Translation procedures applied in translating dental terminology from English to Vietnamese.... CHAPTER 3: RESEARCH METHODOLOGYThe purpose of this chapter is to introduce the methodology
Trang 1UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES
FACULTY OF POST-GRADUATE STUDIES
NGUYỄN THU HẰNG
ENGLISH – VIETNAMESE TRANSLATION OF
ODONTOLOGY TERMS IN ODONTOLOGY MATERIALS
USED FOR VIETNAMESE DENTISTS
(Nghiên cứu dịch thuật Anh – Việt các thuật ngữ Nha khoa trong các tài liệu
Nha khoa sử dụng cho Nha sĩ Việt Nam)
MA THESIS
Field: English Linguistics Code: 8220201.01
Ha Noi - 2020
Trang 2UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES
FACULTY OF POST-GRADUATE STUDIES
NGUYỄN THU HẰNG
ENGLISH – VIETNAMESE TRANSLATION OF
ODONTOLOGY TERMS IN ODONTOLOGY MATERIALS
USED FOR VIETNAMESE DENTISTS
(Nghiên cứu dịch thuật Anh – Việt các thuật ngữ Nha khoa trong các tài liệu
Nha khoa sử dụng cho Nha sĩ Việt Nam)
Trang 3I would like to express my very great gratitude to my esteemed Supervisor,Assoc.Prof.Dr Le Hung Tien, who has unfailingly given me valuable insights into mythesis, oriented me towards the right direction and encourage me to no end throughoutthe process
My deep gratefulness is for my husband, as well as my family, who have always beenbeside me most of the time of the Thesis and given me so much care and help
I would also highly appreciate my colleagues, my husband’s dentist team and myfriends for their close and effective cooperation, without which my doing the thesiswould have been a much more difficult experience
Trang 4This thesis aimed to investigate the translation procedures of the dental terms in thedictionary “Thuật ngữ Răng Hàm Mặt” by the Faculty of Odonto-Stomatology, Ho ChiMinh Pharmaceutical – Medical University, 1993; and the book “Dental Terminology”
by Charline M Dofka, published by Delmar, Cengage Learning, 2012, combined withthe field notes taken by the researcher The notes included the commonly-usedtranslation procedures for the translator – the researcher - between doctors and patients
or clients, who are the participants in this study in a dental clinic The thesis uses thetheoretical framework of translation procedures of Peter Newmark (1995) to classifythe translation procedures of those terms and compare with the actual practice oftranslation The findings of the research reveal that, in some circumstances, manyVietnamese dental terms do not make easy sense to the doctors and patients or clientsbecause they are mostly academic or professional terms The paraphrased terms the
book “Dental terminology” and their synonyms are helpful in making them more easily-understood The paraphrasing and synonymy procedures by Peter Newmark are
also the most effective ones apart from the others which are: literal translation,transference, naturalization, descriptive equivalence, cultural equivalence, shift ortransposition and omission The study suggests practical applications of translationprocedures in real-life dental translating contexts in Vietnam
ii
Trang 6TABLE OF CONTENT
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS i
ABSTRACT ii
LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS iv
TABLE OF CONTENT v
CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION 1
1.1 Rationale 1
1.2 Scope of the study 1
1.3 Aims of the study 2
1.4 Objectives 2
1.5 Research questions 2
1.6 Significance of the study 2
1.7 Methods of the study 2
1.8 Organization of the thesis 2
CHAPTER 2: THEORETICAL BACKGROUND 4
2.1 An overview on translation 4
2.1.1 Translation procedures 4
2.1.2 Technical translation 9
2.1.2.1 Definition of technical translation 9
2.1.2.2 Varieties of technical styles 9
2.2 An overview on terminology 10
2.2.1 Definition of terminology 10
2.2.2 Dental terminology 10
2.2.2.1 Formation of dental words 10
2.2.2.2 Areas of dental terminology 11
2.2.2.3 Types of dental terms 12
2.3 Summary of the chapter 16
CHAPTER 3: RESEARCH METHODOLOGY 18
3.1 Research questions 18
iv
Trang 73.2 Methodology 18
3.3 The researcher 19
3.4 Study participants 19
