An Investigation of Idiom Comprehension and Translation by Translation Students at KSU
Salamah, Dania . 2015
The study attempted to investigate the problems and difficulties related to idiom comprehension and translation with female English Translation students. In general, EFL learners experience difficulties in understanding the meaning of idiomatic expressions; however, the problem is magnified when learners are required not only to understand the meanings of these expressions, but also to render their meanings in another language. The objective of this study was to investigate whether or not female English Translation students at the College of Languages and Translation, King Saud University faced any difficulties in understanding and translating English idiomatic expressions. The study also aimed to classify the translation strategies the subjects used, as well as, the types of errors they made. The researcher followed a qualitative descriptive design model. The study population was composed of female English Translation students. The sample was made up of two groups of female English Translation students in their fourth and fifth years of study. The findings of the study demonstrated that the subjects generally did not face difficulties in understanding English idiomatic expressions, but they generally did face difficulties in translating these expressions into Arabic. The findings also helped identify eleven error categories and seven translation strategy categories.
Purpose
Translator training is an area that has received much interest among the research community of Translation Studies scholars. This is driven by the need for highly qualified and skilled…