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TRANSLATION THEORY AND PRACTICE
CHAPTER ONE: SPECIALISED TRANSLATION AND CULTURE
We are currently living a period of transformation as regards Translation Studies, due to some issues related to the term Cultural Translation, which causes a collapse of binary distinctions between the original/ translated text, the role of translations and translators in society and the need to define Translation Studies as a discipline in itself. This is also due to the changing global situation which is being marked by the continuous movement of people and to the new issues related to globalization. Globalization means the internationalization of texts and textual typologies, but also the re-adaptation in the target culture and its socio-political-economical milieu. Christina Schaffner demonstrates, translation is deeply affected by the globalization process for many reasons, like the role of English as a lingua franca, international communication and marketing. Similarly Mary Snell Hornby argues that progress in science and technology has affected people’s production and perception of language, especially for the choice of English as the dominant language of World Wide Web and the preponderance of translations from this language. Globalization also means more demand of translation services with many economic, political and ethical implications. One of the positive effects of globalization is that it enables cross-cultural communication, producing a framing in the different types of genres and discourses, because language is used in different domains. Translation is the key to cultural diversity, in fact all EU languages are considered to be equal and linguistic diversity is at the core of the European project. Translators and interpreters’ roles are also changing. Translating has been reconfigured as an intellectual activity, and not anymore a secondary occupation. They have created their own professional associations which function as a source of professional advice, and pursue more concrete recognition of the profession. In Italy ANITI1 and AITI2 are both working towards safeguarding the economic and legal interests of translators and the promotion of legislation that recognizes their status.
The acronym LSP refers to a full range of disciples across the Arts and the Humanities, Social and Natural Sciences as well as Engineering and other technologies. Nevertheless, what is meant by the term specialized translation is still open to interpretation. The Italian academic context has been very productive in delineating special languages. In 1994 Michele Cortellazzo defined a horizontal dimension which is given by the degree of specialization of the field and register used, and a vertical dimension which changes according to the participants’ framework. The study on specialized languages comes along with that of specialized genres. Genres follow specific structures which function as a parameter to divide texts into different typologies, already known by the translator. The translator’s competence has been related to his/her training according to various parameters:
- Linguistic competence
- Textual competence
- Subject competence
- Cultural competence
- Transfer competence
- Genre competence
1 The Italian Association of Translators and Interpreters (^2) The Italian Association of Translation and Interpreting
In the Italian context, two important texts have opened the debate on specialized translation since the end of the 90s, Christopher Taylor ’s Language to Language (1998) and La traduzione specializzata by Federica Scarpa (2001). They offer both theoretical and practical aspects on LSP translation outlining that:
the translator must be aware of the conceptual organization of the area in both languages; the translator should know the terminology in both languages and understand how it is used in the TL, so that word order, collocations and grammar rules are respected; the translator should unite linguistic and subject competences. Compared to literary translations, specialized translators are anonymous, even if their work is the result of their own ideas and values, of their own reading, interpretation, and decision-making processes and choices. However, just like literary texts, specialized ones are born and bred in a specific culture and carry its values while they will be received differently in another cultural context. In addition to this, we know many socio- cultural and economic factors are behind the process of translating and publishing. The interest in LSP translation has grown in the last decades; this is clear if we think of the many journals which include issues on translation of music, science, food, economics, business, audiovisual. The most important reference for LSP translation is the open-access online journal JoTrans The Journal of Specialized Translation which offers important insights on the field.
For a long time the cultural aspect has been neglected in specialized translation, and only recently it has acquired more relevance, due to the difficulty in translating culture bound terms. Moreover intertextuality (the relationship of the text with other ones), which has been analyzed in literary translation, is also present in LSP texts and needs to be recognized and transposed in the target text.
