the extra information given by the translator. If they are not accustomed to this method, the explanations and footnotes will seem dull for them. For example, the Chinese translators use a lot of footnotes and explanations to explain the English terms in the translations, and the children are used to this method. Nevertheless, the German and British children are not accustomed to it and may get bored from pausing to read the unneccessary details in the translation (Davies, 2003, pp. 77-78). Here the translator's knowledge about for whom he/she is translating is very significant. Knowing the general characteristics of target readers may help the translator. Example: The example below manifests the strategy of extratextual gloss. SOURCE TEXT TARGET TEXT Bu iĢler hep böyle olur, hep benim üstüme yıkılır. Bununla dördüncü cemiyetin reisliği olacak. Daha İttihak ve Terakki zamanından beri bu böyle gidiyor. (Tanpınar, 2013, p. 301) It always happens like this, the real work always falls to me. This will be the fourth time I've headed a society. It's been the like this ever since the days of the Committee of Union and Progress. (Freely, 2013, p. 302) In the example above, the CSI "İttihak ve Terakki" is translated by Freely by the strategy of extratextual gloss; that is, the CSI has been domesticated by Freely. It is probable that this utterance does not exist in the target readers' context. Thus, when reading this CSI, they need some sociocultural and historical information in order to comprehend the CSI. By regarding this point, it is estimated that the translator added "Notes" at the end of the translation. In the "Notes", the "Committee of Union and Progress" is defined as: 28 A revolutionary political organization that aligned with the Young Turks in 1906 and oversaw the reinstatement of the constitution in 1908. After a brief flirtation with democracy, its leaders moved back to authoritarian rule and are thought by some to have orchestrated the mass slaughter and deportation of Anatolia's Armenians. Having taken the Ottomans into World War I on the side of Germans, the commitee was disbanded, and in some cases the members court- martialed, at the war's end. (Freely, 2014, p. 400) It is very clear that with this explanation, the translator offered the target readers the necessary context to comprehend the message created by the author. By this way, the utterance is after all more familiar to the context of the target readers. 1.4.1.5. Intratextual Gloss This strategy is the same with the previous one, but the translator this time carries out it in the text so as not to disturb the reader's attention (Aixelá, 1996, p. 62). For example, translation of St. Mark as Hotel Saint Mark. Here, the translator wants to underline that it is a hotel not a monastry. This strategy could be defined as the strategy of explicitness. It means to make explicit something in translation which partly given in the source-text or to explicitate a pronoun in the source text (Aixelá, 1996, p. 62). Davies (2003) calls this strategy as "addition" (p. 77). He says that translators may "keep the original item but supplement the text with whatever information is judged necessary". They can directly add the supplemented information into the text (Davies, 2003, p. 77). That is like a combination of repetition and explicitation. 29 Example: The example below sheds more light into the strategy of intratextual gloss. SOURCE TEXT TARGET TEXT Günde beĢ vakit namaz, sahur vakti, iftar vakti..... (Pamuk, 1994, p. 151) We pray five times a day; then in Ramadan, we have the time for iftar, the breaking of fast atsundown, and the time for sahur, the meal taken just before sunup. (Gün, 1997, p. 159) The utterances above "iftar" and "sahur" are CSIs related to Islam religion. The translator has chosen to translate it using the strategy intratextual gloss by adding the explanations “the breaking of fast atsundown” and “the meal taken just before sunup”. If the translator had translated them using the repetition strategy, this would have been too incomprehensible for the context of the target readers. By this way, target readers are offerred the necessary context to understand the source text message of the author. Hence, it could be claimed that some concepts related to ritiuals and beliefs make it obligatory to add extra information for the target readers who are not familiar with Islam religion. If they are not supported with the additional information, it is very likely that the readers may be lost on the way to get the message by the author because of the lack of background information in their context (Sönmez, 1999, p. 83). 1.4.2. Substitution Strategies 1.4.2.1. Synonymy Not to use the same CSIs, the translator prefers to use the synonym or parallel reference of them (Aixelá, 1996, p. 63). 