ISSUES OF MODAL VERBS TRANSLATION FROM ENGLISH INTO UKRAINIAN

Abstract

The article deals with the peculiarities of translating modal verbs from English into Ukrainian, as well as from Ukrainian into English. The author proceeds from the fact that when translating modal verbs it is necessary to take into account their polyfunctionality, as well as mismatching the means of expression of modality in the English and Ukrainian languages. It is stated that modal verbs in English form a special group and have differences in the use of all other verbs. It is explained that we speak of our abilities, requests, ask permissions, forbid something, give advice and talk about obligations with the help of such verb. It reveals modality as a category that has its own characteristics when translated into Ukrainian, since it is transmitted using various language and lexical means. It is stated that the class of modal verbs includes such verbs as can (could), may (might), must, ought, need. It is concluded that these verbs act as an explanation of the circumstance or the possibility of accomplishing something in the sentences. It is emphasized that these verbs cannot be used independently and phrases usually go in conjunction with the semantic verb in infinitive form for the correct formulation. It is shown that most often the modal verb acts as a composite nominal predicate. We are talking about the fact that the translator faces various kinds of difficulties in the process of translation - the transmitting of thoughts, expressed in one language by the means of another language. One of these difficulties is the way of transmitting the meanings of modal verbs from English into Russian. There is no other lexical-grammatical category in the English language that would present great difficulties in the translation process than the category of modality. It is emphasized that in any work dealing with translation problems, the problem of modality arises in one form or another, but terminologically this problem can be formalized differently and serve different tasks of translation research. The most universal and conservative units of modality in the European languages are modal verbs, which together with the adjacent units (semi-modal verbs and modal idioms) form a special class of grammatical units capable of conveying the emotional nuances of the statement with the most unexpected increments of meaning. It is stated that even such a conservative class of language units, as modal verbs, reveals extraordinary semantic flexibility. This circumstance prevents the presentation of the features of modality in the form of strict logical formulas. The logical categorization of modality is just the start-up for the linguist. The conclusion is that the omission of a modal verb in the translation usually speaks not of the lack of appropriate linguistic resources, but of the desire of the translator to remain “invisible”, for which they use the colloquial idioms of the host culture

Keywords

• modality
• modal verb
• specific features
• translation
• language