The last decades have witnessed a re-elaboration of the concept of Cultural Translation in Translation Studies advocated by Susan Bassnett and André Lefevere. The term was coined in 1976 after a seminar in Leuven by André Lefevere. From his perspective the translator acts like a cultural mediator between cultures and his/ her choices affect the reception of the text in the target language. The translator’s interpretation of the text guides his rewriting of the ST and the reception of the TT in the target culture. This is what happens in literary translations. In the case of LSP texts translation cannot be considered as a creative act, but needs to follow more strictly the forms and contents of the original, but it is also the result of an act of reproduction through which the meaning of the source text is transferred to the target text. This process of translation implies forms of textual rewriting because of two aspects:
- the culture specific terms in the ST need to be adapted in the TT;
- the textual typology that vary according to the context where it is used, so that a genre can differ in unrelated cultures.
The Cultural turn of the mid 1980s gave new frames of research. Cultural meant a continual confrontation with different cultural formations together with a reflection on the construction and representation of cultures. Cultural aspects strongly permeate specialized texts too, because all texts are produced in one cultural context and translated into a different one. On this issue, Peter Newmark mentioned the difference between translation methods (relating to the whole text) and procedures (used for sentences and smaller units of language). The methods are:
- Word-for-word translation
- Literal translation
- Faithful translation
- (^) Semantic translation
- Adaptation
- Free translation
practices take place in a web of socio-cultural factors and human agency. In this regard, scholars have proposed various ways of dealing with culture-specific concepts (CSCs) in the practice of translation, for example: making up a new word; explaining the meaning of the SL expression in lieu of translating it; preserve the SL term intact; opting for a new word in the TL which seems similar to or has the same relevance as the SL term. For culture-bound terms (CBTs) are suggested four major techniques for their translation:
- Functional equivalence;
- Formal equivalence or linguistic equivalence;
- Transcription or borrowing;
- Descriptive or self-explanatory translation.
The concept of agency has gained importance in Translation Studies thanks to the cultural turn, postcolonial theories, feminist and sociological approaches. The sociologist Pierre Bourdieu and his concept of habitus3 have been included in the translator’s agency debate and in many studies the term has been accepted with the meaning of “willingness and ability to act” uniting the idea of choice and activity. The issue of ethics in translation is not a new one, but since the last decade scholars have begun to underline the problems linked to the work of the translator and his/her capacity to transpose a culture into a new cultural context. Today, professional translation associations with an online presence post some version of a code of professional conduct or ethics and ethical concerns are raised regarding translator participation in nonprofit translation crowdsourcing. Also today the ethics of translation involves being aware of the risks deriving from speaking for others, erasing a Eurocentric notion of translation and above all, understanding the geo-socio-political context in which the original texts are produced (the so-called ethics of location). A translator is responsible for the final work and its reception. This means that the translator should be an interpreter between two socio-political and cultural worlds. This term was also used by Lawrence Venuti , in his volume on the translator’s invisibility , regarding the translator’s role as professional and the logics on the publishing market. His delineation of two different methods of translation: domestication and foreignization have been widely used by critics and translators. In the end we can say that the specialized translator does create a new text, he is an agent as much as the literal translator, because he is an interpreter of the target specialized text and takes decisions at every level: lexical, morphological, syntactical and pragmatic. In so doing, he takes into account cultural aspects hidden in texts and embedded in social practices.
3 Habitus=Il concetto di habitus è presente nella teoria del sociologo francese Pierre Bourdieu e può essere definito come "un sistema di schemi percettivi, di pensiero e di azione acquisiti in maniera duratura e generati da condizioni oggettive, ma che tendono a persistere anche dopo il mutamento di queste condizioni". L'habitus, in quanto sistema di schemi, genera azioni coerenti relativamente al gruppo o classe di appartenenza: l'habitus non è dunque né universale, né specifico a un individuo. Secondo Bourdieu, l'habitus è l'elemento centrale della riproduzione sociale e culturale in quanto è capace di generare comportamenti regolari e attesi, che condizionano la vita sociale degli individui in relazione alla loro classe di appartenenza.
