Faber, Pamela. 1998. Translation Competence and Language Awareness. Language Awareness, 7(1), 9-21. doi:10.1080/09658419808667097
Pamela Faber lea~t~~~:!~~~~~:sessmentwas simila~ly positive. She felt her pupils had Faculty of Translation and Interpretation, University ofGranada, Spain discipline. greatermterest. Moreover, there werenoproblemswith One of the most difficult things translators have to learn is how to extract conceptual meanings from source texts, so that they base their translations on reformulations of Summary those meanings, rather than on the words or structures that codify them. This article This paper has reported on an investi atio f describes an exercise in lexical analysis, involving verbs of sound in English and emancipatory discourse inPortu ese Ian ~ n °. w?ys of developing an Spanish, Its aim is to enablestudentsto discover underlying patterns ofmeaning which progressed, pupils gradually b~ame s!;e~t:t~~c:gt'.:'a:."'-ZIL As the pro!ect are representative of lexicalMconceptual struCture. Through this type of activity, stuM dents explore the relation between language and thought, while also increasing their . . mg and learnmgprocess, entitled to speak their minds and sively allowed the pupils to speak for th ta~e deciSIOns. Th': teacher progresdictionary skills and awareness. extent of her own oral contribution Ate:se v~~daccordmgly reduced the o the school year, the class Introductionperformed better than a comparable c.1ass useedenas a control group Language Awareness has been defined as 'a person's sensitivity to and e must, as ever, be cautious about ge 1' . fr one W school. Nevertheless, the results ro~~~: Ismg om th~ case .~fone class in conscious awareness of the nature of language and its role in human life' projects in other schools. P a very positive basis for further (Donrnall, 1985: 7). Such awareness is obviously a major asset for any foreign language (FL) Ieamer, but for translation students, it is a vital necessity. Note Arguably, consciousness of underlying patterns of meaning in language (in its generic sense) stands in direct relation to the relative ease with which students A version of this paper was presented at the 'Thi d . 1. Language Awareness, Trinity College Dublin, July 1~96International Conference on acquire translation skills. Translationcanbeseenas a cognitiveprocess involvinga considerableamount References of problem-solving and decision-making (Wilss, 1994). This process, when Althusser, L. (1971) Ideology and ideo! . 1 considered in its microcontextual ornarrower sense, is that which leads strictly and Philosophy and Other Essays LonodgicaNstateLapftparatuses.!n L. Althusser (ed) Lenin A 1 MW · on: ew e Books from source text analysis to the production of the targetlanguage text. Ina wider pp e; . (1990) Ideology and Curriculum London· Routledge. or macrocontextual sense, the strategies translators use and the decisions they Bourd~eu, P. (1982) Ce que Parler Veut Dire Par' .F . d make are oriented to the totality of the target text and thus influenced by a great Clark, R., Fairclough, N. lvanic R and M'\·afar . awareness: Towards critical alt~m~t· Laarm-ones, M. (1991) Critical language variety of factors, of which the most important is the intended purpose of the Fairclough, N. (ed.) (1992a) Critical Lan Ives. Anguage and Education 5, 41-54. targettext inthetarget cuiture (Reiss & Vermeer, 1984; Nord, 1991). Nevertheless, Fairclough, N. (1992b) Discourse and S s;mge wareness. London: L?ngman. behind the translation process, whether macro-or microcontextual, lies the Gramsci, A. (1971) Selectwnfrom the p;;~tal f]:~ye.ksCambndge: Pohty Press. o e oo . London: Lawrence & Wishart problem of the genuine reconstruction ofutterance meanings (Neubert, 1991: 19). Janks, H. and lvanic R (1992) Criti II on · n ca anguage awareness and e · d' One does not have to be explicitly aware of this to translate successfully. I N F . 1 ' · A manc1patory !Scourse. . a~rc ough (ed.) Critical Langua .ge(Thwa;eness. London: Longman. Orlandi, E. (1988) As formas do sil' e orms of silence). Campinas: Editora da Evidently, people can translate in different phases without being conscious that UN!CAMP. encw they are dividing the text into translation-oriented units, searching for functional 'Thiollent, M. (1985) Methodologia em Pes · A equivalence, or organising the resulting text in a theme/rheme configuration qutsa-fao (Methodology in action-research). Sao Paulo: Cortez. similar to the original. In faCt, it is often the case that translators are blissfully unaware that any of the above even exist as concepts related to the process of translating. Translation competence The concept of Translation Competence (TC) can be understood in terms of knowledge necessary to translate well (Hatim & Mason, 1990: 32f; Bybee, 1996: 91f). However, in the past,ithas often beenreferred to as thoughitwerea celestial ©1998 P. Faber 0965-8416/98/01 0009-13 $10.00/0 Vol. 7,No.l, 1998 LANGUAGE AWARENESS 9 l 70 Language Awareness Translation Competence andLanguage Awareness 77 . gift that certain people are miraculously endowed with, and which converts the . 