30 Example: This strategy is well illustrated with the example below. SOURCE TEXT TARGET TEXT Mehmet'in çalıĢtığı eroin tacircilerinin iç hesaplaĢmaları sonucu vurulduğunu söyleyeni de iĢittim, gözü dönmüĢ şeriatçıların kurbanı olduğunu fısıldayarak söyleyeni de. (Pamuk, 1994, p. 220) I heard some say that Mehmet had been shot due to some settling of accounts between the dope pushers at the hotel where he worked, and I also heard it whispered that he had fallen victim to fanatic fundemantalists. (Gün, 1997, p. 236) In the example above, the Turkish CSI "şeriat"/ “fundamentalism” refers to "A form of a religion, especially Islam or Protestant Christianity that upholds belief in the strict, literal interpretation of scripture" (Oxford dictionary). "Şeriatçı"/"Fundemantalist" means the strict follower of this law. As can be seen in the example, the translator prefers to translate this CSI by using its synonymy. By this way, the translator makes the target readers grasp the proper context; thus, they may reach the message presumed to be created by the author more easily. 1.4.2.2. Limited Universalization In the occasions where the translators think that the CSI is too ambigious to target readers or that there is a different CSI, they decide to replace them. In doing this, the translator tries to find a reference which belongs to the source language culture. This reference is supposed to be more familiar to the target readers but less specific. (Aixelá, 1996, p. 63) 31 Example: Majhut (2012) gives the example below to explain the strategy of limited universalization (p. 55). SOURCE TEXT TARGET TEXT An American football (Hammett, 1929) un balón de rugby (a rugby ball) (Páez, 1992) Here the translator uses a CSI, “rugby ball” which pertains to the source culture; however, when it is translated as "rugby ball" using the limited universalization strategy, it is after all more familiar to and suitable for the context of the Spanish readers as it is to the source text readers, and they may have the message by the author more easily. 1.4.2.3. Absolute Universalization This strategy is similar to the previous one. Nevertheless, it is applied when the translator cannot find a better known CSI or opts for deletion of any foreign connotations and thus he/she selects a neutral one for the target readers (Aixelá, 1996, p. 63). Davies compounds these two strategies, calls them as "globalization", and adds that it is "a convenient method of opening up the text to a wider audience since it succeeds in conveying the essential characteristics of a referent while avoiding what might be disconcertingly unfamiliar" (Davies, 2003, p. 83). However, she also indicates that this strategy sometimes may lead to some loss of association in the menaing of the CSI. For instance, "the rock cakes" used in Harry Potter by Rowling has an humorous effect on the readers, but the French translation "Les biscuits" does not have the same effect and also seems unspecified (Davies, 2003, p. 83). 32 Example: Let's have a look at the example to understand this strategy better. SOURCE TEXT TARGET TEXT Even Young Simon‟s jaunts to London are seen as more colourful chapters in the trendy, swashbuckling adventures of Leith Bannanay Flats‟s lovable cavalier, while my trips south invariably have a seedy andunsavoury association in their eyes. Young Simon can do no wrong though. They see the cunt as some sort ay Oor Wullie for the video generation. (Welsh, 1993, p. 198) Onların gözünde benim yolculuklarım altında mutlaka bi pislik barındırırken, Leith‟in bu tatlı Ģövalyesinin Londra yolculukları tamamen o günlerde moda olduğu içindir. Genç Simon hayatta hata yapmaz. Onlar herifi video kuĢağı için bi tür “Süper Çocuk” olarak görüyolar. (Kaliç, 2010, p. 227) In the example above, "Oor Wullie" is a Scottish CSI. It is a Scottish comic strip character and has been appeared in the newspaper, "Sunday Post" in Scotland since 1936 (comicvine.com). It is a michivellous boy who always gets in trouble. The Scotts use this character as a distinct Scotsman. It has a high degree of Scottish culture. Kaliç's pereference of absolute universalization strategy and translating it as "Süper Çocuk" turns this CSI into a more general and neutral referent so that it fits into the context of Turkish readers and understand the source text message by the author more clearly (Hemen, 2014, pp. 72-73). 1.4.2.4. Naturalization Aixelá (1966) says, in this strategy, "the translator decides to bring the CSI into the intertextual corpus felt as specific by the target language culture" (p.63). It is rarely used in literature today. Davies calls this strategy as "localization". Not to have any loss of effect, the translators may use a reference in the target language culture so that "translated texts sound as if they originated in the culture of the target language" (Davies, 2003, pp. 83-84). 