No abstract

This paper aims to investigate the norms governing the translation of fiction from English into Greek by critically examining two Greek translations of Charles Dickens' novel Great Expectations. One is by Pavlina Pampoudi (Patakis, 2016) and the other, is by Thanasis Zavalos (Minoas, 2017). Particular attention is paid to dialect translation and special emphasis is placed on the language used by one of the novel's prominent characters, namely, Abel Magwitch. In particular, twenty instances of Abel Magwitch's dialect are chosen in an effort to provide an in-depth analysis of the dialect-translation strategies employed as well as possible reasons governing such choices. It is argued that both translators favour standardisation in their target texts, thus eliminating any language variants present in the source text. The conclusion argues that societal factors as well as the commissioning policies of publishing houses influence to a great extent the translators' behaviour, and consequently, the dialect-translation strategies adopted. Hence, greater emphasis on the extra-linguistic, sociological context is necessary for a thorough consideration of the complexities of English-Greek dialect translation of fiction.

The aim of the present paper is to explore the relation of intercultural business communication and translation. Having as theoretical background the writings of Edward Hall and Geert Hofstede, it is argued that intercultural business communication and translation are inextricably bound since translators act as mediators who facilitate communication between business people from different cultural and linguistic bacgrounds. In this article a three-dimensional view of business translation is proposed where it is claimed that there are three ways to look at business translation: (i) from the eyes of the student aspiring to become a successful translator, (ii) from the eyes of the professional translator, and (iii) from the point of view of the theorist who seeks to decipher the complex process of sense-making in multi-cultural and multi-linguistic business settings.

In the past two decades, there has been an increased interest in the assessment of L2 writing since the results of such evaluations are used for a variety of administrative, instructional and research purposes. One of the primary issues pertaining the assessment of writing quality is the type of scoring procedure which will be used; admittedly a subject of a great deal of research and discussion in the language testing literature. The aim of the present paper is firstly, to briefly describe the type of scoring used in the Greek School of Foreign Languages for assessing L2 writing performance and secondly, to calculate the inter-rater reliability of five written samples. The results obtained indicate quite high correlations, thus demonstating the evaluators’ uniformity in the application of assessment criteria.

Food is omnipresent in children’s literature, from Popeye’s Spinach to Detective Cluj’s Carpenter Gums, thus signifying its immense cultural value since cultures and societies are built upon food (Keeling and Pollard 2009, 6). Food narratives are capable of performing a number of functions ranging from evoking a sense of coziness and comfort to being a cause of temptation and power struggle, and these functions ought to come under the spotlight when translating children’s books. This article focuses on the English-Greek examination of translation patterns in the Captain Underpants series and on the critical discussion of the translation strategies that have been employed for the transferring of food items to Greek children. To this end, thirty-five examples of food references are analyzed using a purpose-built schema of translation procedures. The results indicate that translators make a conscious attempt to bring foreign dishes closer to the target language culture by adopting a variety of modification and substitution procedures. This study highlights the intrinsic role that the translation tendencies of preservation, modification, substitution, expansion, transcreation, omission, and creation play in enabling food translation, thus bringing to the fore the important yet neglected area of food translation in children’s literature which can have a profound impact not only on literary but also on translational landscapes.