Investigating English - Vietnamese translation of geology texts. M.A. Thesis Linguistics: 60 22 02

The above-mentioned reasons inspired me to carry out an M.A minor thesis titled investigating English - Vietnamese translation of geology texts in the hope that the study can find out t

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES

FACULTY OF POST-GRADUATE STUDIES

M.A MINOR PROGRAMME THESIS

Field: English Linguistics Code: 60220201

Hanoi - 2016

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES

FACULTY OF POST-GRADUATE STUDIES

Field: English Linguistics Code: 60220201

Supervisor: Assoc Prof Dr Lê Hùng Tiến

Hanoi - 2016

Certificate of originality

I, Nguyễn Thị Cúc, hereby claim the originality of my study Unless otherwise indicated, this is my own piece of academic accomplishment

Signature

Acknowledgements

I am sincerely grateful to Assoc Prof Dr Lê Hùng Tiến, my supervisor, for his guidance, valuable suggestions, and precious advice during the course of my MA thesis writing Without his guidance, encouragement and critical comments, the study would have never been completed

My sincere gratitude goes to all my professors and lecturers at the University of Languages and International Studies, Vietnam National University, Hanoi, for their enthusiastic teaching and tremendous knowledge that have directly or indirectly enlightened my research paper

I would like to take this chance to thank all of my colleagues at Department of Foreign Languages, Faculty of Basic Sciences, and at Faculty of Geology at Hanoi University of Mining and Geology for their constant encouragement and the favorable conditions they provided

Finally, I also wish to express my great thanks to my parents, my husband for their love, support and share of housework and childcare Without their help, this thesis could not have gained the current status

Hanoi, October - 2016

Nguyễn Thị Cúc

Abstract

This thesis is targeted at investigating the English - Vietnamese translation of geology texts Specifically, it is more concerned with the translation of some typical lexical and syntactic features in English geology texts which include geological terminologies, nominalizations, the passives, the relative clauses, and

anticipatory empty subject It because of their highly frequent occurrence in

investigated geology texts Major findings of the study are discovered: First, transposition is the main procedure applied to translate geology terminologies and nominalizations Next, modulation and transposition stand out to be the two main

translation procedures in translating the passive sentences and the empty subject It

In the third place, transposition, omission, and addition are three popular translation procedures applied in translation of the relative clauses Besides, there are some lexical and syntactic translation problems which can be solved if the translators are trained to have not only translation skills, specialized knowledge but also English proficiency Some main conclusions are accordingly drawn out In the first place, geology texts have more or less the same characteristics of technical and scientific documents In the second place, although translation methods and procedures applied in translation differ and diversify from one lexical and syntactic feature to another, transposition, modulation, omission, and addition are four common translation procedures applied in translation of geology texts

2.2 Data collection 12

3.1.1 Translation of single geological terms with transposition 15

3.2.1 Translation of English passive structures into Vietnamese active

2.2.2 Translation of English passive structures into Vietnamese passive

3.3 Translation of the relative clauses with transposition, omission, and addition

22

3.4 Translation of the empty subject It with transposition and modulation 27 3.4.1 Translation of the structure It + be + Ven + that clause with

transposition and modulation 27

3.4.2 Translation of the structure It + be + adjective + to V with

3.5 Translation of the nominalizations with transposition procedure 29

3.6 Problems in English - Vietnamese translation of geology texts, possible causes

Part A: Introduction

1 Rationale

Recent developments in science and technology have highlighted the acute need for scientific and technical translation because of its pivotal role in disseminating the latest scientific and technical knowledge At Faculty of Geology, Hanoi University

of Mining and Geology, English for Geology is a compulsory subject and an essential tool for geology - majored students to be most updated with geological advances in the world They usually have to deal with geology - related documents

in English through various kinds of exercises like reading comprehension or translation tasks To many students, translating geology - specialized texts from English into Vietnamese is a difficult and demanding task

