Common lexical difficulties facing in translation process of senior einglish majors at iuh causes and solutions graduation thesis faculty of foreign languages

MINISTRY OF INDUSTRY AND TRADE INDUSTRIAL UNIVERSITY OF HO CHI MINH CITY FACULTY OF FOREIGN LANGUAGES ---  --- GRADUATION THESIS COMMON LEXICAL DIFFICULTIES FACING IN TRANSLATION

MINISTRY OF INDUSTRY AND TRADE INDUSTRIAL UNIVERSITY OF HO CHI MINH CITY

FACULTY OF FOREIGN LANGUAGES

-  -

GRADUATION THESIS

COMMON LEXICAL DIFFICULTIES FACING IN

TRANSLATION PROCESS OF SENIOR EINGLISH MAJORS AT

IUH: CAUSES AND SOLUTIONS

MINISTRY OF INDUSTRY AND TRADE INDUSTRIAL UNIVERSITY OF HO CHI MINH CITY

FACULTY OF FOREIGN LANGUAGES

-  -

GRADUATION THESIS

COMMON LEXICAL DIFFICULTIES FACING IN

TRANSLATION PROCESS OF SENIOR EINGLISH MAJORS AT

IUH: CAUSES AND SOLUTIONS

STUDENT : PHẠM HỮU KHẢI

INDUSTRIAL UNIVERSITY OF HO CHI MINH CITY

FACULTY OF FOREIGN LANGUAGES

Supervisor : NGUYỄN ĐÌNH LUẬT, M.A

Student’s declaration: I declare that this graduation report is entirely my own

work and does not involve in plagiarism or collusion It also has not been accepted as part of a submission to another purpose elsewhere I accept serious penalty for any cheating or plagiarism

Date submitted :

Signed :

Word length : word

COMMON LEXICAL DIFFICULTIES FACING IN TRANSLATION PROCESS OF SENIOR EINGLISH MAJORS AT IUH: CAUSES AND SOLUTIONS

ABSTRACT

Translation is not an easy task During the translation process, translators and students majoring in English often encounter many difficulties Common among them is the lexical

difficulties Therefore, the researcher would like to conduct a study on “Common lexical

difficulties facing in translation process of senior English majors at IUH: Causes and solutions.” to explore further into what lexical problems students encounter during the

translation process and what causes of these problems Thence, the researcher gives some suggested solutions to improve and enhance student’s translation skills The graduation thesis consists of five chapters Each chapter is designed to deal with a specific aim Chapter I, Introduction, deals with the rationale, research goals, research questions and scope of the study Chapter II, Literature Review, gives a general overview of the lexical problems in translation Chapter III, Research Design, demonstrated a clear and detailed plan to collect adequate and reliable data for analysis including the selection of the place where the researcher investigate, the research methodology and research methods, participants, the procedure of data collection and the procedure of data analysis Chapter IV, Findings and Discussions, mainly deals with finding the results from the survey questionnaire Some discussions about these results can also be found in this chapter Chapter V, Conclusion,

summarizes the major findings of the study

KEYWORDS

Lexical difficulties

Senior English majors

Translation

The process of completing this thesis, I have got a large amount of help and support that guide and encourage me to overcome all difficulties and finish my thesis successfully

First of all, I would like to give my deepest gratitude to the School Board

of Industrial University of Ho Chi Minh City and the Faculty of Foreign Languages creating many good conditions for me to complete my thesis

Secondly, I sincerely thank to Mr Nguyễn Đình Luật, my supervisor giving me beneficial guidance and advice that assist me to complete my thesis well From these advices, I have developed my thesis into the right way

Thirdly, I would like to appreciate my group members, Quách Uyên Nghi and Nguyễn Hoàng Bạch Trúc who often gave me useful advice during the process of working thesis

Last but not least, I am grateful to all of lovely participants and lecturers who contributed to help me collect data for my thesis

In short, I really appreciate to all people helping me to finish this thesis successfully