1 a e and thought. At the same time, thistranslator into some sort of latter-day textual alchemist with the magical power to transform a source language text into a target language text (Toury, 1980; !~~~~~~:rt~:e~=:~:~~d~7;':~y~)~!~:::~I:~~c:;:~=~~~~f~!a~~~a~~ two languages have alrea y acqurr.e . t d lity In certain basic Seleskovitch & Lederer, 1984). But if we accept such an explanation of the ability 'ff t I age communities have mterpre e rea . .to arrive at interlinguistic textual correspondence, then no rational analysis is how d1 eren angu ill. . 'd 'th their primary vocabulary, wh!le areas of meaning, languages w come•. e WI possible. th ill be important differences.On the other hand, TC defined as 'the knowledge need to translate well' is in other areas . ere w . the obvious lace to go is the dictionary, an itself too general. It is more productive to divide knowledge into different extr~~;:~~;~:~"::t~r translators inpgeneral.:~~~;:~~~st~::~~~~ subtypes. Bell (1991: 36) defines TC in terms of five types of knowledge: target language knowledge, text-type knowledge, source language knowledge, realmost likely to be looked up tend tfotbhenot:ti~~::nature of meaning. It is ell-known on account o e m are w ' f I t' . d world knowledge, and contrastive knowledge. A similar set of components is h ve both dictionary skills an awareness.proposed by Nord (1991: 146). TC means having these different types of important that~tudents0 tra;~~~~ff:rent dictionaries since there is no sin?leknowledge at one's disposal, and being able to use them to solve problems and Translators ne to use a ran information necessary about word meanmgmake appropriate decisions. dic:/onary t~~: c:! ~:~~ti~~orrespondences. Indeed, Nida (1996: 85) states All these types of knowledge are undoubtedly important, but this article an or pos~I .e . . d uate and based on quite wrong concepts aboutfocuses on contrastive knowledge (which corresponds to a subtype of 'transfer that many dictionan~s are:~ :;at billng>ml dictionaries are often even lessthe nature of meanmg, all competence, in Nord's list referred to above) because the process oflearninghow satisfactory because they usu Y provide only a list. of glosses and have no to translate can be considerably enhanced by making students conscious of thedegree to which languages coincide and differ. This type of language awareness defrr;!~~:;;',~less when they start off, students naively regard dictionaries (bot~for translators has much in common with the new type of contrastive analysis N 1. 'd bilingual) with exaggerated veneration, and cons1de; th mono mgua1 an advocated by James & Garrett (1991b: 6): . th t b invariably reliable. definitions and interlinguistic correspondences m e';'.o e I f lexica-This [language awareness aimed at foreign language learners] suggests This is evident in their readiness to accept evenf ~:i~~=~=:=~~~exercisescope for a new type of Contrastive Analysis (CA), not CA of the classical graphic practice as sacred scnptudre. ~ex;mp:~he Translation Faculty of the sortdone by linguists and then made over to textbook writers, butCA done below in which first-year un ergra ua es . . . University of Granada were given the followmg question. by pupils as FL learners themselves, to gain linguistic awareness of the . .contrasts and similarities holding between the structures of theMT [mother Does the lexical entry below offer sufficier:t informatio~? In your oprmon,tongue] and the FL. why are there so many correspondences g>ven for bawl. This variety ofCA, then, does notmeana detailed contrastivestudy,butrather bawl v. intr. gritar, chillar, vocear, rugir. vociferar, desgafutarse' activities which develop an awareness in students of patterns of meaning common to many languages. Translation is much more than this, ofcourse, and Answers to this question included assertions such as the following: . accordingly, the exercise described here is not a translation method, but rather a (a) Bawl has many 'def'rm'ti'ons' in Spanish' and almost any of them will do. consciousness-raising activity for student translators. (b) Exact translation is seldom possible. Translation students differ from