MINISTRY OF EDUCATION, YOUTH AND SPORTS
CAHUL STATE UNIVERSITY “B. P. HASDEU”
PHILOLOGI DEPARTMENT
ENGLISH AND FRENCH LANGUAGE AND LITERATURE
THEME
Difficulties in Translation of Publicistic Headlines and
their Pragmatic Aspect
CAHUL 2010
Introduction
Publicistic Headline is known as the name of literature, scientific or musical produce. Our research on publicistic headline will study a lot of its definition. We shall notice similarity between them as well. According to Kukharenco V.A., headline is a text at the top of a newspaper article, indicating the nature of the article below it.
Galperin finds the headline a dependent from of newspaper writing. Its main function is to inform the reader briefly about the text which follows it.
The main goal of this research paper is to analyze publicistic headline from difficulties in translation of publicistic headlines and their pragmatic aspect.
The objectives of the given work are:
- To define publicistic Headline.
- to present classification and structure of the publicistic headlines.
- to reveal linguistic peculiarities of publicistic headlines.
- to explain ways of translation the publicistic headlines and difficulties in translation the publicistic headlines.
- to analyze the pragmatic functions and difficulties in translation of publicistic headlines.
We have worked much to complete our goal. The critical analysis of the scientific literature has been fulfilled by us.
While writing this paper we have addressed to such sources as manuals, monographs, dictionaries and, of course publicistic works. In our research we have used explanation and analysis as scientific theoretical methods. As for the structure of the work, it falls into three chapters.
The first chapter deals with the theory concerning publicistic style. It is divided into four parts: 1) defining the Publicistic Headline; 2) classification and structure of the publicistic headlines; 3) linguistic peculiarities of publicistic headlines; 4) on the applicability of publicistic headlines; 5) publicistic headlines under pragmatic aspect.
In this chapter we defined the Publicistic Headline and their classification and structure. Also we showed the publicistic headlines under pragmatic aspect. We wrote about linguistic peculiarities and their applicability of publicistic headlines.
The second chapter is devoted to the translability of publicistic headlines. It is also falls into three parts: 1) on the approaches of translation used in Newspaper Style; 2) on the ways of translation the publicistic headlines; 3) on the difficulties in translation the publicistic headlines.
We defined approaches of translation the Publicistic Headline in Newspaper Style and wrote about different ways of translation. Also in this chapter we wrote difficulties in translation the publicistic headlines.
The third chapter: establishing pragmatic value of publicistic headlines and difficulties of their translation from English into Russian. It is falls into two parts:
In the first we analyze publicistic headlines and their Pragmatic functions. And the second in difficulties in translation of publicistic headlines.
It is all theoretical and practical parts of our research paper about what we will write.
1.1 Defining the Publicistic Headline
The general definition of Headline is the name of literature, scientific or musical produce. Many dictionaries define Headline as a short summary of the most important items of news read at the beginning of a news programme on the radio or television. Headline is one of the basic newspaper features. The headline is the title given to a news item or newspaper article.
To make headlines (grab; hit) means to be an important item of news in newspapers or on radio or television. To headline (usually passive) means to give a story or article a particular headline:
War breaks out in Europe
Atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima
Man walks on Moon
Headlines very often contain emotionally colored words and phrases. To produce a strong emotional effect, broken-up set expressions and deformed special terms are commonly used. The Headline of news items apart from giving information about the subject-matter, also carry a considerable amount of appraisal. Headlines are usually written in bold and in a much larger size than the article text. Front page headlines are often in upper case so that they can be easy read by the potential customer. Headlines in other parts of the paper are more commonly in sentence case though title case is often used in the USE.
The characteristics features of Headlines are the most condensed piece of information on minimum of space. Galperin mentions typical stylistic patterns of Headlines.
a. Full declarative sentences.
e.g. ’China lifts price of domestic oil products’. (Financial Times).
b. Interrogative sentences.
e. g. ‘It the kitchen finished? (The Sun).
c. Nominative sentences.
e.g. ‘Cautious start for bourses’ (Financial Times).
d. Elliptical sentences.
e.g. Child drunk griever banned’ (The Sun).
e. Sentences with articles omitted.
e. g. ‘PM warns against hostility to US’. (Daily Express).
f. Phrases with verbal- infinitive and gerundial.
e.g. ‘Keeping it in the family pays off for baker’. (The Times).
g. Questions in the form of statements.
e.g. ‘Health food?’ (The Times).
h. Headlines including direct speech.
e. g. ‘Blair: I should never have revealed I was quitting’. (Mirror).