IUH : Industrial University of Ho Chi Minh city

FFL : Faculty of Foreign Languages

SL : Source Language

TL : Target Language

CHAPTER I: INTRODUCTION 1

1.1 RATIONALE 2

1.2 RESEARCH GOALS 2

1.3 SIGNIFICANCE OF STUDY 2

1.4 RESEARCH QUESTIONS 3

1.5 SCOPE OF STUDY 3

CHAPTER II: LITERATURE REVIEW 4

2.1 DENIFINITIONS OF KEY TERMS/CONCEPTS 5

2.1.1 Lexical concepts 5

2.1.1.1 Collocation 5

2.1.1.2 Idiom 6

2.1.1.3 Metaphor 7

2.1.1.4 Proper noun 7

2.1.1.5 Proverb 8

2.1.2 Translation 9

2.1.2.1 Definition 9

2.1.2.2 Translation methods 10

2.1.3 Causes of lexical problems in translation process 13

2.1.3.1 Vocabulary 13

2.1.3.2 Cultural Issues 13

2.1.3.3 Context 14

2.1.3.4 Figure of speech 14

2.2 RESULTS OF PREVIOUS STUDIES 15

2.2.1 Review previous studies 15

2.2.2 The gap of previous studies 17

2.3 SUMMARY OF LITERATURE REVIEW 17

CHAPTER III: RESEARCH DESIGN 19

3.2 PARTICIPANTS 20

3.3 RESEARCH METHODOLOGY AND RESEARCH METHODS 20

3.4 PROCEDURES 21

3.5 DATA ANALYSIS 22

CHAPTER IV: FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION 23

4.1 FINDINGS 24

4.1.1 General information 24

4.1.2 Student’s methods in translation process 25

4.1.3 Frequency of lexical problems 26

4.1.4 Lexical aspects students most encounter 27

4.1.5 Lexical aspects that most difficult for students 28

4.1.6 Causes of lexical problems 29

4.1.7 Solutions for lexical problems 30

4.1.8 Student’s confidence of Translation 31

4.2 DISCUSSION 31

4.2.1 Common translation methods used by students 31

4.2.2 Common lexical difficulties that students encounter in the translation process 33

4.2.3 Causes of lexical difficulties 34

4.2.4 Solutions to overcome the lexical difficulties 35

CHAPTER V: CONCLUSION 37

5.1 SUMMARY OF MAIN FINDINGS 38

5.2 RECOMMENDATIONS 38

5.2.1 Suggestions for FFL’s lecturers 39

5.2.2 Suggestions for FFL’s students 39

5.3 LIMITATIONS 39

REFERENCE 41 APPENDICES 44

CHAPTER I: INTRODUCTION

1.1 RATIONALE

Translation is a work that requires creativity, diligence and translators must have a good sense of the language Besides that, translation is also a profession and there are certain tips and rules for better translation However, not everyone is sure of these rules, and some newcomers often make mistakes Translators must equip themselves with a solid knowledge

of the lexical, the writing style and the profound origin of words (phrases) to translate them into the target language in the most accurate way In particular, one of the biggest difficulties for professional English students is lexical difficulties Lexical mistakes can reduce the quality of the translation even changing the meaning as well as the original purpose of the sentence The restriction of lexical mistakes should be considered and given due attention This research comes from the lexical difficulties faced by students in translation process in IUH's foreign language department There are not many researches about the lexical difficulties, or the research is not deep enough on lexical difficulties To improve the above lexical difficulties of senior English majors at IUH The researcher is determined to conduct the study called: “Lexical difficulties in the translation process of English major students at IUH and how to overcome them.”

1.2 RESEARCH GOALS

The main purpose of this study is to find out the lexical problems and difficulties that English major students face in the translation process at IUH This research will find out the reasons cause those problems, help students realize the importance of lexical From there, find out solutions to help students overcome those problems, contributing to improving the translation ability of students in particular and the quality of IUH's training in general

1.3 SIGNIFICANCE OF STUDY

There is no need to discuss the importance of lexical in translation Therefore, it is a good opportunity for us to find out the problems, the causes and how to fix them We believe that our work will bring various benefits: Firstly, the study will provide overview about factors that cause the problem From there, the teachers can catch the students' lexical difficulties, refer the solutions given and apply to their teaching in the most effective way Thus the teachers can choose for themselves appropriate solutions for problems Furthermore, the results of the study may indicate weaknesses as well as other causes that affect IUH senior' translate ability Help students fix those problems themselves or suggest to teachers how to help them in the best way Finally, as writers, we see this as a good opportunity for us to gain more but necessary experience In addition, the research also helps a lot for our translation process or career in the future

1.4 RESEARCH QUESTIONS

The study focuses on answering the following questions:

✓ What translation methods do students usually use?

✓ What are common lexical difficulties that students have to face in the translation process?

✓ What are the causes of those difficulties?

✓ What are some solutions to overcome the above difficulties?

1.5 SCOPE OF STUDY

The study mostly explore the lexical difficulties in translation of senior English majors at IUH The information from the questionnaires will be collected and analyzed Firstly, research scope is mainly limited and focuses on senior English majors of IUH This research paper will not go deep into the specific solutions, but only provide some general solutions for students and teachers to overcome lexical problems The study only goes deep into the problems and reasons why students encounter lexical difficulties Secondly, the study only learns about students' awareness of lexical problems, not considering the students' ability to solve as well as the actual translation ability

CHAPTER II: LITERATURE REVIEW

2.1 DENIFINITIONS OF KEY TERMS/CONCEPTS

2.1.1 Lexical concepts

According to the Oxford dictionary (Hornby, 2015, p 869) that defines that Lexical is

“Connected with the words of a language” In addition, below are the definitions of some words related to the word "lexical" that can be used in this research study

Lexical items (= words and phrases)

Lexical meaning: the meaning of a word, without paying attention to the way that it is used

or to the words that occur with it Lexicology: the study of the form, meaning and behaviour of words But in brief we can summary that” Lexical” refers to the meaning (or meaning) of a word (or lexeme) when it appears in a dictionary Also known as the semantic meaning, the signifying meaning and the central meaning Contrast with grammatical meaning (or structural meaning)

During the translation process, the lexical problem is one of the most important ones This is also one of the difficulties that translators encounter during the translation process Some common lexical classes are:

Ex: ‘Resounding success’ and ‘crying shame’ are English collocations

+The fact of two or more words often being used together, in a way that happens more frequently than would happen by chance

Ex: Advanced students need to be aware of the importance of collocation.”