3.5 Mixed methods procedures 19
3.6 Data analysis 20
3.7 Summary of the chapter 21
CHAPTER 4: FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION 22
4.1 Translation procedures for technical terms 22
4.1.1 Literal translation 23
4.1.2 Transference or naturalization procedures 24
4.1.3 Translation by cultural equivalence procedure 27
4.1.4 Translation by descriptive equivalence procedure 27
4.1.5 Translation by synonymy 29
4.1.6 Translation by paraphrasing technical terms into commonly-used words 29
4.1.7 Shift or transposition procedures 37
4.1.8 Omission procedure 38
4.1.9 Combination of two or more translation procedures 39
4.1.10 Summary 40
4.2 Translation procedures for descriptive terms 40
4.2.1 Literal translation 41
4.2.2 Shift or transposition procedure 41
4.2.3 Omission procedure 42
4.2.4 Summary 42
4.3 Translation procedures applied in translating dental terminology from English to Vietnamese 43
Procedure 1: Literal translation 43
Procedure 2: Transference or naturalization procedures 43
Procedure 3: Translation by descriptive equivalence procedure 44
Procedure 4: Translation by using shift or transposition procedures 44
Trang 8Procedure 5: Translation by using procedure of omission 44
Procedure 6: Translation by using synonymy or paraphrasing procedures 44
4.4 Summary of the chapter 44
CHAPTER 5: CONCLUSIONS 45
5.1 Summary of key findings 45
5.2 Limitations of the study 46
5.3 Implications of the study 47
REFERENCES 50
APPENDIXES I
vi
Trang 9CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION
1 Rationale
First of all, it is not difficult to realise that the Odontology is growing in momentum inmost of the big cities of Vietnam Many dentistry hospitals, dental clinics have beenopened everywhere with a very fast speed
Furthermore, one new field has recently appeared and has been more and more paidattention to, that is “Dental Tourism” – it means tourism combines to dentistry, ortourists come to Vietnam and use Vietnam’s dental services It can be said that DentalTourism will be one of the future key industry of Vietnam, which will contribute asignificant part to the development of national tourism
Secondly, English for Odontology is like a bridge between the specialists who are dentists,dental doctors, dental technicians, dental nurses and their customers or patients Thespecialists are interested in Odontology English to serve their job requirements, such as toread and comprehend foreign documents, listen to and understand the content ininternational workshops, do further studies oversea The scholars or researchers payattention to Odontology English because of their own linguistic purposes The interpreters
or translators take interest in Odontology English to help dentists or doctors in their jobs.Ordinary people also need Odontology English to have basic dental vocabulary tocommunicate with dentists to protect their own oral health
It can be said that, translation of Odontology terms is a very difficult task because most
of the Odontology terms are acedemic and professional ones, which contains theirjargon prefixes and suffixes The translator must make them clearer by paraphrasingthem into more popularly-used words or phrases
Thus, the author of this thesis has made a decision of studying English–VietnameseOdontology translation procedures with the hope to provide the readers usefultranslation procedures what can be applied in their jobs and requirements
2 Scope of the study
Not many Odontology materials or documents are found in Vietnam’s bookstores Thisresearch focuses on studying English Odontology terms and their Vietnameseequivalents, mainly from the dictionary “Thuật ngữ Răng Hàm Mặt” by the Faculty ofOdonto-Stomatology, Ho Chi Minh Pharmaceutical – Medical University, 1993 andthe book “Dental Terminology” by Charline M Dofka, published by Delmar, CengageLearning, 2012
Trang 10The research would analyse features of typical English Odontology terms, based onsome translation procedures, then find out the most commonly applied translationprocedures.
