Semantic challenges of cross-cultural translation: An appraisal of the notion of conflict in the Luganda and German Translations of ‘Animal Farm’

Abstract

This study, which is purely qualitative, investigates challenges of cross-cultural translations, using the notion of conflict in Animal Farm by George Orwell (1945), as a case study. The notion of conflict being a major theme in literary texts, yet sometimes presented differently in translations, was chosen as the object of study with the objective of: Identifying it in the source text, assessing the translators’ representation of this notion in the target texts, and investigating the translation challenges faced and strategies employed by the translators. Types of conflict and their sub-types exhibiting displeasure, discomfort, hurt feelings, loss of face, hostility and violence were identified and collected as data from Animal Farm. The researcher sought to establish whether the two translations - Farm der Tiere and Amaka ga Bawansolo maintained the stance and context of the original. The samples were analysed from a purely linguistic perspective. Findings indicate that translators were generally able to transfer the source text message concerning the notion of conflict into the target language. The study concludes that by using a wide range of strategies, both translators were able to communicate the general message of the source text, whether the target language was close or distant to the source text. The researcher recommends further translation studies that employ linguistic theories like the Appraisal theory to guide the studies. These would help in discovering types of grammatical and stylistic problems hindering appropriate cross-cultural translations.