In translation, collocation plays a very important role That factor directly affects the quality

of the translation product

Sughair (2011) said that Collocations are a fascinating linguistic phenomenon in language and

in translation Collocations reflect the linguistic, stylistic and cultural features of texts He also supposed that within the process of translation, collocations are subject to different approaches opted for by translators when they transfer them for the source text into the target text Translators may have come across them often but did not realize that they are inherently combined like that Therefore, choosing the right phrases helps learners express them naturally, diversely and easily as native speakers We cannot arbitrarily combine words

in English

Most native speakers use the word “heavy rainy” and assume that” heavy” must be combined with” rain” to be appropriate Similarly, Vietnamese people always say “lái xe đạp, lái xe hơi, lái máy bay”, but no one says to “lái ngựa” Even we do not understand why

2.1.1.2 Idiom

“idiom” is defined (Hornby, 2015, p 756) “A group of words whose meaning is different from the meanings of the individual words

EX: ‘Let the cat out of the bag’ is an idiom meaning to tell a secret by mistake

+The kind of language and grammar used by particular people at a particular time or place

Ex: The friends would sometimes revert to playground idiom

+The style of writing, music, art, etc that is typical of a particular person, group, period or place

Ex: He has produced a classical play in a modern idiom.”

Meanwhile, Meryem (2010) said that “One of the most important aspects of English is idioms They are frequently used in a wide variety of situations, from friendly conversations and business meetings to more formal and written contexts” The fact that language learning and translation shows that idioms always create necessary difficulties that must pass for both foreign language learners and translators Foreign language learners and translators need to equip themselves with knowledge of language as well as cultural factors are related to idioms they meet Each language has its own idioms But not all idioms can be translated from English into Vietnamese or Vietnamese into English For example, “Matter of life and death”

can be translated to “Vấn đề sống chết” but “ To sell like hot cakes” should not be translated

to “bán đắt như bánh nóng” It have to be translated to “bán đắt như tôm tươi” Due to different cultural issues, the translator can borrow an idiom with the same meaning of the target language (TL) to represent the idiom of the source language (SL)

2.1.1.3 Metaphor

According to one definition of “Metaphor” (Hornby, 2015, p 947) “A word or phrase used to describe somebody/something else, in a way that is different from its normal use, in order to show that the two things have the same qualities and to make the description more powerful

Ex: She has a heart of stone ”

Newmark (1988) “metaphor is the transferred sense of a physical word” (p 104) Newmark (1988) also supposed “metaphor has referential purpose since it is to describe a mental process or state, a concept, a person, an object, a quality or an action more comprehensively and concisely than is possible in literal or physical language” (p 104) When translating English words into Vietnamese or Vietnamese into English , finding equivalent metaphorical words to translate effectively is not a simple problem because the influence of factors: cultural

- linguistic characteristics, the implications of the author of the source text, social characteristics or context of the text Some example sentences:

• He is a mouse => Anh ta là một người nhút nhát

• He is a lion in the battle => Anh ấy là một người hùng trong trận đấu

2.1.1.4 Proper noun

There was an opinion that (Nordquist, 2019) “A proper noun is a noun or noun phrase that designates a particular person, place or object, such as George Washington, Valley Forge, and the Washington Monument A common noun, on the other hand, is not a particular place or thing, such as a president, a military encampment, or a monument Proper names are uppercase in English.” There are five types of proper nouns that translators may encounter in translation process That is:

• Proper names

• Historical institutional terms

• International institutional terms

• National institutional terms

• Cultural terms

In principle, normally all given nouns cannot be translated or should be translated When it is impossible to know the spelling of the given name just heard, apply the transcription technique (transcription), that is, how to listen to record like that This helps the translators to translate into the target language (TL) ensuring that the repetition is as close as possible to the pronunciation of the source language (SL) But there are still many cases where translators can translate the proper nouns from English into Vietnamese, if the meaning of the given name is easy to understand for the audience

“World Bank” => “Tổ chức ngân hàng Thế giới”

“Germany” => “ Cộng hòa Liêng bang Đức”

2.1.1.5 Proverb

According to the Oxford dictionary, definition of “Proverb” (Hornby, 2015, p 1199) “A well-known phrase or sentence that gives advice or says something that is generally true

Ex: ‘Waste not, want not.’”