33 Example: The example clears up this translation strategy well (GümüĢ, 2012, p. 125). SOURCE TEXT TARGET TEXT You need to be at least six foot or six one to play at that level, and, all things beingequal, it‟s probably better to be six two than six one, and better to be six three than six two. (Galdwell, 2008, p. 90) O düzeyde basketbol oynamak için boyunuzun en az 1,83 ya da 1,86 olması gerekiyor ve esit kosullarda 1,89’luk bir boy 1,86’lık bir boydan ya da 1,92’lik bir boy 1,89’luk bir boydan daha iyi olsa gerek. (Özer, 2009, p. 61) In the example above, "foot" is a CSI, and it refers to measurement unit. The translator‟s preference of naturalization strategy and turning it into a familiar measurement unit for the Turkish readers as "cm" seems appropriate for the context of the Turkish readers. Otherwise, it would be torublesome for them to interpret it. In that way, Turkish readers may reach the context of the source-text readers, and get the message by the author. Hence, it can be claimed that the preference of Kaliç is appropriate for the context of Turkish people. 1.4.2.5. Deletion Leppihalme (2001) states that “cultural distance makes very detailed specificity unnecessary” (pp.144–145). If the translator supposes that the CSI is not acceptable due to ideological or stylistic features of it or that it is not relevant enough to the target readers from the pointview of the effort to understand it or that it is too ambigious, he/she may omit it completely (Aixelá, 1996, p. 64). Davies calls this strategy as "omission" and adds that there are a few reasons of applying this strategy by the translator. The first one can result from finding no sufficient way to transmit the original meaning in the source text, and the second one can be due to the effort to understand the CSI by the target readers in spite of being able to paraphrase or find the equivalent in the target text and target culture. The third one may result from the fact that translator cannot really comprehend the item; thus, provide the equivalent to the target readers (Davies, 2003, pp. 79-80). 34 Example: In the example below the strategy of deletion is very explicit. SOURCE TEXT TARGET TEXT Haven‟t seen you for yonks. How was the Big Apple? (Fielding, 2001, p. 101) Seni çok uzun zamandan beri göremiyorum. Nasılsın? (Körpe and Hazar, 2004, p. 109) In the example below, "Big Apple" is a CSI, and it refers to New York City in America. The Turkish translation corresponds in English to "I haven‟t seen you for ages. How are you?". The translator has omitted the CSI, "Big Apple". The reason of it may be the translator‟s thought about its needlessness. The translator has deleted it to fit it more into the context of the Turkish readers, and also not to introduce a foreign element to them (Dinçkan, 2010, p. 467). In short, domestication strategy of this CSI makes the target readers to reach the message by the author. 1.4.2.6. Autonomous Creation It is the strategy which occurs if the translator wants to add some cultural references, which he/she thinks are interesting for the target readers and do not exist in the original text. Aixelá says that this strategy is most frequently observed in the translation of film titles (Aixelá, 1996, p. 64). Davies calls this strategy as "creation". She states that when the CSI is "too alien or odd in the target culture, or where it is desired to make the target version more semantically transparent, in order to convey some descriptive meaning" (Davies, 2003, p. 88). 35 Example: Aixelá (1996) gives the example below to illustrate the strategy of autonomous creation (p. 64). SOURCE TEXT TARGET TEXT “Shall we stand here and shed tears and call each other names? Or shall we” – he paused and his smile was a cherub‟s – “go to Constantinople?” (Hammett, 1929) Que nos quedemos aquí derramando lágrimas como Magdalenas o que vayamos a Constantinopla en busca del verdadero halcón del rey de España (Páez, 1992). Back Translation: [Shall we stay here shedding tears like Magdalenes or shall we go to Constantinople in search of the real falcon of the king of Spain?”] In the example above, "like Magdalenes" and "the king of Spain" are the items that are not found in the source text but added to the translation by the translator by using intratextual gloss strategy. It is presumed that the translator added them to draw the Spanish readers' attraction and make it more suitable for the context of the target-text readers. 1.4.2.7. Attenuation In this strategy, the translator makes changes which go beyond universalization and naturalization because the changes are in the original. This strategy is applied by considering the target readers‟ "flexibility, tolerance and willigness" in the event of any possible problems arising out of the unfamiliar CSI (Davies, 2014, p. 86). According to Davies, this strategy gives an opportunity to access a wider range of target readers in reading of a literary work (Davies, 2003, p. 87). As for Aixelá (1966), it is the replacement of a CSI which is too strong or unacceptable by a softer and acceptable one in the target culture. The strategy of attenuation is used especially in the translation of slangs and children's literature as well to make the strong items softer (p. 64). 