CHAPTER TWO: TRANSLATING ADVERTISEMENTS
For George Orwell advertising was to blame because it inflamed consumer desires for materialistic goods; certainly advertising has a long and complex history that goes back to the Romans and to their selling and persuasion techniques. The British context is important for the development of advertising, in fact even literary and gossipy publications, such as Richard Steele’s Tatler and Addison and Steele’s Spectator , contained advertisements. Later on, during the reign of Queen Victoria, concessionaries for advertising spaces in newspapers were created and major manufactures began to advertise their products. Copywriters chose for example imperial and patriotic images and slogans to suggest the superior quality of British goods. The symbols of Britishness were used and abused both in the packaging process, and in advertisements: Britannia, the lion, John Bull, the Royal Family and the Union Jack appeared on posters and on goods’ packaging. Advertising was recognized as a powerful form of communication, in fact at the root of modern mass production and mass marketing there is a hidden need to promote the nation; all these slogans were aimed at encouraging British patriotism while using goods known and sold all over the Empire and proposed as truly English. Copywriters used mainly rhymes and repetitions while comparing the product with other brands. Already in the 1920s, advertising campaigns played with language, trying to create effective images for consumption while the inter-war period witnessed the development of advertising and from the 1930s onwards photography became the most used means of attraction, especially in magazines. Later on World War II brought a change in social relations and advertisers proposed selling images aimed at soldiers, nurses and women in factories. The inter war period saw the emergence of the cinema as an important medium for advertising. The 50s and the 60s were the periods of the consumer market; the family was at the center of the ad with all its members. In the most recent period, the main aim is to address the jaded consumer, through humor and play, irony and juxtaposition of competing discourses in the text and in the images. Diachronically, advertising tells us about social change and its language reflects the ideologies that stand behind them. Contemporary advertising is auto-referential and is more focused on its characteristics and communicative strategies rather than on the product itself. Nowadays advertising plays with the consumer, revealing its strategies and becoming more and more pervasive in everyday life. Advertising strategies associate the product with a desirable lifestyle of a social group or a situation, as luxury goods connected to social class or products linked to youth and leisure. The message is created with an ideal consumer in mind, and everyday language is used together with specialized language, according to the product and the campaign. Discourses are produced and interpreted in terms of mental representations, which refer to specific events and are socially shared as social representations. According to Teun Van Dijk, it is up to the recipients to accept beliefs and opinions from credible sources and in everyday discourse. Ads refer to discourses and systems of meanings embedded in society and therefore ad-men communicate with each specific audience in order to persuade specific localized consumers. The language of advertising is used internationally, some English terms are used worldwide, like logo, body-copy, slogan, brand, storyboard or commercial. What does a translator should translate in advertisements? Certainly the verbal text, which main function is to catch the reader’s attention. The written text of an ad follows a hierarchical structure: Headline introduces to the ad message and is connected to the visual elements to the claim Claim a line which explains the qualities of the product and arouses the viewer’s curiosity Subheads constitute a further explanation, they are relevant in order to understand the promotional message and adds emphasis to the message Body-copy explains the product’s characteristics, it adds some information to the headline, it explains how the product can fulfill the buyer’s needs, sometimes it introduces testimonials from users, urges the consumer for an action, for example to try the product. Baseline is a sentence or a term that close the body-copy summing up the advertising argument
adverb or an adjective. Advertising texts are usually brief, thanks to a few linking words and are anchored to the visual elements. Headline, body-copy and pay off keep to a synthetic and simple style carrying out the informative-explicative function together with the persuasive one. In advertising, the communicative function is of primary importance and privileges the relationship with the context and the intended addressee. The text presents a high density of information depicted through the combination of words and images. Each word has a precise meaning and collocation. The correct meaning can be found through keywords of the text and its semantic fields. Usually the text is concise and precise, in order to be easily read and clearly understood. The tone can interchange between the referential/informative tone and the informal/not-emotional one. The tone of the writer is not neutral because the chosen language is emphatic and persuasive. Terms indicate an idea or they refer to more concepts, even opposing ones. Often words are coined through metaphorisation or they acquire a new meaning in a new context. In advertising common language is used in a very peculiar way: it is fully exploited through a sophisticated use of rhetorical figures and word play. New catchy expressions, neologisms, misspelling and a distinctness in the use of ordinary terms make the language of advertising so appealing. According to Roland Barthes, there is a rigid connection between Aristotle and mass culture based on language manipulation. In fact all the elements of Greek rhetoric (invention, disposition, elocution, action, memoria) can be found in advertisements. When translating, transcreation means re-constructing the entire advertising (visual and verbal) text. Other terms used to discuss the same issue are marketization, cultural adaptation, multilingual copywriting, copy adaptation, marketing translation. Advertising language is based upon an archive of shared knowledge in a specific domain, so it is important to bear in mind the distinction between the specialized lexicon of advertising used by professionals and the shared knowledge of advertising terms known by a wider audience. We can talk about different layers of specialized lexis. Fatihi divides it into two categories: informative language and consumer language. The first is used in ads that have a high informative function, the style is more formal and usually presents technical terms connected to the subject of the ad, the second has a high persuasive function, it is full of catchy expressions and glamorous words. Rhetorical figures such as metaphor, metonymy or analogy permeate the second typology created principally to persuade the consumer.