As an ESP teacher, I frequently apply translation as an indispensable means to promote the students' better comprehension of English spoken or written technical documents in general and geology texts in particular The outcomes, however, are not highly pleasing since in most cases students could not give fully clarified explanations of geological terms or perfect translation versions of difficult texts, and the like The reasons may be consequences of inadequate knowledge of English

or lack of translation skills

In addition, as doing researches in applied linguistics is one of mandatory duties of university lecturers, I occasionally pay serious attention to translation of scientific and technical texts, especially geology ones I find doing research on this issue problematic since so far there has been very little discussion about English - Vietnamese translation of geology documents

The above-mentioned reasons inspired me to carry out an M.A minor thesis titled

investigating English - Vietnamese translation of geology texts in the hope that the

study can find out the major factors affecting the translation process, figure out prominent applied translation methods and procedures, problems, solutions and possibly provide useful implications to English - Vietnamese translation of geology

texts and ESP learning and teaching

2 Study objectives

Within the scope of this research, investigating English - Vietnamese translation of geology texts is undeniably an exclusive issue However, due to the time limitation, the main objectives of this research are targeted to investigate an English course book of geology and its Vietnamese translation to locate major affecting factors to English - Vietnamese translation of geology texts, translation methods/procedures, problems, solutions and then suggest implications to English - Vietnamese translation of geology texts Therefore, the main objectives addressed in this research will be:

- Spotting the outstanding lexical and syntactic factors affecting the English - Vietnamese translation of hydrogeology texts, that is geological terminologies,

nominalizations, the passives, the relative clauses, and anticipatory subject It

Identifying the translation methods/procedures applied in translating the above mentioned lexical and syntactic features of geology texts

Defining some translation problems, causes, and possible solutions to the problems

- Suggesting implications to English - Vietnamese translation of geology texts

3 Scope of the study

Geology texts used for the data analysis are ensured to be representative, authentic, original and comprehensive since they are extracted from an English geological

textbook - Applied Hydrogeology by C.W Fetter and its translation (Địa chất Thủy

văn ứng dụng) by Vietnamese experts and teachers at Water Resources University - Nguyễn Uyên, Phạm Thanh Hiền & Phạm Hữu Sỹ These books are now being exploited by lecturers and students as study materials for English for Hydrogeology course at Department of Hydrogeology, Faculty of Geology, Hanoi University of Mining and Geology

4 Methodology

The thesis seeks answers for the following research questions:

(1) What major translation procedures are applied to translate five main lexical and syntactic features of geology texts from English into Vietnamese?

(2) What are possible translation problems, causes, and possible solutions to the problems?

The main method of this descriptive study is data analysis aimed at analyzing and pinpointing the common translation methods/procedures used in the translation of English geology texts into Vietnamese In fact, a flexible combination of methods is employed, which includes referencing to publications, collecting, categorizing and analyzing data, and describing the results Accordingly, the data analysis procedure

is composed of the following major steps:

and terminology

find the answers to the research questions

5 Design of the study

The study will consist of 3 main parts: Part A (Introduction) includes the rationale, aims, scope, methodology and the design of the study Part B (Development) consists of 2 chapters Chapter 1 (Theoretical background) investigates translation theory which is composed of information about the definition, translation methods and procedures, translation equivalence, technical translation, and geology texts Chapter 2 (Methodology) focuses on the subject of the study, data collection of the study Chapter 3 (Findings and Discussion) covers the main findings and discussions related to English - Vietnamese translation of major semantic and syntactic features of geology texts Part C (Conclusion) summarizes the study in terms of the main findings, admits study limitations, as well as recommends

implications for English - Vietnamese translation of geology texts, ESP learning and teaching and suggestions for further research While the references part lists all the books, documents, dictionaries, etc referred in the research, the appendixes part refers English and Vietnamese geology texts exploited in the Study

Part B: Development Chapter 1: Theoretical background

A considerable amount of literature has been published on translation studies; however, within the scope of the research, only some key concepts will be clearly elaborated as follows

Newmark (1988:81) draws our attention to the differences between translation methods and translation procedures: "While translation methods relate to whole texts, translation procedures are used for sentences and the smaller units of language" In translating texts, the translator uses a cluster of translation procedures Translation procedures are methods applied by translators when they formulate equivalence for the purpose of transferring elements of meaning from the SL to the

TL (Delisle, 1999:139)

