Académique Documents
Professionnel Documents
Culture Documents
Anna Lapuka
State Institution of Education
Pruzhany Gymnasium
form 11 A
scientific adviser: L.V. Yuk
English teacher
2011
1
Contents
1. Introduction.3
2. Sound form of word and its meanings4
3. Words meaning social and political and scientific notions.6
4. Words meaning general notions and notions of special character..7
5. False friends of a translator..8
6. Conclusion..11
7. Supplement.12
8. Bibliography...14
Introduction
The vocabulary of most languages contains a lot of words which are common
for two or three languages.
It can be explained by definite historical reasons: the origin of some
languages, communication of nations, borrowings from Greek and Latin.
Common words in compared languages can be alike phonetically or in
spelling, but differ in the place of stress and in sounding of some vowel and
consonant sounds. Its natural that the peculiarities of the sound system of the
given language give an international word its shade.
Consequently, the words of either compared languages (from the point of
view their object-logical belonging) can be in the relations of either equivalence or
none- equivalence. In consideration of the correlation of sound and graphic aspects
of equivalent words and the correlation of their syntagmatic, speech characteristics,
its possible further to differentiate interlanguage categories of absolute and
relative synonymy, homonymy and paronymy. The role of interlanguage
synonyms is played by the words of both languages, completely or partially
coinciding in meaning and using (and consequently are equivalents in translation).
Interlanguage homonyms can be defined the words of both languages which are
similar in the degree of identification in sound and graphical aspects but have
different meanings. And as interlanguage paronyms should be considered the
words of the compared languages which are not completely similar in meaning but
can cause false associations in spite of actual difference of their meanings. By-turn
interlanguage synonyms can be divided into the ones with external similarity and
external difference.
Here are some examples of the words which are alike phonetically and have
the same place of stress.
Russian
English
Business
File
Dock
Elevator
But most English words with Russian equivalents differ in the place of stress.
English
Russian
Interval
Period
Problem
Secret
In some cases English words are similar to Russian ones only in spelling. But
are different in reading.
Russian
English
Climate
4
Pilot
Radio
But the peculiarities of the vocabulary of every language are mainly in the
difference of notions. According to the meaning of borrowed international words
which they got in communication, they can be divided into three categories:
Revolution
Republic
Constitution
Democratic
Culture
Territory
Mathematics
Diameter
Centre
Metal
As a result of science and technology development foreign languages saw the
appearance of some Russian words.
Russian
English
Sputnik
And the Russian language got such foreign words as:
English
Russian
Computer
The Internet
.
Into the second category of international words we put the borrowings which
are in the vocabulary of the given language to define the lexical units with a more
specific character. In the Russian language along with the borrowed international
word we can find its synonym which is normally of a pure Russian origin but with
a more extensive meaning mainly used in oral speech.
Borrowings get into the language to denote a new notion in the field of
science, culture and everyday life with the help of one word without describing this
notion (using a few words).
An unskilled translator often translates industria as ,
industrial in any context though the Russian language has
more habitual lexical units-, .
An international word is used in speech most often in its narrow meaning. So
its better to translate the word comfortable- but not
, person-, but not .
It should be noted that for being understood by most people its necessary to
translate using, if possible, simple expressions and words. The exception is special
material oriented to a certain circle of people (political, economic, scientific, etc.)
variant consultation and the Russian one are not quite similar as
the first word is stylistically neutral and the second word has a bookish shade.
Stylistic difference makes a lot of words absolutely incompatible in translation.
The essential type of stylistic differences are the differences in evaluative and
emotionally-expressive shades. If the English word compilation (,
) is quite neutral here but the Russian word has a
shade of disapproval meaning the work based on the materials of other authors.
Emotional shades often become apparent in figurative meanings: lets take, for
example, the using of such Russian words as , , ,
, in the meaning of , .
10
Conclusion
In spite of the fact that the problem of false friends of a translator attracts
attention of a number of translators, still there is no detailed research of this group
of words in most languages. If not to touch upon concise mentioning in some
articles, on the Internet and some academic issues there are only bilingual
dictionaries on the material of French and English, Spanish and French, German
and French, Spanish and Russian, English and Russian, Russian and Polish. The
differences in lexical combinatory make serious difficulties in learning languages
and in translation but as a rule are not described in bilingual dictionaries. But at the
same time it is supposed that such difficulties are always surmountable in
translation as the translator, using his linguistic feeling, feels in what
combinations the word is relevant. It works mainly in the native language and is
less successful in a foreign one. But the situation is complicated by the
circumstances that the preference can be given to this or that word in this
combination basing on language tradition. The dictionaries of false friends of a
translator dont strive to substitute classical bilingual dictionaries, they are
collections of peculiar and rather valuable commentaries on the words in question.
Such commentaries are directed at preventing mistakes when using a foreign
language and sometimes at improving the quality of translation and even
broadening our outlook. In theory and practice the dictionaries of false friends of
a translator are more useful as give the description of all meanings, express
stylistic and emotionally-expressive shades, explain grammar characteristics and
lexical combinatory which is really important in translation.
Hereby, for an adequate translation a specialist should take into consideration
the general idea of a sentence, the specifics of lexical combinatory of words, the
style and the general contents of the text.
11
Supplement
academic , ,
(academician)
, ;
accurate , (tidy);
aggressive , ,
(, aggressive salesman);
alley , ; blind alley ;
ammunition , ;
anecdote
, (joke);
argument ,
artist , ,
audience
,
brilliant , ;
cabinet ( ), ();
cable ( );
chef - ( chief, boss, patron);
collector , ;
compositor , (composer, musician);
conductor , , ( ),
.-. , , , ,
decade 10 ( 10 );
director , , , (
, );
dock , (
);
episode 1 1, 1, 1 ( 1);
figure p, ; ; ( );
gallant ( );
general , , ( );
intelligent , ( );
lift , , , (
elevator (, .), lift(). , ,
);
magazine ( ), shop, store;
master ( );
mystery , ;
12
novel (, );
;
original , , (
);
paragraph , ;
partisan ; (
), ;
party ( );
patron , ( ),
;
principal , , ,
( principle);
realize , ( );
regular , , (
; regular water () , );
romance ( );
silicon ( silicone). .
, .
student , ;
sympathetic , (
);
sympathy ,
, -, -.;
, : sym- -,
+ pathos ; : sympathetic,
sympathize .
technique , , ;
( technics);
tunic , ;
universal , ;
virtual , ,
13
Bibliography
1. .. . .,1975.
2. .. . .: - , 2004.
3. .., ..
. ., 1990.
4. .. . .: , 2002.
5. .., ..
. .: , 1995.
6. .., .. (
). ., 1976.
7. .. (-). .: .
2002.
8. .. - -
. .: , 1969.
9. .. . . .:
, 2002.
10. .. .
.: -, 2006.
11. . .: , 2007
14