Translating old advertisements
- England’s Glory Matches This was a common ad in the British context at the beginning of the 20 th^ century and it had the main aim to support the British trade and British goods. The ad shows a box ring where John Bull punches a German man in the face > glory of Imperial England reinforced by the visual and verbal elements. The term match is used for the sold matches and the boxing match which is difficult to reproduce in Italian (incontro di box/ fiammiferi). We could translate by “ I fiammiferi England’s Glory infiammano gli animi e accendono lo scontro”.
- Sunlight Soap India This ad sounds racist and offensive nowadays. Sunlight is a brand of household soap introduced by the British company Lever Brothers in 1884. They created ads which referred to personal and household cleanliness, attention to hygiene, aimed to the middle class. This ad is an example of the use of markers of race in advertisements. The illustration is a vivid representation of Indian women washing clothes at the river, enlightened by Western women and wash in a faster way compared to those in the background. This is also an allusion to Western civilization and economic power against the old-fashioned methods of Indian women.
- Aunt Jemima This American brand represents a pancake mix producer. The real Aunt Jemima, Nancy Green, was a business woman, portrayed as Aunt Jemima until her death. She embodied an early 20 th^ century idealized Southern domesticity. The company was founded in 1889 but the image of the smiling black woman with a headband remained for one century. The visual image is that of a comic strip and she is portrayed in one corner. The main theme is that of family life and the traditional American family of the 30s. Two American women (mother and daughter) are worried about preparing dinner for the husband. The language used is informal, in fact there are some expressions which would be hard to translate into Italian ( fix them in a diffy ) and many expressions derived from the Black Southern jargon.
Another example of connection between italian products and fashion ad promoted by ICE (Istituto Italiano per il Commercio). The name of the campaign was The Italian food collection transforming food products into fashion items.