So far, the two main outstanding approaches to translation have been semantic (form-based) approach and communicative (meaning-based) one although different words are used for these concepts According to Larson (1984:15), translation includes two main kinds: literal and idiomatic While literal translation is form-based, idiomatic translation is meaning-based Literal translation which is desirable

to reproduce the linguistic features of the source text sounds like nonsense and has very little communicative value Only with the two closely - related languages, can literal translation be understood thanks to their similar general grammatical forms

Otherwise, the literal choice of grammatical form and lexical items makes the translation sound foreign (Larson, 1984:15)

In contrast, idiomatic translation uses natural forms of TL, both in the grammatical constructions and in the choice of the lexical items; as a result, the translated text sounds as if it was written originally in the TL In reality, translations are often a mixture of a literal transfer of the grammatical units together with some idiomatic translation of the meaning of the text (Larson, 1984:15)

According to Newmark (1988:81), there are eight translation methods in the form of

a flattened V diagram of two main groups - SL emphasis including word for word,

literal, faithful and semantic translation and TL emphasis consisting of communicative, idiomatic, free translation and adaptation Furthermore, Newmark

(1988b:81-91) highlights eight major procedures of translation: transference,

naturalization, cultural equivalent, functional equivalence, descriptive equivalent, through-translation, shifts or transpositions and modulation He also discusses

other translation procedures like synonymy, recognized translation, translation

label, compensation, componential analysis, reduction and expansion, paraphrase, couplets, notes, additions, and glosses

Basing on the three levels of style of lexis, distribution, and message, Vinay and Darbelnet (1958) define seven translation procedures which are classified into two

main groups: direct or literal translation (including borrowing, calque, and literal translation) and oblique translation (consisting of transposition, modulation,

equivalence and adaptation) While literal translation occurs with recourse to an

exact structural, lexical, even morphological equivalence between two very related languages, oblique translation occurs when word for word translation is impossible In addition, other authors like Nida and Delisle attempt to propose other

closely-translation procedures, for example: additions, subtractions and alterations (Nida, 1964a), addition vs omission, paraphrase and discursive creation (Delisle, 1993)

In general, all previously stated translation methods and procedures have both

similar and different features Some of them are characteristically the same but expressed with different terms However, only some following procedures that are useful for further parts of the study are focused on in details as follows:

1.1.1 Transpositions

Transposition is the procedure involving a change in the grammar or part of speech from SL to TL, for instance, (i) change from singular to plural, (ii) the change required when a specific SL structure does not exist in the TL, (iii) change of an SL verb to a TL word, change of an SL noun group to a TL noun and so forth (Newmark, 1988b:86) According to Newmark (1988b:86), transposition is the only translation procedure concerned with grammar, and most translators make transpositions intuitively Transposition also means the replacing of one word-class

by another without changing the meaning of the message Mostly, some words denoting the meaning in the former language, then its translated form may be given not as the same structure in the latter A very simple example of transposition is the translation of “a beautiful girl” with “một cô gái xinh đẹp”, which involves automatic change of word order in the noun phrase from SL into TL

1.1.2 Modulations

Modulation is a variation in the message when it is translated into a target language due to a change in the point of view, seeing something in a different light (i.e one part to another, passive to active and vice versa, abstract to concrete and vice versa, and double-negative to positive) Thus, modulation occurs when the translator reproduces the message of the original text in the TL text in conformity with the current norms of the TL, since the SL and the TL may appear dissimilar in terms of perspective (Newmark, 1988b:88) One typical example of this procedure is “It’s not unlikely that - Có vẻ như là” (TL positive for SL double negative)

1.3.3 Omissions

Omissions or subtractions are a grammatical redundancy of certain forms in two

languages Whenever we do translation we are certain to meet some speech

omitted or supposed to be According to Nida (1964b), there are four situations where the translator should use omission procedure, in addition to when it is required by the TL: unnecessary repetition, specified references, conjunctions and adverbs For instance, the relative pronoun in the SL phrase “the car that I bought last year” is omitted in the TL phase “chiếc xe tôi mua năm ngoái”