Due to the popularity of the terms “dental” or “dentistry”, I will use them instead ofthe less popular ones: “odontological” or “odontology”
3 Aims of the study
This study is carried out with the aims of making the writer’s job easier when she works
as a translator in Hoan Kiem dental clinic, Hai Phong city Simultaneously, the study is thereference source for the people who are concerned about the dentistry industry
4 Objectives
Based on the aims of the research, some specific objectives would be drawn out Thoseare:
• To find out the useful translation procedures applied in translation process
• To make some implications and applications for the dental term translation process
5 Research questions
On this ground, the study seeks the answer to these two questions:
Research question 1: What are the translation procedures used in the communicationbetween dentists and patients / clients?
Research question 2: What translation procedures are effective?
6 Significance of the study
Originating from the problems in the translation job of the researcher, in which thelisteners sometimes find it difficult to understand the dental terms, I have studied thechanges in the translation methods by applying the translation procedures of Newmark(1995) into my job The results show that patients and doctor communicate moreeffectively, the listeners do not have to ask for the information again and again, thetranslator does not have to use the online dictionaries during the dialogues
7 Methods of the study
A mixed method which is the mixture of both quantitative and qualitative methods isapplied in the thesis The participants are the doctors, patients or clients and thetranslator – also the researcher – working in Hoan Kiem dental clinic, Hai Phong city
8 Organization of the thesis
The paper is divided into 5 chapters as follows:
2
Trang 11Chapter 1: Introduction
This chapter provides readers an overview of the study including reason for choosing the topic, scope, aims, objectives and its organization
Chapter 2: Theoretical background
Theoretical background in the light of which the research matters is discussed in this chapter
Chapter 3: Methodology
This chapter provides the main methodology and procedures of data collection
Chapter 4: Findings and Discussion
This chapter presents, analyzes and discusses the results what the researcher found out from the collected data It also gives answer to the research questions
Chapter 5: Conclusion
This chapter summarizes the overall study and suggests some forms of further studies
on the field
Trang 12CHAPTER 2: THEORETICAL BACKGROUND 2.1 An overview on translation
2.1.1 Translation procedures
Many linguists have mentioned the concept of “translation procedure” up to now However,they have different expressions for the similar terms Some linguists use the term “procedure”,some others prefer “procedure”, the rest choose “method” Clarifying the distinction amongtranslation procedures, procedures, and mothods is a challenging task
Krings (1986:18) sees translation procedure as “translator’s potentially conscious plans forsolving concrete translation problems in the framework of a concrete translation task”.Similarly, Loescher (1991:8) defines translation procedure as “a potentially consciousprocedure for solving a problem faced in translating a text or any segment of it”
Besides, Newmark (1995: 68) clearly distinguishes translation methods with translationprocedures: “while translation methods relate to whole texts, translation proceduresare used for sentences and the smaller units of language”
In brief, translation procedure can be basically understood as ways of choosingappropriate translation methods and procedures applied in particular cases
I myself choose the theory framework about translation procedures by Newmark (1995)
to apply in the thesis In the book “A text book of translation” by Peter Newmark (1995:68-91), he classified the translation procedures into twelve types as follows:
2.1.1.1 Literal translation
Literal translation is the most important of the procedures, so he discussed it in aseparate chapter According to Newmark (1995: 69), literal translation ranges from oneword to one word, through group to group, collocation to collocation, to sentence tosentence; the longer the unit, the rarer the one-to-one This also means “above theword level, literal translation becomes increasingly difficult” He (1995: 70) alsoadded “normally, the more specific or technical a word, the less it is likely to beaffected by context” and “the more likely a literal translation” Further, “a commonobject will usually have one-to-one litetal translation if there is a cultural overlap,though most languages have strange lexical gaps” and “a term for a common objectsometimes has other common senses”
Specific features: This type of procedure is mostly used when translating SL words /phrases / text with available meanings presented in the dictionary into TL words /phrases / text
4
Trang 13For instance: the English words “tooth”, “gum”, “lip” has just only one Vietnamesemeaning in the dictionary as “răng”, “lợi”, “môi”, respectively, therefore the translatorhas to use their available meanings.