CHAPTER THREE: TRANSLATION, ADVERTISING AND CULTURE
If we look at print ads of Italian products for an Anglophone market, we can see that they reiterate very specific and connoted images of Italy and Italianness all over the world. Ads are always cultural representations created for a target consumer who possesses his own mental representations, attitudes and values. Stuart Hall’s notion of translatability of culture in terms of shared conceptual maps, codes and signs is useful in decoding these ads, as they are the result of a set of social conventions through which individuals become cultural competent subjects. If ads on the one hand, ads of Italian products abroad are dictated by economical choices, on the other hand, they are the result of social practices strictly linked to a collective ideological imagery for which Italy and Italianess are connoted in a very specific way, usually through stereotypes. Both visual and verbal discourses play a central role in the formation and recreation of Italian cultural representations for a foreign audience that delivers ads in English. A very good example is Italian food and beverages ads of the last two decades. Different scholars have outlined that food is an important element in order to recreate a collective memory and identity, and have studied food as a locus of memory, among Italian immigrants in the USA or first generation Italians-Americans. Ads exploit linguistic and non-linguistic/pictorial metaphors as many scholars have demonstrated. Stereotype definitions follow the idea of a mental scheme, a sort of simplified structure easily applicable and
recognizable in authentic situations. The stereotype helps an individual build a certain way to perceive things and understand reality, a way of knowing a foreign word. According to Coleman, a stereotype is a fixed oversimplified generalization about a group or class of people, usually focusing on the negative, unfavorable characteristics, although some authorities recognize the possibility of positive stereotypes just as well. If we look at advertisements in English of Italian products, we can see that there are various themes around which the advertiser constructs these texts. The principal themes are: The Italian family, love and passion, a stereotyped version of gender roles, authenticity, the myth of rural pre-industrial past, sunny weather and holidays, Italian life-style, genuineness and unadulterated food, aesthetic values, Italian history. Examples of these themes in advertisements of Italian products: “Carapelli. The oil that fuels Italians”, “La Dolce Vita in Italy”, “Lavazza. Italian for life”. The Italian products which are the most sold abroad are food and wine goods, fashion items and cars or motorbikes. If we look at examples of food and wine products, we can see that Italian culture is at the centre of both the visual and the verbal text. This is obvious since, as Newmark underlines, “food is for many the most sensitive and important expression of national culture; food terms are subject to the widest variety of translation procedures”. The brand Bertolli, which is actually split into four different companies, varies its profile and product range from market to market differentiating the advertising strategies according to the context. These advertisements use visual and verbal elements to create a representation of the place that a British, American or an international consumer expects to find and consequently, will be more inclined to buy the product. Foreign foods are adapted to fit the culinary expectations of their new settings. For example, Bertolli proposes to the Anglophone consumer products which are not sold in Italy, such as olive oil sprays or spreads. The campaign Little Alberto by Bertolli (on the left) presents as testimonials old Italian men looking active and healthy, a referring to cultural stereotypes. The first line of body copy highlights the fact that one of the reasons people in the Mediterranean enjoy such long lives is the result of their traditional diet with of course olive oil. The visual and the verbal are anchored through irony in order to translate the quality of the product. Themes of Italianness are represented in the ad:Tuscan landscape, sport suit, healthy relaxed man. The translation of the headline would be difficult in Italian otherwise the wordplay with trainers would be lost. The campaign Roberto by Bertolli (on the right) shows a testimonial with a similar name, used as a representation of various cultural stereotypes connected to Italy. The oil refers to the oil used for the hairstyle and the product (Olivio).
demonstrates how old age has been represented through an idea of elegance and charm. Alliteration is lost but the term chic is a very good choice for gorgeous.
Now advertisers have understood that there are different masculine, feminine and LGBT audiences. Thus, learning to match the right language with the right sex as gender roles blur has become a key marketing challenge. Understanding gender is a key factor to marketing success, while others rank its importance below other segmentation variables such as age, income, education and lifestyle. Gender in marketing literature has mostly been conceptualized as a personal identity, in contrast, a gender group identity is a self- conceptualization that is derived from acknowledging oneself as a member of one’s gender group and all the meanings and values associated with that gender group. Gender is the symbolic role attributed to members of a sex based on historically constructed interpretations of their nature, disposition, and role of said members. An interest in gender has been persistent and gender issues have been investigated in many domains. Theories analyzing gender as a cultural phenomenon originate in movements like the women’s liberation, feminism or the LGBT movement and have always had a political aspect. Whereas early feminist theory saw biology as he determining factor for gender difference, Judith Butler defines gender as a mere cultural construction. Images of femininity and masculinity must be considered in light of cultural expectations which are continuously changing. Ads reflect social familiarity and show how ideas and values change in society, including gender and sexuality issues. The advertising of femininities/masculinities change according to different cultures, the same product is advertised in a different way in many countries because local cultural values shape the representation of women and men in ads. The cultural context changes and decides the future of a campaign, especially when dealing with issues that are not culturally accepted. A noteworthy example is the censured campaign of Ra-Re Clothes by Oliviero Toscani, which caused outrage in Italy, due to the lesbian and gay intimacy showed in the ad. Generally, the recent fluidity of gender roles and expressions in Western society is affecting and changing the advertising world introducing a new market segment: gay and lesbian consumers. Gay-friendly advertising has been identified in two typologies: gay-window advertising and a out of the closet. However, we divide LGBT advertising into three main areas:
- The use and abuse of gay images for the heterosexual market.