Word-by-word translation doesn't work for common sayings like proverbs

Correct translation of a proverb requires a number of steps and it often requires the translator

to dig deeper into the culture of the source and target language to determine how to translate a proverb Proverbs often have equivalent words in the target language Thalji (2015) supposed that “Proverbs are fixed expressions that are important in any language because they have meanings that can cover all aspects of life and, this in turn, makes them important elements in peoples' speech” Ultimately, the challenges in translating proverbs depend on the particular case, and therefore, it is best for translators to adjust their methods case-by-case With that said, here are a few examples of how to translate specific proverbs:

“New one in, old one out” => “Có mới nới cũ”

“You get what you pay for” => “Tiền nào của nấy”

“All roads lead to Rome” => “Đường nào cũng về La Mã”

2.1.2 Translation

2.1.2.1 Definition

Translation is the conversion of meaning, content from one language to another Translation can take place in many different ways There are divided into many methods: Word-for-word translation, Literal translation, Faithful translation, Semantic translation, Adaptation Free translation, Idiomatic translation, Communicative translation

There are various definitions from different scholars as:

Newmark (1981) defined that ““Translation is a craft consisting in the attempt to replace a written message and/or statement in one language by the same message and/or statement in another language”

Catford (1988) defined “Translation as the replacement of textual material in one language (SL) by equivalent textual material in other language (TL).”

Besides that, Catford (1965) asserts that” Translation is a very important activity in the modern area and it is an interest topic for linguists, professional translator and amateur translators, and also to language teachers Because translation is relate to languages, analysis and description In the process of translation that has considerable in using categories of language to describe from the source language into the target language In other words, it must use the theory of linguistic general-theory.”

Meanwhile, there was an interesting opinion,” Translating consists of reproducing in the receptor language the closest natural equivalent of the source language message, first in terms

of meaning and secondly in terms of style” Nida & Taber, (1982)

Another ideal, Binh (2010) said that “ Translation consist of studying the lexicon, grammatical structure, communication situation, and cultural context of the source language text; analyzing it in order to determine its meaning; and then reconstructing this same meaning using the lexicon and grammatical structure which are appropriate in the receptor language and its cultural context.”

“Translating is a complicated skill that a translator needs to understand the source text and put

it into the target language, keeping the style when translating, and need to be a competent translator in both foreign languages and mother tongue Translation is the process changing a text from one language into the target language about the written message or statement without changing the meaning in the source language” said by (Newmark, 1988)

From the above comments, in general, translation and translation is the process of converting content from source language (SL) to target language (TL) This process requires translators

to be fluent in both languages Besides, it is also necessary to understand the content to be translated most accurately To have a successful translation, it requires the translator to have the expertise as well as understanding of the culture of the two countries using those two languages, in addition to the ability to use the most accurate sentences To avoid unnecessary errors, translators should proactively equip the necessary knowledge before starting the translation process

2.1.2.2 Translation methods

There are many different methods in the translation process Each author or translator offers their own different methods, but the most popular are Newmark's methods There were 8 translation methods (Newmark, 1988):

A Word-for-word translation

This is often demonstrated as interlinear translation, with the TL immediately below the

SL words The SL word-order is preserved and the words translated singly by their most common out of context In this translation method, the order of words in SL is kept intact and does not follow any grammatical structure, words are also translated in common meaning, out of context For example: “ I go bicycle to here”

B Literal translation

The SL grammatical constructions are converted to their nearest TL equivalents but the lexical words are again translated singly, out of context As a pre-translation process, this indicates the problems to be solved.This method is almost the same as the word-for-word translation method, The SL grammatical structure is converted to their closest equivalent structure in TL but words are still translated very singly, without context For example: He has a big liar; He has a sweet tooth

C Faithful translation

A faithful translation attempts to reproduce the precise contextual meaning of the original within the constraints of the TL grammatical structures It ‘transfers’ cultural words and preserves the degree of grammatical and lexical ‘abnormality’ (deviation from SL norms)

in the translation In this method, words are translated in context They try to transfer cultural words form SL to TL but do not naturalize them

D Semantic translation

Semantic translation differs ‘faithful translation’ only in as far as it must take more account of the aesthetic value (that is, the beautiful and natural sound) of the SL text, compromising on ‘meaning’ where appropriate so that no assonance, word-play or repetition jars in the finished version Further, it may translate less important cultural words by culturally neutral third or functional terms but not by cultural equivalents The distinction between ‘faithful’ and ‘semantic’ translation is that the first is uncompromising and dogmatic, while the second is more flexible, admits the creative exception to 100% fidelity and allows for the translator’s intuitive empathy with the original For Example: Right in the heart of Hanoi, Hoan Kiem Lake is an enchanting body of water, a peaceful oasis away from all the hustle and bustle of the city

E Communicative translation

Communicative translation attempts to render the exact contextual meaning of the original

in such a way that both content and language are readily acceptable and comprehensible to the readership Communicative translation freer than semantic translation It gives priority

to the effectiveness of the message to be communicated and focuses on factors such as readability and naturalness For example: Keep off the grass; Her face is all her fortune

