Translating Ideology: An Intergroup Mediation Perspective

Abstract

Ideology is an important component of text production and reception, and therefore of translation. In the paper, we address the translation of ideology through the prism of the intergroup threat theory. The resulting intergroup mediation perspective is a practical framework aimed at helping translators to evaluate whether an ideological recontextualisation may be desirable when dealing with divergence in ideological contexts between the author, the source text readership and the target text audience. The framework includes ideology shifts analysis in terms of the roles ideology can play in a text: it can constitute a part of the message (foreground) or belong to the background. Although applicable rather generally, the framework is derived from an example-based study of news translation. The study focuses on translation between French, English and German using examples form online versions of major European news media, such as the French Le Monde and Le Figaro , the German Zeit Online and Die Welt , and the British The Independent , The Telegraph and Guardian . The paper allows for a better understanding of ideology-related problems in translation, helps identify essential factors influencing translator’s choices and could be used as a guidance in translation practice. Also, considering the formal character of the framework, it could eventually serve as a basis for handling ideology-related issues in machine translation in the news industry.

Keywords

• news translation
• ideology
• translating ideology
• ideology shift
• recontextualisation
• intentionality
• intergroup threat theory
• background/foreground role of ideology