1.3.4 Additions

Additions are a type of grammatical transformation which can be used formal inexpressiveness of grammatical or semantic components of the original texts Addition means to give the meaning with the use of another word adding to a context Nida (1964b) mentions various contexts that might oblige the translator to make an addition: to clarify an elliptic expression, to avoid ambiguity in the target language, to change a grammatical category, or to amplify implicit elements to add connectors For example, SL elliptic phrases like “the Beanie Babies” and “eBay” can be translated with addition procedure as “những món đồ chơi Beanie Babie” and “trang mạng đấu giá trực tuyến eBay”, respectively

1.4 Translation equivalence

As Catford (1965:21) states that: “A central task of translation theory is that of defining the nature and conditions of translation equivalence", a large volume of published studies investigates this issue such as the researches by Nida and Taber (1982), Catford (1965), Nida (1986), and Koller (1979)

In general, there have been three main points of view about equivalence in translation When examining the communicative aspect of translation, some researchers like Catford, Nida, Toury and Koller state that equivalence is achievable, a target and a necessary condition of translation While considering translation an issue of linguistics, other linguists like Snell-Hornby and Gentzler agree that equivalence is unachievable and a hindrance to translation Other theorists like Baker, however, have a neutral viewpoint when considering equivalence in translation in combination with linguistics and languages in use

They think that there is no complete equivalence, but equivalence is targetable to some degree and equivalence is not only a conceptual unit in translation theories but also a useful category to translation studies and practices

Theoretically, equivalence in translation can be classified into four main types: function-based (Nida & Taber, 1982:200; Nida, 1964:191-192), form-based (Baker, 1992), meaning-based (Koller, 1989:100-103) and quantity-based equivalence (Kade, 1968, as cited in Hatim, 2014) However, according to Baker (1992), there are always problems in selecting equivalents at any level, and accordingly, it is very difficult for the translator to obtain a complete equivalence between SL and TL Therefore, it is the duty for the translator to recognize the hindrances in the SL texts and then transfer them in a way that the TL readers can comprehend clearly with most appropriate translation methods and procedures

1.5 Technical translation

Grouping translation into literary translation and scientific and technical

translation, Sofer (1991) points out that technical translation covers scientific and

technical matters (science books, technique books, etc.) and technical translation is usually done by the one with significant knowledge of linguistics and background knowledge of the specific technical field Newmark (1988:151) adds that “technical translation is one part of specialized translation; institutional translation, the area of politics, commerce, finance, government etc…is the other” It is primarily distinguished from other forms of translation by terminology (5-10% of a text) It concludes technical reports (mostly), instructions, manuals, notices, publicity, grammatically characterized by passives, nominalizations, third persons, empty verbs, and present tenses (Newmark, 1988:151)

Regarding neologisms in technical documents, Newmark (1995) pinpoints out its ten categories followed by different corresponding translation procedures Ten categories consist of old words with new sense (recognized translation/ through translation with a descriptive equivalent if the words do not exist in the TL), new

coinages (transference or by a functional or generic term), derived words (naturalization), abbreviations, collocations (i.e noun compound or adjective plus noun, transference with a functional/ descriptive term), eponyms (transference with explanations), phrasal words (semantic equivalents), transferred words, acronyms (transference), and pseudo-neologisms

In addition, when dealing with translating technical texts, Newmark (1988:156) suggests that the translators should first read the text to understand it, underline difficult words and then to assess its nature, its degree of formality, its intention, the possible cultural and professional differences between the readership and the original one After that, the translator should give the translation the framework of a recognized house-style Moreover, the translator is advised to consider every word, every figure, letter, every punctuation mark, etc He then focuses our attention on

two major methods of technical translation: translating the title, and going through

the text

1.6 Geology texts

Halliday and Martin (1993) pointed out that the major goal of science is explaining how the world is organized and why it is organized in that way; and science textbooks and other documents mainly in the genres of reports and explanations deal with these two concerns Therefore, geology documents as a subgenre of science textbooks have the same functions as science textbooks do (Halliday and Martin, 1993)