2.1.1.2 Transference
The second type of translation procedure is the transference, which was discussed in
“A textbook of translation” (1995: 81)
Newmark defined “transference (emprunt, loan word, transcription) is the process oftransferring a SL word to a TL text as a translation procedure He also gives somefollowing cases applied the procedure: “names of all living” and “most dead people”,
“geographical and topographical names including newly independent countries such as(le) Zaire, Malawi, unless they already have recognized translations”; “names ofperiodicals and newspapers; title of as yet untranslated literary works, plays, films;names of private companies and institutions; names of public or nationalizedinstitutions, unless they have recognized translation; street names, addresses, etc”.Until now, there have been always arguments about transference procedure, “theargument in favour of transference is that it shows respect for the SL country’s culture.The argument against it is that the translator’s job to translate, to explain” (Newmark,1995: 82)
Specific features: This procedure is applied usefully in translation the materials andchemicals that have in the TL words the similar pronunciation or transcription as the
Another type of procedure is the naturalization translation In his book, Newmark (1995:
82) said: “The procedure succeeds transference and adapts the SL word first to thenormal pronunciation, then to the normal morphology of the TL” It means the SL andthe TL words or phrases have the similar way of pronouncing and their word-forms.Specific features: This procedure has a similar feature as the transference one in the way ittransfers the similar pronunciation or morphology of the SL words into the TL words.For instance: the English word “abscess” in the SL has the similar pronunciation in the
TL as “áp-xe”, therefore its equivalent in the dictionary is “áp-xe” as well
Trang 142.1.1.4 Cultural equivalent
Every context has its own cultural aspects The translator needs to consider the culturalequivalents to produce more appropriate TL
Newmark (1995: 82) also said that the procedure is “an approximate translation where
a SL cultural word is translated by TL cultural words” He clearly points out that “themain purpose of the procedure is to support or supplement another translationprocedure in a couplet”
Specific features: This procedure has its advantage when the TL words need a culturalfactor translation
For instance: For the English word “gum”, if it is translated as “lợi”, it just makessense in the North of Vietnam whereas if it is translated as “nướu”, it will make moresense in the South of Vietnam However, in the case that the listener masters bothdialects, they do not differentiate
2.1.1.5 Functional equivalent
As it is stated by Newmark (1995: 83), the procedure is usually applied to culturalwords, “it requires the use of a culture-free word, sometimes with a new specificterm” Therefore, it generalizes or neutralizes the SL word This procedure is “the mostaccurate way of translating i.e decentralizing a cultural word”
Specific features: This procedure is opposite to the cultural one mentioned above when
it is used for “decentralizing a cultural word” However, this procedure is rarely used
as a single one, it is usually combined with another procedure, such as transferenceprocedure, to make a “couplet’ in translation - Newmark (1995: 83)
2.1.1.6 Descriptive equivalent
According to Newmark (1995: 83-84), “in translation, description sometimes has to beweighted against function” Moreover, functional procedure and descriptive one can besimultaneously used in translation It is reasonable when he says “description andfunction are essential elements in explanation and therefore in translation” and “intranslation discussion, functions used to be neglected; now it tends to be overplayed”.For instance: “Samurai” is described as “the Japanese aristocracy fro the eleventh tothe nineteenth century” The TL text tends to add more information to the SL text tomake it clearer to the listeners
2.1.1.7 Synonymy
Newmark (1995: 84) uses “the word “synonym” in the sense of a near TL equivalent to
an SL word in a context, where a precise equivalent may or may not exist” “This
6
Trang 15procedure is used for a SL word where there is no clear one-to-one equivalent, and theword is not important in the text, in particular for adjectives or adverbs of quality”.The procedure is only appropriate where literal translation is not possible and becausethe word is not important enough for componential analysis “Here, economy preceedsaccuracy.”