FL learners in that the former should already (c) Language varies according to specific socio-cultural contexts. possess a native-like command of at least two languages when they begin their (d) Certain words are more difficult to translate than others. whichstudies. However, it is well-known that bilinguals are notnecessarily competent (e) By looking at the text, the translator will automatically know translators. Knowledge of two languages is only part of the knowledge that is correspondence is the best one. S . h . richer necessary for translating well. An importantperceptionfor translators to acquire, Bawl has so many correspondences in Spanish because paniS IS aeither consciously or intuitively, is that language structure (both paradigmatic (f) language than English with a grea:er variety of possible nuances, and a and syntagmatic) is a representation of conceptual structure. translator must inevitably accept this. Dictionaries and lnterlinguistic Correspondence This exercise was given as part of an Applied Linguistics course: designed to Exercises inlexical analysis enable translation students to discern the patterns familiarise students with basic linguistic concepts us~ful in.tr~la~~h:;;:~:~: underlying meaning. Their value lies in the fact that one of the most difficult w~ co;:~s;~:e~~~~~t;;~~ec~:'!~~~~~~~~l{;:'l'acc~ptable fluenc~ things translators have to learn is how to extract conceptual meaning from a ':'a ve p in assed the university entrance exam, as well as a .seco!'source text, and to base their translation on a reformulation of that meaning, not m English, ha~f' g p o1ven at the Faculty. About 20% possessed native-like onthe words orstructures that codify it. The aim of such exercises is for students lang>mge-speci IC exam 0 72 Translation Competence and Language Awareness 73 Language Awareness fluency because they had either Jived abroad and/or one of their parents was eanmgcomponents for bawl and warble Figurel M English-speaking. warble Even though none of the students had any background in lexicography or Meanin:< component bawl semantics, one might have expected a greater awareness of the differences in Classifier (indicating field SING (to make a musical SING (to make a musical meaning in the Spanish equivalents offered for bawl. However, the students membership) · sound) sound) pleasantlY seemed to feel that the authority of the dictionary was greater than their own as Mannerl loudly voice language users. Moreover, not one noticed the most obvious problem with the Instrument voice high-pitched, with trills above entry: namely, that among the six possible correspondences given (itself Manner2 badly like a bird an excessive number even for bilingual dictionaries of this type), there is no mention of berrear, which is arguably the 'best aU-purpose' equivalent. Nor did Pragmatic information (negatively evaluated by anyone remark uponthe fact that bawl could havedifferent meanings, depending (world knowledge) the perceiver) on whether the agent is a drill sergeant (shouting), a baby (crying), or a tone-deaf singer (singing). Although in answer (c), sociocultural contexts were mentioned, nobody showed any clear expectation that the dictionary might offer an . Th . d finitions can thus be dividedexplanation of the meaning differences between the various correspondences on otherverbs withthe same nuclear meanmg. elr ethe basis of different contexts. This result is indicative of the fact that until then, into the components!" Figu:e \; same semantic field are sing, hum, croon, yodd,students had not reflected either on the importance of dictionaries, or on the Other lexemes which fail m.t ~eld. defined here as 'the set of all lexical urutsdifferent types of information a useful dictionary for translators might contain. chant, carol and troll: A sem~tk IS n-trivial semantic component' (Mel'cuk,Given the incomplete and occasionaiiy inaccurate information offered in that share an explic;tly dlstu;gul~h~::au follows that a semantic field can be certain bilingual dictionaries, a useful technique to increase dictionary skiiis and 1988: 170). From this def~~on, It ll flichsharethesamenuclearmeaning.awareness is for students to learn how to establish interlinguistic corresponconceived as a hierarchy 0 exen:e~a ~ ry covered by a specific field and thusdences by using the information found in monolingual dictionaries. An activity The classifier marks th~ semantic. em~ld membership. This is also in consowhich opens many students' eyes to the relationship between language and the becomes the factor which dete':;:'m~in~iple which stipulates that the definitionmind is the use of dictionary information to map out an area of the lexicon in two nancewithMel'cuk'sDecomposz zan r th t emanticallysimplerthanitselflanguages, or to construct paraiiel representations of part of a semantic field. of a lexical unit must contam only terms a a:e s.