Do Kim Phuong (2012) in her doctoral dissertation investigating the structure and meaning of geological textbooks as a scientific genre in English and Vietnamese in the light of systemic functional grammar finds out the similarities and differences in the generic structure and linguistic features of English and Vietnamese geological textbooks On the one hand, English and Vietnamese geological textbooks are similar in their same pattern of organization with three main parts, a high percentage of unmarked theme, a large number of declarative clauses and relational

and material processes, a small percentage of modality and passive voice constructions On the other hand, they generically and linguistically differ in many ways For instance, unlike English geological textbooks, Vietnamese ones do not have any section of concluding remarks or summary, there is no non-finite embedded clause as marked Theme in Vietnamese, no vocatives and the Finite as the interpersonal Theme in Vietnamese Furthermore, there are no fronted predicator as unmarked Themes, no place denoting nominal groups as adjunct Theme in English as they can only be found in Vietnamese (Do Kim Phuong, 2012:178)

Furthermore, data gathered from survey questionnaires through emails with professors and lecturers at Department of Hydrogeology, Faculty of Geology, Hanoi University of Mining and Geology indicate another prominent hindrance to English-Vietnamese translation of geology texts that is relative clauses Most of the respondents agree that beside translation of terminologies, translating relative clauses in hydro-geology texts is a big problem to geology-majored students (see the appendix 2 for more details)

It can be concluded that there are many distinctive features that distinguish geological documents from other kinds of documents, and there are also some disparities between English and Vietnamese geological texts These differences will become big challenges to a translator when considering equivalence between SL and TL as Baker (1992) points out that there are always problems in selecting equivalents at any level The duty of a translator is to recognize these hindrances in the SL texts and then reproduce them in a way that readers of the TL can comprehend clearly without any cultural misunderstandings (Baker, 1992) The five remarkable obstacles in English - Vietnamese translation of geology texts that can

be named here are: geological terminologies, nominalizations, the passives, the

relative clauses, and anticipatory subject It Therefore, in the following chapter of

the thesis, these aspects will be carefully investigated in order to figure out translation methods or procedures applied and identify possible relating problems

Chapter 2: Methodology 2.1 Study subject

The study subject is geology texts, in which examples of five main characteristics are located and extracted for data analysis These texts are ensured to be representative, authentic, original and comprehensive documents because they are

extracted from an English geological textbook - Applied Hydrogeology by C.W

Fetter and its translation (Địa chất Thủy văn ứng dụng) by Vietnamese experts and teachers at Water Resources University - Nguyễn Uyên, Phạm Thanh Hiền & Phạm Hữu Sỹ

These books are now being exploited by lecturers and students as study materials for English for Hydrogeology course at Department of Hydrogeology, Faculty of Geology, Hanoi University of Mining and Geology These books are also used in many other geology faculties of other universities like Water Resources University Another study subject which helps to obtain more convincing information for the study is the questionnaires which were delivered through emails to lecturers at Department of Hydrogeology, Faculty of Geology, Hanoi University of Mining and Geology These questionnaires were employed to define most difficult problems and possible solutions when translating geology texts from English into Vietnamese

2.2 Data collection

The main methods of this descriptive and qualitative study were book observation and data analysis These methods were aimed at analyzing and pinpointing the common translation methods/procedures used in the translation of English geology texts into Vietnamese To be more detailed, a flexible combination of methods was employed, which includes some major following steps:

The first step was investigating the study subject to locate the samples of geology texts possessing five main semantic and syntactic features which concretely

includes geological terminologies, nominalizations, the passives, the relative

clauses, and anticipatory empty subject It because of their highly frequent

occurrence in geology texts, as discussed in the previous chapter

The next step was collecting these samples and then categorizing by using tables to list all the collected samples Then, the third step was to clarify and analyze the texts in order to find the answers to the two following research questions

(1) What major translation procedures are applied to translate five main lexical and syntactic features of geology texts from English into Vietnamese?

(2) What are possible translation problems, causes, and possible solutions to the problems?