F Idiomatic translation

Idiomatic translation reproduces the ‘message’ of the original but tends to distort nuances

of meaning by preferring colloquialisms and idioms where these do not exist in the original This method reproduce the ‘message’ of the original It prefers colloquialisms and idioms which do not exist in the original For example: Cô ta rất bướng bỉnh; Có công mài sắt có ngày nên kim

G Free translation

Free translation reproduces the matter without the manner, or the content without the form

of the original Usually it is a paraphrase much longer than the original, a so-called

‘intralingual translation Free translation reproduce the matter without the manner; the content without the form of the original Paraphrases much larger than the original For

example: Heartsease (pansy) is used again for healing the heart It is for disappointment in love, and in separation

H Adaptation

This is the ‘freest’ form of translation It is used mainly for plays (comedies) and poetry: the themes, characters, plots are usually preserved, the SL culture converted to the TL culture and the text rewritten by an established dramatist or poet This method preserve the theme, plots, characters only The SL culture is converted to the TL culture This method is kind of rewriting the text in translation For example: IT ; Chicken run; The thorn bird

2.1.3 Causes of lexical problems in translation process

2.1.3.1 Vocabulary

An interesting opinion was expressed by Wulandhary (2018) that “Vocabulary is one of linguistic aspects that should be learned by all students Vocabulary is an essential part in learning English because without vocabulary, it is impossible for all students to master English well and the learners cannot communicate appropriately.”

An interesting opinion was expressed by Jackson (2002) that “Vocabulary is the stock of words in a language, or that is known or used by an individual, or that is associated with particular activity Vocabulary can be defined as the words we teach in the foreign language” (p.202)

Vocabulary is a significant knowledge of every English translator Due to the characteristics

of the job is to contact many people, many different fields, many localities, many religions, many races the translation method is also different That's why translators need a huge amount of vocabulary Lack of vocabulary directly affects the quality of the translator's translation product

2.1.3.2 Cultural Issues

As the study (Williams, 1983) observed “Culture is considered one of the two or three most complicated in the English language Culture could be seen as a reflection of shared meaning

So when people see things from the same perspective, then it is said that these people belong

to the same culture” Culture is formed from the habits, customs and practices of a part or a group of people Cultural issues can arise from differences between cultural references, such

as the name of the dish, the festival, and the cultural connotation in general Meanwhile, Khasanah (2009) said that Translation and culture are highly correlated because every culture has its own language It can be said that the process of translation does not only refer to the process of translating language but it also involves the process of transferring culture Translators will use language localization to precisely tailor the translation to the culture of the target language (TL) Translators without a certain cultural capital will not be able to understand a text in general and a literary text in particular Translating a language from any culture requires firstly knowledge of that culture

For example, the noun "I" in English can be translated into many different ways in Vietnamese such as: “tôi”, “ anh”, “chị”, “em” , “chú”, “cô”… This is due to the difference

in culture between Vietnamese and British Vietnamese people often have a respect for family and social rank, so younger people must address older people respectfully

2.1.3.3 Context

There was an opinion (Slava, 2009) “By context what is meant is the entire environment in which the word or sentence is expressed or stated So a translator has to go into the background of the text to understand the text Thus translator first de-contextualizes the original text and re-contextualizes it for the target text This forms a good contextualized translation.” Context is the result of many factors: Full understanding of the objective and details of the original text, understanding or at least belonging to the industry or area being discussed and proficiency in the language aspects such as tone, style, vocabulary

Idlibi (2018) supposed that The influence of context on sentence meaning, in general, and utterance meaning, in particular, gives a clear view of the role context plays on meaning interpretation He also said that Context plays a great role in the way utterances are interpreted; as single utterance may lead to different interpretations or utterance meanings in different contexts In the process of using words, translators should choose short, concise words that show full meaning rather than word-for-word translation To do this well, you must regularly look up words and read many foreign documents, understand deeply the words used

Figure of speech often includes: personification, metaphor, metonymy, synecdoche, hyperbole, etc By Vezzaro (2019) “Figure of speech” was defined as “a way of saying one thing and meaning another” Translators often have to comprehend the figure of speech in the source language (SL) and find the correct meaning sentence for the target language The translation process does not go beyond finding equivalence points in the target language (TL)

or communicates general information of the meaning of the source language (SL) Some techniques and strategies are acceptable and easy to understand, several techniques and strategies should be chosen as the basis of translating

2.2 RESULTS OF PREVIOUS STUDIES

2.2.1 Review previous studies

During the translation process, lexical difficulty is one of the most common difficulties that senior have to encounter There are some studies related to this topic:

The first studies belonged to Benfoughal (2010) The research topic was “Students'