36 Example: The example below shows the strategy of attenuation very explicitly. SOURCE TEXT TARGET TEXT Ma cousin Nina looks intensely shaftable. She‟s goat long, dark hair, and is wearing an ankle-length, black coat. Seems tae be a bit ay a Goth. Noting some ay Willie‟s squaddy pals and ma Weedjie uncles gettin oan well, ah find masel whistling „The Foggy Dew’ (Welsh, 1993, p. 212). Kuzenim Nina harbiden düzülebilicek gibi görünüyo. Uzun, siyah saçları var ve ayakbileklerine dek uzanan siyah bi palto giyiyo. Biraz kaba saba görünüyo. Willie‟nin bazı arkadaĢlarının ve amcaların kendilerine gelmeye baĢladıklarını fark edince ıslıkla “Sabah Sisi”ni çalmaya baĢlıyom (Kaliç, 2010, p. 243). "The Foggy Dew" is translated as “Sabah Sisi” using the strategy of attenuation. It is a rebel song of the Irish. The pratoganist of the novel sings it in the funeral of his brother who died owing to an IRA bombing in the Northern Ireland. However, the people at the funeral support the British Army in Northern Ireland (Hemen, 2014, p. 129). Hence, it is a culture-loaded item and has a strong feature. Kaliç omits the strong effect of “the Foggy Dew” and softens it by not perplexing the target-text readers so that they can be familiar to both the author and the target readers as they are to both the author and source-text readers. There are also a few more strategies such as compensation (deletion+autonomous creation) and dislocation (displacement of the same reference in the text). 37 A High Degree ofIntercultural Manipulation A Low Degree of Intercultural Manipulation Manifestation Autonomous Creation Deletion Naturalization Absolute Universalization Limited Universalization Intratextual Gloss Extratextual Gloss Linguistic (Non-cultural) Translation Repetition Table 4: Typology of intercultural manipulation by Aixelá The strategies of Aixelá can be also dealt under “domestication” and “foreignization” strategies of Venuti. Before listing them under the strategies of Venuti, here arises a necessity to give some information about the strategies. Domestication and foreignization can be well expressed in Schleiermacher‟s words: “either the translator leaves the author in peace as much as possible and moves the reader toward him; or he leaves the reader in peace as much as possible and moves the writer toward him” (Venuti, 2004, p. 49). Here, the first strategy corresponds to foreignization and the second strategy corresponds to domestication. And according to Venuti (1995), domestication is “an ethnocentric reduction of the foreign text to target- language cultural values, bring the author back home, whereas foreignization is “an ethnodeviant pressure on those (cultural) values to register the linguistic and cultural difference of the foreign text, sending the reader abroad” (p. 20) (paranthesis added by me). Domestication requires translating in a transparent, fluent and inivisible style so as to make the foreignness of the target text minimized (Munday, 2001, p. 146); that is to say; the translator is invisible. Foreignization “entails choosing a foreign text and developing a translation method along lines which are excluded by dominant cultural values in the target language” (Venuti 1997, p. 242). 38 Venuti advocates the foreignizing method, which he also names as “resistancy” (Venuti, 1995, p. 305) and “minitorizing” (Venuti, 1998, p. 11) since it makes the readers free from the restrictions conducting their reading and writing to domesticate the foreign text by destroying its foreigness (Venuti, 1995, p. 305); and provides the creation of a heteregeneous discourse (Venuti, 1998, p. 11) by making the translator visible and giving the impression that the target-text readers are reading a translated text (Munday, 2001, p. 147). From the perspective of the CSIs, which is the main issue of this thesis, when they are foreignized by the translator in the target-text, the sociocultural and historical background of the source text is not provided by the translator, that is to say, they may feel that they are reading a foreign, translated text and have difficulty in finding out the meaning of the CSIs that are presumed to be implied by the author. On the contrary, when the CSIs are domesticated, this gives the target-text readers an opportunity to enrich their sociocultural and historical background. Accordingly, the strategies of repetition, linguistic (non-cultural) translation, and orthographic adaptation of Aixelá fall under “foreignization”; and the strategies of intratextual gloss, extratextual gloss, absolute universalization, naturalization, and attenuation fall under “foreignization”. As a consequence, this chapter has focused on the importance of culture in translation, the concept of culture, the problems come across by the translators in the translation of the CSIs, and the strategies put forward by different scholars. In particular, Aixelá 's strategies have been explained with examples in detail to provide the basis for the case studies. Besides, these strategies of Aixelá have been considered under the strategies of “domestication” and “foreignization” of Venuti. The next chapter will focus on the related concepts of relevance theory to this thesis for the reason that the translation of the CSIs extracted from the case studies for the thesis will be examined within the framework of relevance theory. 