We can see this procedure in many examples around us every day For instance: theEnglish word “tartar” can be synonymized as “calculus” to make it more easilyunderstood before it is translated into Vietnamese equivalent as “cao răng”
For instance: “WHO” is translated as “World Health Organization” (Tổ chức Y tế Thếgiới); MPD (maximum permissible dose): liều tối đa cho phép
2.1.1.9 Shifts or transpositions
According to Newmark (1995: 85-86), “shift” or “transposition” is a translation procedureinvolving a change in the grammar from SL to TL There are four main types The firsttype is the change from singular to plural of in the position of adjectives, nouns, adverbs.The second type is used when a SL grammatical structure does not exist in the TL Thethird one is required when literal translation is grammatically possible but may not accordwith natural usage in the TL The fourth type of transposition is the replacement of avertical lexical gap by a grammatical structure
As it is also stated by Newmark (1995: 88), transposition is the only translationprocedure concerned with grammar, and most translators make transpositionsintuitively”
For instance: The transposition translation is needed when translate “the white house”from English to “ngôi nhà màu trắng” to Vietnamese, because of the position of theadjective The shift is required when an SL grammatical structure does not exist in the
TL, in the example: “It is interesting that ….” from English is translated as “… thật làthú vị”
Trang 16“concrete translation procedure which can be applied in principle to any action (verb)
or quality (adjective or adverb)”
However, it is reasonable when Newmark (1995: 88) thoroughly states “in theorynegative is not as forceful as the positive; in fact, the force of the double negativedepends on the tone of voice, and therefore the appropriateness of this modulationmust depend on its formulation and the context”
Vinay and Darbelnet (1965) give several types of modulation Some examples are:abstract for concrete, cause for effect, one part for another, reversal of terms, active forpassive, space for time, intervals and limits, change of symbols
For instance: the English word “loan” is alternatively translated as “claim” or “credit”
or “debt” depending on the point of view at the time of translation
2.1.1.11 Paraphrase
One more procedure that was mentioned in the book “A textbook of translation” byPeter Newmark is the paraphrase This procedure was said to be “an amplification orexplanation of the meaning of a segment of the text It is used in an “anonymous” textwhen it is poorly written, or has important implications and omissions” (Newmark,1995: 90)
However, as far as I know, in translating technical terms, this procedure is adequatelyused (Chapter 4, this thesis)
2.1.1.12 Translation label
Newmark (1995: 90) regards translation label as “a provisional translation, usually of anew institutional term, which should be made in inverted commas, which can later bediscreetly withdrawn”
In addition, there are other procedures such as compensation, componential analysis,reduction and expansion, and so on Writing notes or additional information intranslation at bottom of page, at end of chapter or book is a useful way to support and
8
Trang 17clarify the meaning of target language terms Normally, in the translation of terms indiagrams, maps, or models, notes are written under them or at bottom of page.
In general, the translation procedures are useful to the translator The translator mayapply the flexibly in particular context and he may combine two, three or fourprocedures (couplets, triplets, quadruplets) to deal with a single problem
2.1.2 Technical translation
2.1.2.1 Definition of technical translation
It is necessary to mention technical translation in this part, because, it is, to someextent, directly or indirectly related to its branch: medical terminology In the sameway, dental terminology belongs to its mother category “medical terminology”
According to Peter Newmark (1995: 151) “Technical translation is one part ofspecialised translation, institutional translation” and “technical translation ispotentially (but far from actual) non-cultural, therefore, universal” Mark asserts that
“Technical translation is primarily distinguished from other forms of translation byterminology, although terminology usually makes up about 5 – 10% of a text”
2.1.2.2 Varieties of technical style
Newmark (1995: 152) states that there are four varieties of technical language: (1)scientific, (2) workshop level, (3) everyday usage level and (4) publicity/sales.However, a scale is likely to be valid only for one or two terms in a new field Based