- Gay-window advertising, which is allusive, non-explicit and non-direct; it leaves the viewer in doubt about the issue of homosexuality.
- Out of closet advertising, which is explicit and direct and wants to get to the gay market immediately without creating doubt.
In 2011 Tiffany launched the campaign Will you? which clearly shows a gay couple. This ad was not translated into the Italian market, in fact was accused of being controversial. Same sex marriage was an improbability and civil unions for same sex couples was passed only in 2016. Adverts for the LGBT community are not common in Italy and still seen as controversial. It is better to change and adapt the campaign because of negative reactions in cultural contexts where some issues are still risky.
CHAPTER FOUR: TRANSLATING TOURISM
Tourism is a vital source of income in many countries, including Italy, where it has become one of the most important businesses. The last few decades have seen a proliferation of publications on Tourism Studies, a subject which aims to develop a theoretical understanding of tourism by analyzing the phenomena and relationships arising from the interaction between tourists, business suppliers, host governments and communities in the process of attracting and hosting visitors. There are different types of tourists and travelers; both domestic and international, varying in age, sex , class, ethnicity and regarding their choice of travelling the world( mass tourism, individual t., religious t.). Common motives for travel are: leisure, business, cultural tourism, eco-tourism, study-tourism, health tourism, sports tourism. The literature on Tourism Studies is growing and it is in expansion and specific studies have been dedicating to advertising in tourism outlining how any organization involved in tourism business uses advertising in one form or another. Advertising is a key marketing tool in tourism industries and cannot be underestimated. Tourism has a long history in the Western World, in her volume Il linguaggio specifico del turismo (2006), Maria Giovanna Nigro goes back to the etymology of the term tourism and traces back the history of tourism from antiquity to the modern age. Modern tourism is traced back to the Grand Tour, the traditional trip around Europe undertaken by upper class European young men between the 17 th^ and the 19 th^ century. With the Industrial Revolution and the rise of the middle class, leisure travel emerged, and pioneers like Thomas Cook created the travel agency business, taking advantage of Europe’s expanding railway network. Tourism developed at a faster rate in the 20 th^ century with the advent of automobiles and planes. Mass tourism grew thanks to a number of distinct but interrelated developments after WWII. People adopted new ideas regarding leisure and living standards, holidays became a standard benefit for employees, media like TV and cinema made people think about faraway places. Tourism discourse began to fill popular culture in a world that was becoming more and more fascinated by the idea of mobility. Tourism is first of all a form of communication, it is a product which needs certain communicative strategies in order to persuade the would-be tourist to choose a precise destination. The language of tourism together with a correct and persuasive translation of texts are central elements for the success of tourist communication. Tourism is a wide area and tourist textual typologies are numerous: from advertising catalogue to the professional letter, guides, leaflets and websites. Moreover tourism is related to
Professional translators are not always involved in the translation of tourist texts, so there is a great deal of poor quality in this sector. As for the translation of advertising text it is important to translate tourists texts differently according to the linguistic and cultural context. If a tourist text requires an adaptation, a rewriting, this is due to what the tourist, prior to departure, expects to find and see at this particular destination. Therefore, the first choice for a translator of tourist texts is to choose which cultural aspects to give more or less emphasis to, according to what s/he believes are the readers’ expectations. A second aspect to take into consideration is that the reader of the target text possesses his/her own knowledge of tourist textual conventions and expects to find different contents; however s/he is strongly influenced by his/her own cultural values. The translator works as an intercultural mediator, choosing the style and register according to a different use of language, for example, opting for a more direct or indirect communication, or a more formal or informal language. Generally speaking, we can visualize four different phases in translating a tourist text: the first is a bottom-up text analysis where the ST needs to be analyzed and fully understood; the second phase focuses on a contrastive analysis in which linguistic and cultural features and knowledge systems are compared for translation