Headline conventions include normally using present tense and omitting ‘a’ and ‘the’ as well as forms of the verb ‘to be’ in certain context. [2, p.75]
- The Present Simple is also used to describe actions as instant, happening in a moment. For actions over a period, we use the continuous.
e.g. United are playing really well now.
The crowd is cheering them on.
Most newspaper features a very large Headline on their front page, dramatically describing the biggest news of the day. Headline is the most basic text organizing tool used to invite the reader to become involved with the publication. Limit headlines to no more than three lines. A headline is text at the top of a newspaper article, indicating the nature of the article below it. A headline which is called – banner headline. The Headline (the title given to a news item or an article) is a dependent form of newspaper writing. It is in part of a large whole. The specific functional and linguistic features of the headline provide sufficient ground for isolating and analyzing it as a specific ‘genre’ of journalism.
1.2 Classification and structure of the publicistic headlines
The main function of the headline is to inform the reader briefly of what the news that follows is about. Sometimes headlines show the reporter’s or paper’s attitude of the fact reported. In most of the English and American newspapers sensational headlines are quite common. The function and the peculiar nature of English headlines determine the choice of language means used. [4, p.35] Headlines also contain emotionally colored words and phrases as the italicized words: ’Crazy waste of you? Syntactically headlines are very short sentences or phrases and have a variety of pattern.
A. Full declarative sentences.
B. Interrogative sentences.
C. Nominative sentences ‘Atlantic sea Traffic’.
D. Elliptical sentences ‘Off to the Sun ‘.
E. Sentences with articles omitted. (Articles are frequently omitted in all types of headline). ‘Frock man find gold in river ‘.
F. Complex sentences.
G. Headlines including direct speech.
The Headlines in English language newspapers can be very difficult to understand. One reason for this is that newspaper headlines are often written in a special style, which is very difficult from ordinary English. In this style there are special rules of grammar and words are often used in unusual ways.
a. Headlines are not always complete sentences. Many headlines consist of noun phrases with no verb.
- More wage cuts.
- Holiday Hotel Death.
b. Headlines often contain string of three, four or more nouns; nouns earlier in the string modify those that follow.
- Furniture factory pay cut row.
Headlines like these can be difficult to understand. It sometimes helps to read them backwards. Furniture Factory Pay Cut Row (disagreement) about a Cut (reduction) in Pay at a Factory that makes Furniture.
c. Headlines often leave out articles and the verb ‘be’.
- A woman walks on moon.
d. In headlines, simple tenses are often used instead of progressive or perfect forms. The simple present is used for both present and past events.
- Blind girl climbs Everest (=…has climbed…).
- Student fight for course changes (=…has fighting …).
The present progressive can be used, especially to talk about changes. Be is usually dropped.
- Britain getting warmer, say scientist.
- Trade figures improving.
e. Many headlines words are used as both nouns and verbs, and nouns are often used to modify other nouns. So it is not always easy to work out the structure of a sentence. Compare:
- We cuts aid to third world (= The Us reduced its help…cuts is a verb, aid is a noun).
- Aid Cuts Row (= There has been a disagreement about the reduction in aid. Aid and Cuts is both noun).
- Cuts Aid Rebels (= the reduction in aid is helping the revolutionaries. Cuts is a noun, Aid is a verb).
f. Headlines often use infinitives to refer to the future.
- PM to visit Australia.
- Hospitals to take fewer patients.
For is also used to refer to future movements or plants.
- TROOPS FOR GLASGOW? (= Are soldiers going to be sent to Glasgow?).
g. Auxiliary verbs are usually dropped from passive structures, leaving past participles.
- Murder Hunt: Man Held (=…a man is being held by police.)
- Six killed In Explosion (=Six people have been killed…).
Note that forms like held, attacked are usually part participles with passive meanings, not past tenses (which are rare are newspaper headlines). Compare:
- AID ROW: PRESTDENT ATTACTED (=…The President has attacked.)
- AID ROW: PRESTDENT ATTACTED CRITICS (=…The President has attacked her critics.)
- Boy Found Safe (= The missing boy had been found safe.)
- Boy Find Safe (= A boy has found a safe.)
h. A color is often used to separate the subject of a headline from what is said about it.
Strikes: PM to ACT.
Motorway crash: Death toll rises. Quotation marks (‘…’) are used to show that words were said by some else, and that the newspaper does not necessarily claim that they are time.
- Crash Driver ‘Had been drinking’
A question mark (?) is often used when something is not certain.
- Crisis over by September?