The results, then, were recorded for data analysis to figure out the main findings of the study Within the time limitation and scope of this study, this paper was accomplished with samples of translation methods/ procedures which are significantly present throughout the investigated data Analysis and description of data were done to highline the methods/ procedures applied in the translation of five main lexical and syntactic aspects of geology texts,

Chapter 3: Findings and discussion 3.1 Translation of geological terminologies with transposition procedure

One of the most challenging issues for technical translators is terminologies since Peter New Mark (1988:151) once pointed out that “technical translation is primarily distinguished from other forms of translation by terminology (5-10% of a text)” In this part, only geology terms which are boldly printed in the investigated books are extracted to analyze They are mainly divided into two groups: single terms and compound terms, which are nouns and compounds, respectively To translate these geological terms, the prominent translation procedure applied is transposition which involves automatic change of word order in components of nouns or compounds

3.1.1 Translation of single geological terms with transposition

The investigated single terms are mainly single nouns, most of which not only bear

their specialized meanings but also have a more general meanings such as aquiclude

(lớp cách nước), hydrology (thủy văn học), evaporation (sự bốc hơi), transpiration (sự thoát hơi nước), aquifuge (lớp không thấm), aquifer (tầng chứa nước), precipitation (mưa), weir (đập tràn), evapotranspiration (sự bốc - thoát hơi nước),

etc (see more examples in the appendix 1a) Remarkably, most of the nouns are blends which are words formed with blending process, one of the most popular methods of word formation, which can be elaborated through some examples as

follows:

aquifer = aqua (Latin: water) + - ferre (Latin: bear) = tầng chứa nước

geohydrology = geology + hydrology = địa chất thủy văn evapotranspiration = evaporation + transpiration = sự bốc-thoát hơi nước

The other common method of noun formation is derivation like in the following examples:

học

precipitation = precipitate (rain) + -ation (suffix) = mưa

It can be seen that transposition procedure is applied to translate these above single terms, in which the word order in components of nouns is automatically changed backwards from English to Vietnamese However, among these single terms, there are highly technical terms which may require explanations for a layman to fully

understand the concepts as in the case of interflow (dòng hội lưu) In this case, the

SL words are put in brackets to ensure that the readers know what terms are mentioned like the following example:

Under some conditions water can flow laterally in the vadose zone, a process

known as interflow

Ở một số điều kiện, nước có thể chảy ngang trong đới không khí, gọi là dòng

hội lưu (interflow)

The boldly printed compound terms that are investigated in this part are compounds

which can be formed by two components: noun + noun (e.g gravity drainage -

thoát nước trọng lực, water table - mực nước ngầm), adjective + noun (e.g adiabatic expansion - giãn nở đoạn nhiệt, hydrologic equation - phương trình thủy văn), V-ed + noun (e.g confined aquifer - tầng chứa nước bị chặn, perched aquifer

- tầng chứa nước treo) or V-ing + noun (e.g gaining stream - dòng chảy nhận nước, wilting point - điểm héo) Only some compounds have three components,

such as ground - water basin - lưu vực nước ngầm, ground-water divide - đường

phân chia nước ngầm The four - component compounds like stage - discharge rating curve (đường cong quan hệ lưu lượng - cấp độ sâu) rarely appear in the

study data

As Cobuild (1990:38) defines a compound noun as “a fixed expression which is made up of more than one word and which functions in the clause as a noun”, the formation of compound nouns is a very important factor to determine their meanings and accordingly, to have appropriate translations Although relationship

between the words in a compound noun depends on the particular expression, they have one thing in common The last word in the compound explains what the thing

is while the preceding word or word group or the classifier describes the thing like the following examples:

storm hydrograph = hydrograph dedicated to storm = biểu đồ thủy lượng bão

dew point = point of dew = điểm sương

magmatic water = water having magma = nước macma

Since the word order in English compounds and Vietnamese ones are opposite, compound terms are translated backwards with means of transposition (i.e automatic change in order of compound’s components from SL to TL) Like translation procedure applied in translating single nouns, sometimes, the SL compound terms are placed in brackets in translation, especially with highly

geology - specialized terms such as depression storage (nước đọng) and overland

flow (dòng chảy tràn / dòng quá thấm) in the following example sentences

Some water may be temporarily stored on the land surface as ice and snow

water in puddles, which is known as depression storage

Một số nước được lưu giữ tạm thời trên mặt đất dưới dạng băng, tuyết hay

nước trong các vũng nước, được gọi chung là nước đọng (depression

storage)

Some of the rain or melting snow will drain across the land to a stream

channel This is termed overland flow

Một phần nước mưa và tuyết tan chảy lan trên mặt đất vào các sông suối, là

dòng chảy tràn hay dòng quá thấm (overland flow)

