Ella Shustikova

Kostanai State University named after A.Baitursynov.Kazakhstan.

The Role of Functional Equivalents in Teaching Translation of Scientific Literature.

The development of scientific and technical ideas around the world makes each highly qualified specialist constantly replenish the knowledge through reading literature. Therefore, the ability to translate should be included in the list of competences of the university graduates of nonlinguistic specialties, the translation here acts in two capacities-as one of the additional means of training and as a learning tool. When translating the texts the students are set the task of searching the means for the adequate expression of thoughts reflected in the original ,thus the attention focuses on the similarities and differences between the mother tongue and the foreign language studied. And the fact of comparing the two languages will be present, since the process of translation is the transference of the utterance , contents made in one language by means of another. Barkhudarov L.S. writes that "in its very essence and nature the process of translation is possible only thanks to the phenomenon known as the" double-sided nature of a language ". This means that each language has two sides: the expression plan (form) and the content (the meaning).The requirement for the translation is complete and accurate reproduction of the content and replacing the expression plan. Striving to maintain the expression plan means to introduce consciously the principles of literal translation.

The aim of the theory of translation is to establish relations of equivalence between different linguistic units in compared languages. When establishing the equivalence, it should be taken into consideration that one language unit of a language ( it may be a word, a combination of words, a sentence) can be associated with multiple equivalents in the target language, and these equivalents might differ in their structure. Charles Bally also mentioned functional equivalents. Under the functional equivalents he meant those parts of the grammar system which can be interchanged due to their common function. Speaking about the location of the material in the stylistics, Gvozdev A.N. indicates that stylistics has language facilities for synonymous groups, both in vocabulary and in grammar. For expressing the shades of one general meaning different figures of speech can be used, varying in their grammatical structure. Morphological and syntactical phenomena act as synonymous means here. This broad understanding of synonymy, which permits the assignment to synonyms language units of different structures may seem controversial. However, when we talk about learning the translation competences, we cannot forget about the synonymy in the broad sense of the word. Since the main objective of the translation is the accuracy of the transference of the content and the form of the transference may be different, you should ensure that students have foreign equivalents for the basic, most common notions of the mother tongue, these foreign language equivalents may be in the form of synonymous groups, consisting of two-three units and the grammatical structure of these equivalents may be different .

Let’s turn to the specific examples of the English equivalents, relevant words and combinations of words most commonly used in scientific literature. The first group, the least common includes the cases where Russians combinations and their equivalent English combinations are the same on the lexical value of their component parts and on the value of the combination as a whole and on grammatical structure, for example: сделать заключение-to make a conclusion; сделать замечание-to make comments; принимать в расчет-to take into account; в соответствии с - in agreement with etc.

The second group includes cases where the combinations have the same meanings and the same grammatical structure, but the components of the combinations are different, for example: проводить исследование- to make a study, to carry out a research; поставить вопрос- to raise a question; иметь в виду-to keep (to bear) in mind; имеются веские основания в пользу-there are good reasons for it; проливать свет- to cast (to throw) light; обратить внимание- to call attention; etc.

And, finally, the third group, the most numerous, presents the cases where combinations give the same meaning in the Russian and English languages, but they differ in their grammatical structure, and sometimes in the meaning of their constituent parts, for example: вступительное слово-opening remarks; полностью-in full; подробно-in detail; ведется исследование-studies are underway; etc. We’ll illustrate with the examples the statement given above that the linguistic unit of one language might correspond to two-three or more units of another language, which are synonymous with each other, although they may differ in structure and vocabulary and according to Ch. Bally’s terminology could be called functional equivalents.

So the English equivalents of the sentence: "есть основания полагать" ...can be:

1 There is reason to believe...2 It is reasonable to believe... 3 It seems reasonable to believe...

The combination "сделать замечание" in English can be: to comment, to make comments, to remark, to pass a remark.

The combination " в заключении"- in conclusion, to conclude, in the closing. Synonymous groups in English are widely presented by impersonal principal clauses with the compound verbal modal predicate, which performs only an introductory function, because all the information is contained in a subordinate clause. Such impersonal clauses can be synonymous in their common meaning and in the meaning of their components (modal and notional verbs ) although their grammar structures can vary. So the sentence"Следует подчеркнуть" may have the following equivalents:

1 It must be stressed. 2 It should be emphasized. 3 It is to be emphasized.

One of the main tasks and strategies of an English teacher is to teach the students to speak a foreign language on topics related to their professional collaboration experience and scientific work. And special attention should be fixed on the selection and systematization of linguistic material. The words, combinations of words and whole sentences with their foreign equivalents should be selected and systematized, which themselves do not contain factual information, but they would organize the material containing the information, and they are common to most fields of science. These word combinations and sentences are not difficult when it comes to the translation from foreign languages into the mother tongue. But if you want to use the same combination in the speech in a foreign language or in the translation into a foreign language, it will be difficult for a student to recall and choose the necessary word combination without previous systematization and training such words and combinations. Material selection, systematization and training, prior to the work on the translation itself, should be conducted taking into account the situations in which the word combinations or sentences can be used. If the task is set to teach students to make a report in the foreign language, first of all you should introduce the words and combinations necessary for any message or report, with their synonyms and two or three functional equivalents.

Usually the message begins the problem which it addresses. The options on the message or report are:

1.The present communication ( paper , report ) is concerned ( deals with , is devoted to ) the problem …2. This ( present ) paper examines ( describes , discusses ) the problem ...3. In this paper we shall examine ( describe , discuss ) the problem …

Looking back at the history of the question the author usually indicates what has taken place in this area for a specific time period. For example:1 Over the past few years, this area of chemistry (physics, linguistics, biology ...) developed particularly rapidly.2Great progress has been made in this field during the last few years….

Давно известно, что ...1It has long been known that … 2 It has been known for many years that …

For descriptions of the study itself the following phrases may be used:

1the work has been done , the investigation has been carried out ; 2 the results reported here … 3 He has made great progress lately ( recently ) 4 He is doing well .( He is making great progress ) 5 It will be settled in the near future

Often the challenges remain in the investigation. To inform about this you should acquire the following combinations and their equivalents:1it is still an open question, the question is left open; 2 there remains much to do, there is much work to be done, much remains to be done; 3 it is necessary to determine, it is yet to be determined, it remains to be determined ;4 despite the fact that the report has not mentioned about it, In spite of the fact that it was not mentioned in the report.

5 It is no problem now (at present)

These are just a few examples of combinations and proposals that organize and make out the content of the scientific message. Oral training of these combinations and sentences should precede the work on the translation of the text. The translation of a coherent text is very important, because you can learn the correct usage of such words and combinations only translating coherent texts . Oral and written translations should be done. Thus conscious approach to the phenomena of two comparable languages ultimately leads to the development of motor skills of a language competence .

References:

1 Бархударов Л.С. Общелингвистическое значение перевода. Л.1973.

2 Балли Ш. Общая лингвистика и вопросы французского языка. Издательство иностранная литература.1965.

3 Федоров А.В. Основы общей теории перевода. М.О.О.О. Издательский Дом “Филология Три” 2002.