on medical vocabulary, he suggests the three following levels:
• Academic: This includes transferred Latin and Greek words associated with academic papers
• Professional: Formal terms used by experts
• Popular: Layman vocabulary which may include familiar alternative terms
In cases where there is a TL technical equivalent, the translator may translate a SLdescriptive term by a TL technical term This shows out the translator’s knowledge andacclimatizes the professional reader Conversely, in cases where the translator does notfind TL equivalent for a SL technical term, he should use a descriptive term
One of the most important requirements for a translator to become a competenttechnical translator is that he has to have much knowledge of linguistics andbackground knowledge of the specific field (a particular technical field)
Trang 182.2 An overview on terminology
2.2.1 Definition of terminology
Valeontis and Mantzari (2006: 01) described “terminology has a two fold meaning: (1) it
is the discipline concerned with the principles and methods governing the study ofconcepts and their designations (terms, names, symbols) in any subject field, and the job
of collecting, processing, and managing relevant data and (2) the set of terms belonging tothe special language of an individual subject field” In another word, a term, orterminology unit, is the name or designation of a concept in a particular subject field.Backer (1998: 261) pointed out the differences between words and terms that “Termsdiffer from words in that they are endowed with a special form of reference, namely thatthey refer to discrete conceptual entities, properties, activities or relations which constitutethe knowledge space of a particular subject field.” In Vietnam, a lot of research onvocabulary as well as terminology have been made by famous linguists such as NguyenVan Tu, Do Huu Chau, and Nguyen Thien Giap Nguyen Van Tu (1968) stated thatterminology consists of fixed words or phrases which denote concepts of sciences,manufacturing fields, or culture and so on Similarly, Do Huu Chau (1998) said thatterminology includes specialist words used within a scientific field, a profession or anytechnological field Besides, Nguyen Thien Giap (1999) defined it as a part of special lexis
of a language It consists of fixed words or groups of words which accurately nameconcepts and subjects belonging to different specialized fields of human beings From theabove-mentioned definitions, terminology can be considered fixed words or phrases whichaccurately denote concepts of particular subject fields
More specifically, she represents “In medical terminology, many words refer to theproximity or nearness to anatomical structures Many dental terms originate from thenames of bones or structures, but more often, from the names of dental procedures”
2.2.2.1 Formation of the dental words
Also, in the same part, she writes “Dental terms are usually formed by a combination
of small words or syllables linked in a “building block” or word chain”
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Trang 19When analysing the structure of a dental word, some considerations to observe includethe following:
• A prefix: qualifies the word by indicating such things as the quantity, color,size, condition or location A word may or may not have a prefix
• A root: provides the basic foundation for the word A dental term may havemore than one root When two roots are combined, a combining vowel (usually
“o”) is used to connect them
• A suffix: is sometimes added to a root (s) to qualify or describe themeaning The combining vowel (o) placed after the root is not used when thesuffix itself begins with a vowel
• A word may be easier to analyse by beginning with the suffix and working toward the beginning of the word
• Many word structures have multiple meanings, either from Greek, Latin, orFrench languages
2.2.2.2 Areas of dental terminology
Charline M Dolfka (2012:3), in the book “Dental terminology” divides Dental
terminology into areas of interest like the following:
(1)Operative dentistry: general information about the working dentistry
(6)Radiography: digital radiography, biological effects and safety
(7)Cosmetic dentistry: tooth reconstruction, gingival reductions and
augmentation, implant placement and other cosmetic procedures
(8)Prosthodontics: material combination, makeup and uses of the
requirements for practice
Trang 20(9)Endodontics: charting and diagnosis of pulpal conditions as well as newinstruments such as flowmeters, loupes, microscopic surgical instruments andmethods.