The possible reason is that the translation may sound ambiguous or awkward to the targeted readers; thus, the translators have to mention SL terms as a solution to ensure the readers’ throughout understanding and also present the translators’ hope

for a more appropriate translation

It can be concluded that transposition is the most frequent translation procedure applied automatically to all terms present in geology texts This is a rather easy translation method because there are only few steps that the translators have to follow to apply this procedure: first, locate different components of the terms; next, identify the head noun, the modifiers or the division between the elements in the terms; and then change the word order into the TL corresponding word order

3.2 Translation of the passives with modulation and transposition

Although the passive structures are present in many languages, their function and usage differs from language to language In English scientific and technical written documents, passive sentences are more regularly used than active ones, to draw attention on concrete scientific phenomenon and processes rather than on the

doers/agents and in order to avoid using the first person (I, We) Apart from being

an effective depersonalization strategy to ensure the objectivity of the documents, the passive structure is particularly feasible with agentless sentences in which the agents of the sentences cannot be specified

In Vietnamese, however, the use of passive structures is completely opposite to English because it is more preferable to use the active structure than the passive

one In order to express passive meanings, two words bị, được are used in

combination with main verbs; however, a careful use of these words is necessary since these words sometimes do not express any passive meaning (Bùi Thị Diên, 2005: 36-42) In order to translate English passive sentences in the study subject, two main ways are applied, namely corresponding Vietnamese active sentences and passive structures, which will be elaborately specified in the following parts

3.2.1 Translation of English passive structures into Vietnamese active ones with

modulation procedure

The most common translation procedure applied in translating English passive sentences is modulation which involves “a variation through a change of viewpoint,

of perspective and very often of category of thought” (Vinay and Darbelnet, 1958) The change from active to passive voice or vice versa is a typical example of modulation Modulation procedure means a change in the sentence structure from

SL passive into TL active, therefore it is obligatory that the translators have to find the agent/doer of the action, which can be located at the end of the passives or in the previous sentences

If there mentions the agent, the passive can be translated into an active with some change in the sentence structure as follows:

The creation and distribution of precipitation is heavily influenced by the presence of mountain ranges

Các dãy núi ảnh hưởng rất nhiều đến việc tạo mưa và phân bố mưa

agentless, V is the main verb and Ven is the past participle of the main verb So, the

have a complete transference into TL

If the agent cannot be identified, especially with agentless sentences, the translators need to add the agent to the corresponding Vietnamese active structures In most

cases, Vietnamese active structures start with first or third plural subject as chúng

tôi, chúng ta, người ta, họ like the examples hereinafter

To solve the problem, three close precipitation stations with full records that

are evenly spaced around tine station with a missing record are used

Để giải quyết vấn đề này, người ta dựa vào ba trạm có số liệu đầy đủ ở gần

hoặc cách gần trạm thiếu số liệu

Another outstanding feature is that in TL active sentences, the first or third plural

subject as chúng tôi, chúng ta, người ta, họ are intentionally omitted by the

translators Although the subjects of the active sentences in TL are hidden, it is

possible for the readers to understand that the implied subjects here are some words

like “chúng tôi, chúng ta, người ta, họ Consider the following example for more

details (see more examples in the appendix 1b):

In drawing the isohyets, such factors as known influence of topography on

precipitation can be taken into account

Khi vẽ các đường đồng mức mưa phải xem xét các nhân tố ảnh hưởng của

địa hình đến lượng mưa

It can be said that modulation procedure can ensure semantic equivalence; but its undeniable disadvantage is differences in structure and pragmatics between SL and

TL However, using TL active sentences to transfer SL passives are still considered

to be more natural, easier to understand, and more appropriate with Vietnamese ways of thinking

3.2.2 Translation of English passive structures into Vietnamese passive ones

with transposition procedure

Another translation procedure to deal with SL passives is transposition which

involves change in word class when a SL passive is translated by a TL passive

structure While in English, the passive voice is reflected in verb form (Ven), in

Vietnamese, the passive meaning is expressed by two passive words được, bị which

precede the verb of the sentence (Bùi Thị Diên, 2005: 36-42) It is worth noticing that in Vietnamese, the passive structures contain both positive and negative

meanings, which are respectively conveyed by two different words được and bị, so

it is advisable to read the sentences carefully to determine the meanings of the sentences to translate them in a proper way