purposes; a third phase of reformulation in which the TT is produced and the ST reformulated and a fourth phase of revision and re-editing of the translation. Another aspect to consider is the importance of the verbal text in tourism materials. Usually tourist texts translate verbal texts into more than one language but keep the same visual elements in all target texts, portraying well-known sights and landmarks of the destination. Images play an important role in convincing people to visit a certain place, they act as stimuli in the reader’s mind, and modality (reliability of images) and salience (degrees to which the elements are used to attract the viewer’s attention) are central elements in building up a tourist text. Many scholars have underlined the linguistic and pragmatic challenge of translating “realia”, “culture specific concepts”, “culture specific items”. There are many procedures for translating cultural-bound elements: loan translation or calque, transference, cultural equivalent, addition, deletion, ortographic adaptation and substitution. These elements are central in tourist texts for the communicative situation and the target culture expectations. Lack of explication of implicit information in the target text in fact, can cause misunderstandings or produce a less effective communication. When we translate tourist texts promoting or dealing with non-Western destinations we have to take into account the weight of postcolonial discourses in the representation of these places in the tourist field. Many ex colonies have become popular tourist destinations, including exotic people and customs, indigenous lifestyles and cultural heritage. A good example of representing a non-Western destination is the Indian campaign Incredible India launched in 2002 for the European, Asian and Middle East markets. In 2004 the new campaign was entitled The colors of India focusing on the different Indian cultures together with the various culinary traditions and festivals around the country. The campaign was based on images and colors and the written text was quite short. The campaign was later launched in 71 newspapers and magazines and it was accompanied by events in various places in Europe to support Indian tourism. The text with the Taj Mahal is accompanied by the headline Pure White where the color referred to the monument itself, but metaphorically to the idea of pure love. An Italian translation is possible, as well as a more literal one. The ad is formed by the headline plus a sentence at the bottom of the text in smaller characters. The second ad is called Red Hot and in this case a literal translation is possible too, conveying the shade of the color and the idea of passionate behavior of Indians, which is also relatable to Italians.
If we analyze some printed texts of the 2006 campaign, four major themes prevail:
- Personal wellness
- Cultural diversity reflected in India’s geography and society
- Country’s architecture and cultures
- Natural beauty
The theme of personal wellness can be found in the following ads. In the first one the visual choice strikes the reader, due to the colorful page (red, orange, yellow) but also due to the verbal message with the use of the culture bound term karma , a common word in Western countries. The second ad shows a face of a beautiful Western young woman doing a therapy. The verbal message conveys the idea of wellness, with the repetition of the word self focus on the individual and to the quest for physical and mental health.
The text of this ad focuses on endangered species visible only in India. Visually, the ad shows a Bengali tiger in a timeless setting. Verbally, we can notice binary oppositions of adjectives. India is described as a cradle of civilization where the tourist can still get in touch with the nature. The headline is made up by a humorous play with the audience, that is, a stereotype of Indians as polite, hospitable and vegetarian. The Italian version would feature the same image, but would be more general in the description and the stereotype would be filtered through cultural schemes.
Translating food and drink Food is something we share in our community, it’s ours and different from the food of others. It is a cultural item subject and restricted to taboos (religious ones). Scholars have talked about the semiotics of food as a system of communication, memories, meanings and it is part of a sensory experience. In Time Out London , a free weekly magazine based in London, several events and reviews are featured. In particular, we have analyzed some extracts about restaurants and cafés in London. The reviews are detail-oriented, featuring the restaurant interiors and their food specials. An Italian translation should respect the same info and be accurate. The English description recalls the themes of authenticity and nostalgia in the description of the locations. The difficulty consists in translating the CBTs such as pie , house ale beer and keep the same informative content, without misguiding the reader.