(10) Oral and maxillofacial surgery: various surgical procedures formaxillofacial treatment, bone reconstruction, implant placement as well assurgical participation in esthetic dentistry
(11) Orthodontics: direct or indirect banding or brackets, lingual or invisalign braces, anchor devices
(12) Periodontics: periodontic treatment in cosmetic dentistry,
(13) Pediatric dentistry: development and growth concerns of the child patients as well as control and sedation of the child
(14) Dental laboratory procedures: computer-assisted systems in the area
of dental restoration and appliances
(15) Implantology: system of the methods of implanting a total false tooth (including both crown and root) in to the clients’ alveolar bone
Each area has its own and specific content related to its functions and missions in thegeneral dental terminology system, which are presented in the book “Dentalterminology” mentioned in this thesis
2.2.2.3 Types of dental terms
Each field of research has its technical terms and descriptive terms These types ofterms are not the same in both form and usage
The sources of data are taken from the two materials: one is the dictionary “Thuật ngữRăng Hàm Mặt” by the Faculty of Odonto-Stomatology, Ho Chi Minh Pharmaceutical– Medical University, 1993 and the other is the book “Dental Terminology” by Charline
M Dofka, published by Delmar, Cengage Learning, 2012 For the later book, I haveused it to compare and contrast the English meanings of the terms in order tounderstand the nature of them
In the dictionary “Thuật ngữ Răng Hàm Mặt”, I have collected about 450 terms whichare used in my every day job as a translator They are divided into technical terms anddescriptive terms (Newmark, 1995: 153)
About 250 words / phrases of all are the technical terms, which occupies approximately55%, and the rest of words / phrases are the descriptive terms, which occupies 45%
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Trang 21a Technical terms
In the book “Writing That Works, Walter E Oliu, Charles T B & Geraid J A, 1998),technical terms were defined as “words which are meaningful only in a certainspecialised industry Outside this specialised industry, these words cannot beunderstood”
As mentioned above, these 250 technical terms are of academic and professionalstyles, and the rest 200 descriptive terms are of popular style
* Prefix added terms
It is found that, many terms in the dental field are added with prefixes to createdifferent meaning derivative words A prefix alters the word’s meaning by indicatingnumber, color, size, location or condition (Charline M Dofka, 2012, 4-5-6) The prefixadded terms are taken from the book “Dental terminology, 2012” and their meaningsare looked up in the dictionary “Thuật ngữ Răng Hàm Mặt, 1993”
The examples are in the table below:
Prefix added words
Trang 22* Suffix added terms
Charline M Dofka in her book (Dental terminology, 2012, 11) says that “An elementadded to the end of the root word or combining form to describe or quality the wordmeaning is a suffix A suffix cannot stand alone and is usually united with a rootelement by inserting a combining vowel (“o”) unless the suffix begins with a vowel Inthat case, the combining form or vowel is dropped.”
For instance, the surgical removal of gum tissue is the meaning of “gingivectomy” from the root word “gingivo” (gum) and suffix “ectomy” (surgical excision) Dropping the ending vowel in “gingivo” and adding “ectomy” to make
“gingivectomy” unites these two-word elements.
Suffixes used as adjectives are word endings that describe or show a relationship.Suffixes have the ability to transform a noun or verb into an adjective, or verbs intonouns, by the addition of a word ending The specific examples are taken from the twomaterials mentioned above and listed below:
Trang 23osteotrophy : sự phát triển xương
Some of the dental acronyms are used in English and applied directly in Vietnamese.They are formed from the initial letters of words that create a term or a proper name
For instance, MPD (maximum permissible dose): liều tối đa cho phép; MOD (mesioclusion distal): khớp cắn xa giữa / khớp cắn ngoại biên; DMD (Doctor of medical dentistry): bác sĩ nha khoa; MGJ (mucogingival junction): đường nối lợi dính However, those terms are not very popular in daily used context.