Vapors can be detected by gas-monitoring wells, which are simply wells that terminate in the unsaturated zone

Hơi có thể được phát hiện bằng các giếng giám sát khí là các giếng đơn

giản đào trong đới không khí

Excess vadose water is pulled downward by gravity

Khi nước ẩm của đất dư thừa thì bị kéo xuống dưới do trọng lực

can have more than one ways of expression with some small changes Consider the following sentence and its possible translations for more details:

Excess vadose water is pulled downward by gravity

Nước ẩm của đất dư thừa bị trọng lực kéo xuống dưới

Typically, the TL passives are often used to inform the rheme or the new information of the sentence and to create an objective order in a sentence Consider the following sentence and its possible translations:

The catch of precipitation gauges is affected by high winds (5)

Việc hứng mưa bị ảnh hưởng của gió mạnh (6)

Gió mạnh ảnh hưởng tới việc hứng mưa (7)

If we use an active structure (7) to translate the sentence (5), the given information

“việc hứng mưa” is in the rheme; then, this will contradict the theory on information

structure proposed by Halliday (1967:200) (i.e old/given information in the theme and new information in the rheme) Therefore, it is more suitable for this old information to occur in the theme of the sentence by using a passive structure (6) Using a TL passive structure to translate a SL one not only ensures the old-before-new principle but also explains the fact that in technical texts, the English authors prefer to put the long or heavy structures at the end of the sentence to focus readers’ attention on new information, which is known as the principle of “end-weight” or

“end-focus” That is the reason why passive structures are frequently used in technical writings in general and in geology documents in particular Therefore, in order to translate SL passive sentences with long and heavy ending parts, it is advisable that the translators use corresponding passive structures in TL like the following examples:

Vapors can be detected by gas-monitoring wells, which are simply wells that

terminate in the unsaturated zone

Hơi có thể được phát hiện bằng các giếng giám sát khí là các giếng đơn

giản đào trong đới không khí

Leaks can potentially be detected by monitoring the water in the vadose

(unsaturated) zone

Rò rỉ được phát hiện bằng cách giám sát nước trong đới không khí (đới

không bão hòa)

It can be seen that transposition procedure can help to assure the structural, sematic and pragmatic equivalence between SL and TL though it creates some changes in

especially suitable to the SL passive sentences with long and heavy rheme The use and form of passive voice in both English and Vietnamese, however, should be

carefully investigated in order to achieve proper equivalence in translation

Syntactic and semantic role of bị and được in Vietnamese should be considered to

avoid mistakes between passive structures and non-passive structures

3.3 Translation of the relative clauses with transposition, omission, and

addition

Relative clauses are widely used in English geology texts to serve their two main traditional functions While restrictive relative clauses define subsets or to specify a particular subset of a general class as a necessary qualifying element in a nominal group especially when the classifier cannot provide enough qualifying information; non-restrictive ones give some additional information about things or persons which are already fully specified English relative clauses in geological texts can be finite

or nonfinite clause When they are finite, they can be introduced by one of relative

pronouns like who, which, that, whom, whose, or relative adverbs such as when,

why, where In some cases, the relative pronouns/ adverbs can be omitted, in others,

they cannot When they are non-finite clauses, they can be -ing clauses, -ed clauses,

or to- infinitive clauses

Unlike English grammar, in Vietnamese, the ideas of relative pronouns and clauses

do not exist in Vietnamese; therefore, to fill the gap between SL and TL or to compensate for the fact that there is no equivalent of relative pronouns in

Vietnamese, in most cases, the translators use the words ở nơi mà, ngày mà, ở đây,

tại đây, khi as a linking device plus a verb phrase together with other elements (if

any) to transfer the relative clauses into Vietnamese Using the linking device mà

makes the translated sentences more cohesive and coherent

3.3.1 Translation of the relative clauses with transposition

Since a relative pronoun modifies the preceding noun and is directly affected by the role of this noun in the sentence (i.e as subject or object of the main verb), translation of this pronoun can have an impact on English - Vietnamese translation

of the whole sentence Specifically, if the noun of the main clause serves as the