(Mel'cuk, 1988: 170). Wierzbicka (1992: 11) wntes. .Mapping Out Semantic Space3 . . ll plex words to semantically Explicating involves reducmg se~anticady c:'explication are not selectedAlthough in one respect beginner translation students hold dictionaries in simple words, and hen.ce the wor s use mds and a correct definition willgreat awe, in quite another, they do not give them the importance they deserve. at random: there IS a hierarchy among wor 'Standard dictionaries contain the body of knowledge gathered by lexicographic reflect this hierarchy.tradition and their definitions have the status of referential authority for users of . . of the field they belong to in different the language in question. Moreover, it invariably comes as a revelation to LexThemes sp~c:fya~Ji~~~~:;;'u"::~ntare the basis uponwhich the lexemesstudents that anything so mundane as a dictionary definition is in one sense a ways. ese mmnn d . t eaningful configurations in the same area translation of perceptions ofreality, and thus encodes how the dictionary makers are interrelated and structure m o m perceive and categorise the world. in fact, each dictionary definition can be of sBemru:tic ~p:~~~ty of dictionaries as texts that embody our shar~dknowl~dgeconsidered an example of a micro-knowledge representation, because definiYusmg t t and compare the definitions gJVen about words, students are asked to con ras . tional structure is iconic with how subjects andevents are categorised onthe basis In this way they extract theof sensory data. for verbs within the same general are~fm~ru;re~tional anal~sis, identify the meaning components of each lexeme rou h . d fini·tions on the basisbawl to sing badly in a very loud voice d 1 how to construct t e1r own e type of c~n:~onent: an. e~m . . For this type of analysis, three or morewarble to sing pleasantly in a high-pitched voice with trills (like a bird). of this mzru-mvestigation mto meanmb.g nsus of the meaning componentsdictionaries' are used in order too tam a conseFor example, inthe precedingdefinitions, we cansee, thatbothbawl andwarble for each term. h are ways of singing. The fact that they share the same nuclear term or classifier A thesaurus can be used as t e source for the initial group of verbs. However, ifi d the members of (sing) locates them in a subdimension of the lexical field of verbs of SOUND. In . g relationships among these lexemes are spec e ' as therneanmh t both cases, the adverbial modification of sing in their respective definitions, . h. h may vary somew a.the lexical set which ~aiiy appeabr : :~e ~==gyarea in question, each term is encodes features which differentiate them from each other, as well as from the To justify the mcluswn of aver e 74 Language Awareness lexically decomposed so that its definition consists of a nuclear word (or a prevwusly defined non-nuclear one), and one or more features which differenti a~e 1t fr?m the preceding.members of the hierarchy. For example in the lexical ~unens1on, to ~ake a mustcal sound, the nuclear word, sing, is the superordinate m. te;ms of W~l"!'. all the other words are defined. The adverbial modification wtthm the defint~or:s encode features (semes) which differentiate the lexemes from each other Within each meaning area. Lexemes are distinguished from each other by on: seme o; n;inimal distinctive feature. The various kinds of features of semantic dtfferentiation show us the divisions and distinctions th t ch I k"h aea 1 ~~agema es m t e semantic continuum (Faber, 1994; Faber & Mairal, 1994; .For.example: in the case of bawl, definitional analysis would be carried out by usmg information from the following dictionaries: bawl to shout in a loud, rough voice; to cry noisily (Longman Dictionary of Engltsh Language and Culture). bawl to shout or cry loudly (Oxford Advanced Learner's Dictionary). bawl If you bawl, you shout or sing something very loudly and rather harshly. Ifa child i~ bawling, it is crying loudly (Collins Cobuild). bawl to shout or smg m a very loud voice; to cry loudly (CambridgeInternational Dictionary ofEnglish). bawl to cry .or sob loudly; wail; to cry out loudly and vehemently; shout (Amertcan Herztage). Once it is ascertained, that bawl is in reality not one lexeme, but three, the students w~uld then pr?c.e~d to insert sense components (derived from the precedmg dictionary definitions) as showri in Figure 2. Figure 2 Activity