Lexical cohesion register variation in transition : "The merchants of Venice" in afrikaans

Abstract

On the assumption that different registers of translated drama have different functions and that they therefore present information differently, the aim of the present study is to identify textual features that distinguish an Afrikaans stage translation from a page translation of Shakespeare's The Merchant of Venice. The first issue addressed concerns the nature and extent of lexical cohesion in these two registers. The second issue concerns my contention that the dialogue of a stage translation is more "involved". (Biber 1988) than that of a page translation. The research was conducted within the overall Descriptive Translation Studies (DTS) paradigm but the analytical frameworks by means of which these aims were accomplished were derived from text linguistics and register variation studies, making this an interdisciplinary study. Aspects of Hoey's ( 1991) bonding model, in particular, the classification of repetition links, were adapted so as to quantify lexical cohesion in the translations. Similarly, aspects of Biber's (1988) multi-dimensional approach to register variation were used to quantify linguistic features that signal involvement. The main finding of the study is that drama translation register (page or stage translation) does have a constraining effect on lexical cohesion and involved production. For Act IV of the play an overall higher density of lexical cohesion strategies was generated by the stage translation. In the case of the involved production features analysed, the overall finding was that the stage translation displayed more involvement than the page translation, to a statistically highly significant extent. The features analysed here cluster together sufficiently to reveal that in comparison with an Afrikaans page translation of a Shakespeare play, a recent stage translation displays a definite tendency towards a more oral, more involved and more situated style, reflecting no doubt a general modern trend towards creating more appropriate and accessible texts