Difficulties and Strategies in Translation The Case of Third Year Students, Mentoury University Constantine” The aims of this study that in this research they are concerned with

translation from English into Arabic They aim at shedding light on the strategies students have adopted to deal with problems they encounter while translating In other words, they will consider the translation level of the 2 students as they translate from English as a second language into Arabic; their native language This research uses quantitative research methods The study presented the analysis of the students' questionnaire along side the analysis of the translated text, meaning at evaluating our students' translation level and their linguistic proficiency in both languages; Arabic as well as English Through the questionnaire and the translated text they want to examine the students' level in translation, student’s problems and strategies The sample consists of thirty third year student of English, in applied linguistics.The results of this research show that, student often preferred translating from English to Arabic than Arabic to English Not surprisingly, All of the students surveyed said that they always have problems during the translation process The problems that students often encounter are: grammatical problems, stylistic problems, cultural problems and lexical problems In particular, the problem of Lexical is the problem that students encounter the most, accounting for 76%

The second study of Hang, N.T.T & Hang, T.T (2015) The study was about “Vietnamese –

English Translation Errors Made by Second Year Translation-Major Students: An Initial Step towards Enhancing Translation Standards” The aims of this studies was finding out “What

are the common errors in the Vietnamese - English translations made by 2nd year students majoring in Translation and Interpreting?” Besides that, the thesis also pointed out the possible causes of these common errors and suggested some solutions to rectify these errors The researchers attempt to address the research questions from both qualitative and quantitative approach, via which students can compare, contrast, supplement and especially produce the most adequate outcomes This study conducted the survey both by questionnaires and interview The questionnaire was aimed at finding out students’ view of the most frequent

translation errors they made, the possible causes as well as their suggestions for avoiding these errors in future translation Participants included the whole 81 students majoring in translation and interpretation The questionnaire was designed in the form of Numerical rating scales and Multiple-choice items and comprised both closed-ended and open-ended questions The interview chose 3 students that interested in the translation to participate in the interview, finally got the in-depth answer According to the results from the survey, the mistakes students face are: The use of articles, Capitalization, Parts of speech, Preposition, Punctuation Spelling, Singular and plural forms Subject-verb agreement, Tense, Lexical choice, The result showed that the most common errors students make was lexical choice, while they rarely had problems with subject-verb agreement, part of speech and capitalization Lexical choice belonged to a broader field of vocabulary, which seems more challenging

The study of Napu, N & Hasan, R (2019) The topic of the study was “ Translation

Problems Analysis of Students' Academic Essay ”.This study aimed to investigate the students

of translation classes’ problems in translating academic essay It also helped students learn about translation problems that would be unraveled in the discussion and discovered the causal factors behind the problems themselves In addition, teachers, who are immersed in the teaching of translation, can also use this research as this study will also explain translation methods that can be used to reduce the number of problems deals in the translation of academic essays Furthermore, this study will be of benefit to further researchers who want to discover more about translation problems, who may not primarily be discovered in this study This study was carried out by using a qualitative method The participants in this research was the students in the English Translation class, English Department, Faculty of Letters, and Cultures of Universitas Negeri Gorontalo in Indonesia The translation students as the participants had been asked to translate two kinds of academic essay, argumentative and comparison and contrast essay from source language Indonesian to target language English In the ten tests, including both argumentative and comparison and contrast essay, which were translated by the ten participants Five participants of this study had translated four paragraphs and eighteen sentences of the argumentative essay, and three paragraphs and fifteen sentences

of the comparison and contrast essay Also, each participant of this study had coded into AR (Argumentative essay) and CC (Comparison and Contrast) Finally, in the result, the author found that there were four problems found on participant’s translation works: Lexical choices problems, grammatical, rhetorical, and pragmatic problems The study showed that the grammatical problems as the major problems discovered in the translation students’ translation work both in the argumentative and comparison and contrast essay There were

several words and phrases from the Indonesian source language text that were not translated clearly into target language English because the words chosen did not reveal the intended meaning of the Indonesian source language at all Following that, the students also faced to the problems of lexical choice Word choice or lexical choice creates the possibility of multiple meanings Therefore, it is difficult for students to accurately convey content from source language (SL) to target language (TL)

2.2.2 The gap of previous studies

The above studies use many different methods, but the common thing is the understanding of the problems students encounter in the translation process These studies above have different source languages (SL) but in general, they all have English as target language (TL) And they also share the same difficulties in the translation process In general, it help us better understand the problems that students have to face Those thesis above indicate that lexical difficulties are one of the most common difficulties in the translation process The results from the above studies have partly proved that However, there is one point that these studies have encountered is that they only show that the Lexical problem is one of many other problems that students encounter They do not have in-depth analysis of the Lexical problem Moreover, the previous thesis haven’t identified the specific lexical problems such as: collocation, idiom, proverb, proper name or metaphor They pointed out that there exist lexical difficulties, but have not gone deep into this problem Following that, those thesis have not given solutions and suggestions to overcome specific lexical difficulties Therefore,

in this study, we will go deeper into Lexical problem, not cover the problems students face in the translation process We look forward to finding the cause of Lexical difficulties What are the specific Lexical problems encountered during translation? Besides, finding out the ways to overcome those difficulties From there, help students overcome those problems, improve the quality of the translation