Sheet 1 bawl1 bawl2 bawl3 Oassifier shout sin~ cry Mannerl loudly loudly very loudlv instrument voice voice voice Manner2 harshlv badly unoleasantlv Pragmatic information (indicative of speaker authority and/or strong emotion) (negatively evaluated by the perceiver) of children The components in Figure 2 allow them to construct new definitions, something like the following: bawl1 to shout loudly and harshly bawl2 to sing badly in a very loud voice. bawl3 to cry very loudly in an unpleasant way (of children). The meaning components used are natural language phrases found in Translation Competence and Language Awareness definitions, and thus differ from componential analysis (Nida, 1975). In componential analysis, the meaning of a word is the sum of the binary features it possesses, such as +I-human, +I-male, +I-concrete, etc. When componentialanalysis was most popular in the 1950s, linguists hoped that it would enable them to arrive at the set of universal semantic features. However, it soon became clear that this type of analysis is only applicable to a small sector of vocabulary (e.g.kinship), and that word meaning is much too complex to be expressed purely in terms of binary oppositions. Varieties of componential analysis have been proposed by various authors both as an ald to translation (Newr_nark, 1981; 198.8)and vocabulary learning (Rudzka et al., 1981, 1985). However, m translation, 1ts use has always been somewhat limited because the translator must inevitably give priority to correspondence at higher levels of the text, and words must be considered in context. Nevertheless, the elaboration of lexical hierarchies is a valuable exercise because it more generally helps students acquire dictionary skills and awareness, and more specifically shows them how the polysemy of lexemes such as bawl can be resolved. The next step after elaborating the definitions for each verb in the Figure 3 Activity Sheet 2 Within each of the following meaning dimensions, arrange the verbs listed in lexical hierarchies in terms of their definitional structure. y-ERBS OF SOUND sound to make a particular noise. SQUNDS PROD! !CED BY Hl !MANS To make a sound by speaking TQmake a !Qud sQund hy !!Peaking bawll, roar, shout, shriek, bark, holler, whoop, scream, bellow, howll, yell, vociferate, screech, cry out Ta mak~ a ~a:uud fX.llr~~siug: unha~b:u~~~ cry1, cry2, moan, whine, groan, whimper, bawl2, yowl, sob, weep, wail, blubber, howl2 To produce musical sounds sing, bawl3, hum, troll, croon, yodel, warble, chant, carol lexical set is to specify their relationship with other lexemes. Figure 3 shows the activity sheet given to students for this task. When completed, the hierarchies would be similar to the ones in Figure 4. As can be observed, within verbs of SOUND, bawl would appear in three different subdimensions, depending on the type of agent producing the sound. The completed version of Activity Sheet 2 shows that bawl falls in three different areas of meaning, and as such, is related to three different sets of 16 Language Awareness Translation Competence and Language Awareness 17 An example of the definitional analysis of berrear (the Spanish equivalent ofbawl) Figure 4: Activity Sheet 2 (completed version) can be seen in Figure 5. Figure 6 is an example of the comparison of the definitional components of bawl3/berrear3. VERBS OF SOUND sound to make a particular noise. Figure 5 Activity Sheet 3 (completed) SO! TNQS PRODTJCED BY BIJMAN$ To make a sound by speaking berrear Dar berridos los becerros u otros anirnales. 2. Llorar o gritar To make a loud sound by speaking desaforadamente unni.ft.o. 3. fig. Gritaro cantardesentonadamente shout to speak loudly las personas (Diccionario de Ia Real Academia Espanola). yell to shout loudly (because of excitement, anger, pain). berrear Dar berridos los becerros u otros anirnales. fig. Gritar o cantardewhoop to shout loudly (because ofexcitement, happiness). sentonadamente. (Diccionario ideolgico de Ia lengua espanola). cry to shout (because of excitement, surprise, fear). (1) Emitir su voz propia un becerro u otro animal que Ia tenga ;cre)am to cry out loudly in a high-pitched tone (because of great exdtement, anger, pain, berrearear. semejante.shriek to scream very sharply and loudly. (2) (desp.) Emitir gritos estridentes; por ejemplo, una criatura screech to sluiek disagreeably and continuously. cuando !lora.Ibawl(l) to sbout loudly and harsblyj Se aplica hiperb6licamente a !a acci6n de cantar con estridencia y roar to shout loudly and continuously in a very deep voice. desafinaci6n. (Marfa Moliner). bellow to shout in a loud deep voice. · berrear1 berrear2 berrear3 