Short words save space, and so they are very common in newspaper headlines. Some of the short words in headlines are unusual in ordinary language (e.g. curb, meaning ’restrict’ or ‘restriction’), and some are used in special senses which they do not often have in ordinary language (e.g. big, meaning ‘attempt’). Other words are chosen not because they are short, but because they sound dramatic (e.g. blare, which means ‘big fire’, and is used in headlines to refer to any fire). The following is a list of common headline vocabulary.
Act - take action: do something.
-Foot Crisis: Government to act.
Aid – military or financial help: to help
-More aid for poor countries.
-Unions aid hospital strikers.
Alert – alarm, warning.
-Flood alert on east coast.
Allege – make on accusation.
- Woman alleges unfair treatment.
Appears – appear in court accused of a crime.
- MP to appear on drugs charges.
Axe – abolish, close down: abolition, closure.
- Country bus services axed.
- Small schools face axe.
Knowledge as to the usage of the pun’s mechanisms in publicity lead to better understanding of the specificity of English press and may be used in the theory of translation or during the creation of newspaper or advertisement headline with the help of a pun.
The headline (the title given to a news item or article) is a dependent form of newspaper writing. It is in fact a part of a larger whole. The specific functional and linguistic features of the headline provide sufficient ground for isolating and analyzing it as a specific “genre” of journalism. The main function of the headline is to inform the reader briefly what the text that follows is about. But apart from its, headlines often contain elements of appraisal i.e. they show the reporter’s or the paper’s attitude to the facts reported or commented on, thus also performing the function of instructing the reader.
English headlines are short and catching; they “compact the gist of news stories into a few eye-snaring words. A skillfully turned out headlines tells a story, or enough of it, to arouse or satisfy the reader’s curiosity.”
Such group headlines are almost a summary of the information contained in the news item or article.
The functions and the peculiar nature of English headlines predetermine the choice of the language means used. The vocabulary groups considered in the analysis of brief news items are commonly found in headlines.
An excellent way for a more advanced learner to increase their English proficiency is to read an English-language newspaper on a regular basis. Most people who read a newspaper do so selectively and skim though the pages looking for the most interesting-looking articles to read first. They usually make their choice on the basis of the headlines of the articles. And this is where the difficulty for the non-native speaker of English arises, since newspaper headlines are often extremely difficult to understand. There are two main reasons for this. The first reason is that newspaper headlines have to be brief and consequently use words that are rarely used in everyday speech or indeed in the rest of the article itself. (Probe for investigation, blast for explosion etc.) And the second reason is that headline writers, at least in British newspapers, look for every opportunity to include a pun in their headlines. It is the main aspect of newspaper headlines that we want to concentrate on in this work.
All the headlines of all types (primary or page headlines, secondary or paper headlines, paper subsection headlines, leads and captions) of the local daily called Kauno diena) is emotionally destructive and people should be aware of this in order to diminish its emotional impact.
By the basic functions of newspaper titles nominativna, informing, communicative, and also pragmatic or attraktivna, that will realize the action of text, his having a special purpose orientation. Exactly some researchers consider this function basic, as setting of title consists above all things in bringing in of attention to the article, in creation of stimulus for its reading, which is often achieved by the use of the system of expressive means of languages, among which an important place is taken a play on words.
1.3 Linguistic peculiarities of publicistic headlines
The role of newspaper in the nowadays life and its influence on the modern society is generally recognized. The printed media remains one of the oldest a most effective way to communicate the freshness news. Newspaper has the following basic features: brief news items, advertisements and announcements, the editorial and the headline. This paper investigates only one element of the newspaper- the headline.
By the pragmatic effect of application of play on words in this title arising up as a result of combination of frock’n’roll, that is paradoxical on character and owns a fully certain estimating plan is something amusing and unusual. Appropriately to assume that speech in the article will go about the place of woman in modern music. A question is this serious, however estimating a plan, formed the element of frock that is brought in a title complex bring in the tint of sarcasm in the supposed interpretation of problem the author of the article.
The following title gives the very dim picture of Te, what theme of the article:
Ugly noises from Los Angeles mayor’s nest
An author orients a reader in the value of attitude toward the described facts, them marks and uses a play on words: mayor’s nest omonimichno mare’s nest – to expression, that a “senseless device” means, and the question is about machinations on selections, thus one of candidates – mer city Los-Angeles. A pun in dannomu case carries expressively stylistic information which represents author emotionally evaluation attitude toward an object, or expressively cognitive setting of this linguistic registration of idea. Negative attitude of author is here traced toward a situation which was folded on elections, and a pun specifies on personality which to a certain extent is herein guilty, and characterizes her. Except for it, a pun is directed on Te, to come into notice of reader to the described events and compel him not only to laugh above them but change their motion. [11, p.52]