2.3 SUMMARY OF LITERATURE REVIEW

In the process of translating students face many different difficulties, but the most common are lexical difficulties In this second chapter, the study has pointed out the lexical aspects that students encounter most often The first is collocation, this is the lexical aspect that plays a very important role in the translation process, it directly affects the quality of the translation Second, Idiom is a very common difficulty, each language has its own idioms, how to translate idioms of one language into another is a challenge for translators Third is the metaphor, when translating a metaphor, it requires the translator to really understand the

meaning of that metaphor, if not really understand that metaphor, the student's translation will

be inaccurate or lacking in spontaneity Proper noun is also a very common difficulty with translators Translators often wonder whether to translate proper nouns or not ,whether the translation is correct or not Most proper nouns should not be translated, but in some cases, translators can translate proper nouns so that the audience understands the meaning better Finally, Proverb is also one of 5 lexical aspects that we mention in the research study The word-by-word translation is not effective for this lexical aspect, to translate this part well, it is necessary to understand many factors The first cause of these difficulties is the lack of vocabulary Having a large and varied vocabulary is one of the factors that make a good translator Besides, lack of cultural awareness is also a cause of lexical difficulties Without cultural awareness, translators cannot translate lexical aspects such as idioms or metaphors well Meanwhile, not understanding the context is also a cause of lexical difficulties and reduces the quality of the translation Understanding context is important to convey content to the audience in the most accurate way Another cause of lexical difficulties is lack of awareness of figure of speech Each language has its own figures of speech, so if you want to translate well, translators need to learn more about figures of speech in both source language (SL) and target language (TL) In this chapter 2 , the study also reviewed some previous studies and their results However, it can be seen that those studies have not gone deep into lexical issues In this study, we will fix those missing points This study will explore the causes of lexical problems as well as suggest some solutions to overcome them

CHAPTER III: RESEARCH DESIGN

3.1 RESEARCH SITE

I conducted my research at the Industrial University of Ho Chi Minh City (IUH) The school was established on December 24, 2004 , under the Ministry of Industry and Trade Currently, IUH is one of the leading public universities in Ho Chi Minh City in particular and Vietnam

in general More specifically, I investigated the survey at the Faculty of Foreign Languages (FFL), Industrial University of Ho Chi Minh City Established since 2005 Since then, the Faculty of Foreign Languages has risen, becoming one of the representative Faculties of IUH Currently, the department is in charge of English language training for all faculties and training levels at IUH The study program at IUH Faculty of Foreign Languages lasts 4 years The study program at IUH helps students gain the knowledge of both teaching and translation There are 3 courses of Translation, In which, Translation 1,2 are compulsory courses and Translation 3 is an elective course

In addition, the Faculty of Foreign Languages also trains students majoring in English language, providing quality human resources for the whole society The Faculty has been training 12 university courses, 10 College courses and 7 Vocational College courses

3.2 PARTICIPANTS

The participants in this research were senior English majors who were studying at the Industrial University of Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam We selected seniors for this study because most of seniors at IUH have already undergone Translation 2, so they have enough knowledge and skills to participate in this survey They were randomly chosen by online questionnaire survey

3.3 RESEARCH METHODOLOGY AND RESEARCH METHODS

Quantitative methodology was applied in this investigation An opinion about the advantages

of quantitative methodology stated by Creswell (2017) that “Quantitative research employs strategies of inquiry such as experimental and surveys, and collect data on predetermined instruments that yield statistical data The findings from quantitative research can be predictive, explanatory, and confirming It involves the collection of data so that information can be quantified and subjected to statistical treatment in order to support or refute alternate knowledge claims” In the other hand, Babbie (2010) that “Quantitative research methods emphasize objective measurements and the statistical, mathematical, or numerical analysis of data collected through polls, questionnaires, and surveys, or by manipulating pre-existing statistical data using computational techniques Quantitative research focuses on gathering numerical data and generalizing it across groups of people or to explain a particular

phenomenon The final written report has a set structure consisting of introduction, literature and theory, methods, results, and discussion” We chose the quantitative method because we found it suitable for the purpose of the study A broader study can be performed, involving more subjects and allowing for more generalization of the results Data collection can be automated through digital or mobile surveys, allowing a large number of interviews to take place simultaneously across multiple places

The questionnaire is used as a collecting tool in this study because of its convenience This is one of the most popular methods available today It is very convenient, helping us to gather information quickly and accurately Also easier in the process of collecting and analyzing survey results By Aristya, K (2019) “A questionnaire is a means of eliciting the feelings, beliefs, experiences, perceptions, or attitudes of some sample of individuals As a data collecting instrument, it could be structured or unstructured The questionnaire was most frequently a very concise, preplanned set of questions designed to yield specific information

to meet a particular need for research information about a pertinent topic The research information was attained from respondents normally from a related interest area.” In this questionnaire we have a total of 12 questions all about lexical problems in the translation process Question 1 and 2, we will ask students about the general information Question 3 in the questionnaire is the first research question, in this question we will find out the methods that students often use in the translation process Questions 4,5,6 in the questionnaire will answer the research question number 2 In which questions 4 and 5 find out the lexical aspects that students most often encounter, and question 6 find out the lexical aspects that students think it the most difficult Research question 7 will answer research question number 3, they will find out what causes of lexical problems for students during translation process Questions 8, 9, 10, 11, 12 will answer research question number 4 Question 8 will survey students' opinions about the offered solutions Question 9 will ask about individual students' solutions Questions 10, 11, 12 will question students' scores and confidence in the translation course, to see if the solution really works