39 CHAPTER 2: RELEVANCE THEORY AND TRANSLATION The first purpose of this chapter is to give a detailed information about Relevance Theory of Sperber and Wilson (1986, 1995). To this end, at first, the preceding theories before relevance theory will be explained briefly. Then, the concepts of relevance theory necessary for the analysis of the case studies of this thesis will be expressed. Particularly, some kind of “concepts of relevance” such as cognition, mutual manifestness, contextual effect, and context of the target readers will be focused. The second purpose of this chapter is to focus on the relationship between translation and relevance. Under the umbrella of this relationship, at first, the interpretive use of translation, direct, and indirect approaches to translation will be analyzed respectively. However, the general and the foremost function is to express the role of relevance theory in the translation of CSIs. It is very certain that the concepts specified above are very crucial in the correct understanding of the CSIs by the target readers. Thus, the primary reason of explaining relevance theory in this chapter is to demonstrate how significant role it plays in the translation of the CSIs since in the process of their translation it provides the correct perspective with the help of these concepts. Within this framework, in this chapter, how relevance theory brings light on the translation of CSIs will be expressed; as a result, the bridge between relevance theory and translation of CSIs will be built steadyingly with the examples including CSIs. The categorization of strategies for the translation of CSIs in scope of direct and indirect translation will be dealt in detail, and this categorization will be used effectively in explaining the examples extracted from the case studies of this thesis. 2.1. RELEVANCE THEORY Pragmatics studies "the use of language in human communication as determined by the conditions of society” (Mey, 2000, p. 6). According to Sperber and Wilson (1995), "the study of the interpretation of utterances belongs to what is now known as pragmatics" (p. 10). For Levinson (2001), pragmatics is "the study of relations between language and context that are grammaticalized, or encoded in the structure of a language” (p. 9); 40 and the aim of pragmatics is to state how meaning in linguistic code interacts with the context in comprehension and interpretation process (Xu and Zho, 2013, p. 492). There have been a great number of approaches to pragmatics up to now. However, things have changed a lot in the last twenty years. The code model which was universally accepted to play a role in communication was dethroned by the inferential model (Wilson and Sperber, 1994, p. 36). In code model of communication, the speaker encodes his message in the linguistic form with the help of his/her lexicon and grammar. This message is transmitted via a certain kind of channels such as writing or speech and the hearer who gets this message decodes it as the speaker encodes it (Weber, 2005, pp. 37-38). However, when the utterance according to code model is encoded in a linguistic form and then decoded by the hearer, there is a huge gap. Nevertheless, this gap is to be filled with the inferential process (Yus, 2006, p. 514). As a result of and regarding this deficiency of code model of communication, Paul Grice put forward the inferential model of communication as an alternative to code model. According to Grice, this inferential process is guided by the Coparative Principle and maxims (Xu and Zho, 2013, p. 492). These maxims are listed as "Quantity, Quality, Relation and Manner" (Grice, 1975, pp. 26-27). Then, following these two models, relevance theory which is the inferential approach to pragmatics came in sight. Relevance theory was developed by Sperber and Wilson in the mid 1980s (Gutt, 2006, p. 416). "A context is a psychological construct, a subset of the hearer's assumptions about the world" (Sperber and Wilson, 1987, p. 698). The notion of context of Sperber and Wilson is one of most significiant elements of this thesis for the reason that the target readers need their context in interpreting the CSIs in the original works and arriving at the correct interpretation of them. They may recover the intended meaning of the original author and arrive at the correct interpretation by only using the context envisaged by the original author. Before getting deeper in context, it is necessary to have knowledge on some preliminary concepts related to relevance theory. 41 The starting point of relevance theory of Sperber and Wilson is the relevance which was previously put forward by Grice. Accordingly, speakers should be relevant while speaking in order to provide information that they think more crucial or relevant for their hearers (Martinez, 1988, p. 171). The main purpose of relevance theory is to describe the mechanisms in the human psychology; thus, how humans communicate with each other (Sperber and Wilson, 1986, p. 32). According to relevance theory, relevance and maximation of relevance are the fundementals of human cognition (Wilson and Sperber, 1994, p. 41). Relevance is a typical feature of human cognition (Yus, 2006, pp. 517-518). This basic claim