To make a sound expressing unhqppiness llorar w~eto make a long, hi~-pit<:hed sonnd (because of unhappiness). Classifier l~ritar cantar whrmper to make short, high-pttched sounds (because of unhappiness). Mannerl sonido fuerte haciendo mucho sonido fuerte moan to make a long, low-pitched sound (because of pain, grief, suffering). ruido groan to make a long, low-pitched, rather loud moan (because ofpain, worry, disapproval). la voz lavoz Instrument la voz cry 1 to make a loud sound (because of unhappiness, fear, pain). Manner2 sonido desafinadarnente sonido wail to make long, loud, high- pitched cries (because of sorrow, pain). desagradable desagradable howl to make a long, loud cry (because ofpain, fear, unhappiness). yowl to howl loudly. Pragmatic despreciativo despreciativo infantil cry2 to make a sound when you produce tears expressing strong emotions . information weep to cry very softly. berrearl gritar con estridencia (sonido fuerte y desagradable) (desprecia sob to cry 1, breathing in short breaths. blubber to cry very in an unpleasant, childish way. tivo). berrear2 cantar mal (desafinadamente), haciendo mucho ruido. /bawl(2) to cry very loudly in an unpleasant wayJ berrear3 llorar un ni.ft.o con estridencia. To produce musical sounds sing to produce musical sounds with/without words. . hum to sing with closed lips, without prononncing words. croon to sing insweet, low voice. Figure 6 Activity Sheet 4 (completed) warble to sing pleasantly in a high-pitched voice with trills (like a bird). yodel to sing. changing quickly and continuously from a normal voice to a very high one (as berrear3 (can tar! inSwitzerland). baw/3 (sin!l) chant to sing a religious prayerIsong. Classifer sing can.tar carol to ~inghappily (esp. Chrishnas songs). loudly haciendo mucho ruido Mannerl troll to smg loudly to relebrare something (old-fashioned). Instrument voice la VOZ Jbaw1(3) to sing badly in a very loud voice. I Manner2 badly desafinadarnente Pragmatic information (negatively evaluated by despreciativo """ the perceiver) lexemes. These hierarchies of meaning constitute the basic structural pattern of each area of semantic space. Such an analysis helps students learn to be discriminating dictionary users. It also helps them learn how to establish The parallel representation in English and Spanish of the subdimension of to make a musical sound, with approximate correspondences within the two sets of interlinguistic correspondences within the context of an entire lexical field. In order to do this, Spanish verbs are examined in the same wayas the Englishones. verbs, would be similar to those in Figure 7. Language Awareness Figure 7 Contrastive lexical hierarchy for verbs of singing in English and Spanish To vroduce musical sounds Emitir sonidos musicales sing to produce musical sounds cantar emitir sonidos musicales, with/without words formando palabras o no (to emit musical sounds with/without words)] to sing on key entonar cantar, ajustandose a! tono (to sing on kev) hum to sing with closed lips, tararear cantar sin pronunciar las without pronouncing words palabras, con voz dulce (to sing in a sweet voice, without pronouncing words) croon to sing in sweet, low voice canturrear cantar con poca voz y descuidadamente (to sing softly without thinking what one is doing) warble to sing pleasantly in a high-gorjear cantar con un sonido pitched voice with trills (like a semejante a los pajaros (to bird) sing like a bird) . yodel to sing, changing quickly and cantar a 1a manera tirolesa continuously from a normal voice to a very high one (as in Switzerland) to sing in a nw1Wtone salmodiar cantar alga con cadencia mon6tona (to sing in a monotone) chant to sing a religious salmear cantar salmos (to sing psalms) prayerIsoni, to sin5!' vsalms carol to sing happily (esp. cantar villancicos Christmas sor\gs) troll to sirig loudly to celebrate cantar muy alto para celebrar alga something (old-fashioned) bawl to ~ing badly in a very loud berrear cantar mal, hacienda mucho vmce ruido (to sing noisily and offkev) When students compare the subdimension in Figure 7 (to make amusical sound) with that of Figure 8 (to make a loud sound by speaking), they find that although ~exemes such as bawl belong to more than one meaning area, these meanings are mterconnected and must necessarily be taken into account in the search for correspondence. Inthis case, all the meanings of bawl coincide in the component of loudness. Nevertheless, it is evident that the lexicographer who elaborated the initial bilingual dictionary entry only chose to define bawl as a kind of slwuting. . ~tudents thus acqUlre a graphic representation of how