3.4 PROCEDURES

First of all, based on the research questions, we will design the appropriate questionnaire From that questionnaire, we will collect results and conduct research Initially, we planned to conduct questionnaire survey in both online and offline But due to the impact of the Covid-

19 epidemic, the questionnaire was only sent online We will make the questionnaire using Google Form software After that, the questionnaire will be sent to the Facebook group of the

Faculty of Foreign Languages, term 13: “Đại học Anh văn 13- IUH" A total of 100 students participated in this survey

CHAPTER V: CONCLUSION

5.1 SUMMARY OF MAIN FINDINGS

Senior English majors at IUH think that Translation 2 is a difficult subject for them With a strong awareness of the importance of lexicology in translation learning, the writer decided to conduct the survey aimed at finding out common lexical problems senior English majors at IUH encounter during the translation process This chapter mainly concerns about some major conclusions of the research that the writer drawn after careful analyses From the findings, there are some following conclusions:

During the translation process, students often use simple and l methods such as word translation, Free Translation or Adaption Students rarely use methods such as Idiomatic translation and Semantic translation

Word-for-In the process of studying and doing exercises in this subject, students very often face lexical problems In the lexical aspects given, Collocation is the lexical aspect that students encounter the most, but Idiom is the lexical aspects that cause the most difficulties for students

The students mostly agreed that lack of vocabulary, lack of awareness of cultural target and misunderstanding the context were the three main causes of lexical problems, all three causes were chosen by more than 50 students In addition, lack of awareness of figure of speech was also chosen by 43 students, a pretty high number

In 4 solutions, most students said that "collect more vocabularies" was the most effective method, with a total of 60% of students saying they were effective or extremely effective In addition, percentage of students choosing "self-study" higher than "ask teacher for better methods" This means that senior English majors are quite independent They believe that self-study is more effective than relying on teachers

Students who get high scores give their own methods to improving lexical problems: improve comprehension of words and read more books and poems related to English

5.2 RECOMMENDATIONS

Many senior English majors at IUH have encountered lexical problems during translation process As the results, they want to fix these problems and improve the quality of the translation In fact, there are a lot of effective ways and useful techniques that senior English-majored students can apply to improve their skills Both FFL’s lecturers and senior English majors should consider some suggestions as the following:

5.2.1 Suggestions for FFL’s lecturers

Firstly, Students who use the Word-for-word method have many students with high scores This shows that the assessment and grading of teachers is not really accurate Teachers need

to adjust their own assessment Teachers should encourage students to use highly professional methods such as communicative translation, semantic translation and idiomatic translation instead of word-for-word translation

Secondly, based on the results, although students do not often encounter idioms during translation, only 21% of students often encounter this lexical aspect, but this is the most difficult lexical aspect for students Meanwhile, collocation is the lexical aspect that students face the most and also very difficult for them Teachers should spend more time reviewing students about these two lexical aspects Teachers provide students with materials about common idioms and collocations in English

In addition, when providing vocabulary of topic for students, teachers should not only provide the meaning of words, but should provide additional types of words, word forms, phrase and some examples of idioms, metaphor, collocation or proverb related to that words

In subjects such as American English Literature and American-English, teachers need to improve the quality and ensure that students master the knowledge of these two subjects Students with cultural knowledge will avoid lexical problems

5.2.2 Suggestions for FFL’s students

Based on the results obtained, the students found collocation and idiom as the most difficult lexical aspect, 36% and 29% respectively Students need to read more books and literature related to English, which will help students collect more collocations and idioms, thereby improving their translation skills

Besides, students also need to collect more vocabulary by writing in notebooks or taking notes Students can improve cultural awareness by reading books and watching movies in English When studying subjects such as Anglo-American literature, students need to listen attentively and master the knowledge Learn more about British culture on the internet at home

5.3 LIMITATIONS

The number of students participating in the survey is quite limited This research paper will not go deep into the specific solutions, but only provide some general solutions for students and teachers to overcome lexical problems Secondly, the study only pays attention on

students' awareness of lexical problems, not considering the students' ability to solve as well

as the actual translation ability

5.4 DIRECTIONS FOR FUTURE RESEARCHES

This is a quantitative study, to ensure accuracy, the number of students participating should be over 200 students Due to covid-19 we cannot use qualitative methodology, future researches should use a combination of both qualitative and quantitative methodology This will help find more specific solutions for senior English majors Last but not least, the number of

students surveyed is not only in IUH but also in other universities

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