different languages divide up the same semantic space, and see distinctions made in one language that are not made in another. This coincides with the following list of insights which can usefully be gained through Language Awareness activities: Translation Competence and Language Awareness Figure 8 Contrastive lexical hierarchy for verbs of shouting in English and Spanish VERSOS DE SONIDOVERBS OF SOUND prod_~t un sonido (to produce a sound to make a particular noise sonar sound SONTIJOSPRODUCTDOSPORSERESSOUNDS PRODUCED BY HUMANS HUMANOS Producir un sonido articulado To make a sound bv sueakine. Producir un sonido altQ_y articulado To make a loud sound bv sneakint!' hablar muy alto (para hacerse oir o gritar shout to speak loudly por enfado) [to speak very loudly (in o~~er to be heard or because of anQ:er gritar (lit.) [to shout (literary)] vocear yell to shout loudly (beca~of excitement, ar\o-er, nain whoop to shout loudly (beca~of excitement, rul'nOiness chillar gritar de manera aguda y cry to shout (b~~use of excitement, estridente (to shout in a sharp, surorise fear high-pitched tone)to cry out loudly in a high-pitched scream tone (because of great excitement, aneer, uain fe.;,l' to screamverv sh•mlv and loudly shriek screech to shriek disagreeably and continuouslv berrearl gritar con estridencia bawll to shout loudly and harshly (despreciativo) [to shout very ~~udly ~~agreeably deroeato vociferar gritar muy fuerte y de manera descompuesta (to shout very loudlv and with stromz emotion gritar muy fuerte usu. varias vecesto shout loudly and continuously rugir roar como por dolor o ira (to shout very in a very deep voice loudly and continuously because of nain or anger) rugir de forma vio~:~ima(to roar bellow to shout in a loud deep voice bramar in a verv violent wa bramar (fig.) [to bellow (figurative)] mut!'ir Languages are different in many ways, e.g. • there is no word-for-word equivalence, • like-sounding words may not mean the same, • some languages have several words for only one word in another, • some languages do not have a word that others have (Donmall, 1991: 120). Conclusions Even students with a good command of two languages oftenbegin translation studies with an erroneous concept ofthe translation process and what it involves. This is partly due to naive ideas about meaning and language. One of the most important tasks for the teacher is to foster awareness in students ofhow language Language Awareness works through a wide variety of activities which ultimately lead them to understand translation better. The exercise in lexical analysis described here builds on knowledge the students already have (the use of dictionaries, knowledge of the L1 and 12) and helps them see how basic correspondences at the level of word can be derived. Italso encourages students to place words in terms of their paradigmatic relations with other words in the same meaning area. This is valuable because even students with a high level of proficiency in the FL often do not have an overview of the semantic distinctions made in comparable lexical domains. The effectiveness of these activities can be judged from the reports of the students themselves: that they later found insights from the activities to be beneficial for pre-translation text analysis, as well as for the subject of Terminology where they also had to derive conceptual relationships between terms in specialised domains. It also made them more wary about blindly accepting so-called translation correspondences in bilingual dictionaries, but even more important, it gave them more realistic expectations of what dictionaries can offer translators. Notes 1. This research was carried out within the framework of the project Desarrollo de una 16gica lt!xica para Ia traducci6n asistida por ordenador a partir de una base de datos lexica inglt!s-espaiioljrances-alemtin multifuncional y reutilisable funded by the DGCIYT (PB 94-0437). The author wishes to thank Peter Garrett as well as the two anonymous referees for their suggestions and helpful comments regarding this article. 2. Entry taken from Amadar English-Spanish Dictionary. 3. The lexicological model used to structure the lexical field of SOUND is the Funetional-Lexematic model elaborated by Martin Mingorance (1990, 1995), which integrates Coseriu's Theory of Lexematics (Coseriu, 1977) and Simon Dik's Functional Grammar (Dik, 1978, 1989). 4. The English dictionaries used were Collins Cobuild, Oxford Advanced Learners' Dictionary, Cambridge International Dictionary, American Heritage and The Longman Dictionary of English Language and Culture. 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