* Letter-contained terms
Some dental terms contain letters in their combination, thus, there are no translation
equivalents for them For instance, the term “X-ray tube” contains the letter “X”, it is translated in the way that the equivalent contains the letter “X” (ống tia X-quang) In
15
Trang 24another example, “T-strips”, the English term contains the letter “T”, and the Vietnamese translation also consists of that letter (nút buộc chữ T) The term “X-bite”
is in the same case: we have to translate it “cắn chéo chữ X”
b Descriptive terms
Different from technical terms, when we meet a descriptive term in the dentistry field,
or in other text, we can still understand its meaning Because descriptive terms’meanings are always the same in every context Here I arrange them in the field ofdentistry whereas they can appear in other fields because their meanings are alsorelated to the dentistry field They are considered as “words whose meanings belong to
a specialised industry, but they are still broadly meaningful in other industry”(Newmark, 1995)
As far as I know, descriptive terms are of root word terms, which are usually verbs,nouns or adjectives as in the examples below:
Verbs: intrude (thụt vào), incline (nghiêng), masticate (nhai), grind (mài), irritate (kíchứng), bite (cắn)
Nouns: pulp (tủy), punch (kìm bấm), saliva (nước bọt), sac (túi, nang), broach (cáichâm dùng để thăm dò ống tủy)
Adjectives: oral (thuộc răng miệng), manual (bằng tay), fixed (cố định)
(Thuật ngữ Răng Hàm Mặt, 1993)They are phrases as well, such as: cemental resorption (sự tiêu xê-măng), rest bar(thanh tì / thanh ngáng), incisal rest (tựa bờ răng cửa), retaining wire (dây cố vị),gingival retraction (sự co nướu / lợi), sensitive teeth (răng nhạy cảm), dental laboratorytechnician (kỹ thuật viên phục hình răng)
(Thuật ngữ Răng Hàm Mặt, 1993)
2.3 Summary of the chapter
In this chapter, the theory on translation procedures by Newmark (1995) as well astechnical translation with varieties of technical styles is stated The field of dentalterminology is also presented here with the three sub parts The first is the formation ofthe dental terms in which prefixes, suffixes or roots are usually taken intoconsideration The chapter also mentions the dental areas of interests (Charline M.Dofka, 2012) which are: Operative dentistry, practice facilities setups, emergency care,examination and prevention, pain management, radiography, cosmetic dentistry,prosthodontics, endodontics, orthodontics, periodontics, periatric dentistry, dentallaboratory procedures and implantology
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Trang 25The last but not least is the types of dental terms which are divided into technical termsand descriptive terms, based on the theory of Newmark (1995).
The next chapter appears to deal with the research methodology of the thesis
Trang 26CHAPTER 3: RESEARCH METHODOLOGY
The purpose of this chapter is to introduce the methodology for the research based onNewmark’s (1995) framework of translation procedures, which will be brought toapply for translation process of Dental terms from English to Vietnamese Thisapproach is allowed for an in-depth understanding of the daily communicationbetween doctors and patients or clients in Hoan Kiem dental clinic, Hai Phong city
A mixed method, which is the mixture of quantitative and qualitative methods, isselected to fulfil the study The research plan includes the methodology, studyparticipants, procedures, analysis method, which are also the primary components ofthis chapter
3.1 Research questions
This study sought to build a theory in answer to the following research questions:Research question 1: What are the translation procedures used in the communicationbetween dentists and patients / clients?
Research question 2: What translation procedures are effective?
3.2 Methodology
A mixed method study is appropriate when the goal of the research is not only collectingthe data from reliable sources of materials and classifying them but also explaining thetheory and analysing the theoretical aspects applied According to Creswell, J W, andPlano Clark, V L (2011), “a mixed method focuses on collecting, analyzing and mixingboth quantitative and qualitative data in a single study or series of studies Its centralpremise is that the use of quantitative and qualitative approaches, in combination,provides a better understanding of research problems than either approach alone”
When to use mixed methods study, Creswell, J (2008) presented that “When bothquantitative and qualitative data together provide a better understanding of the researchproblem than either type by itself” and “When one type of research (qualitative orquantitative) is not enough to address the research problem or answer the researchquestions”
In the research field, after the data are collected and classified, they are described andanalyzed basing on the translation procedures theory of Newmark (1995), thengeneralized into the useful translation procedures As appeared in chapter two of thethesis, twelve translation procedures are examined to find out the useful procedures totranslate dental terms from English to Vietnamese
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Trang 273.3 The researcher
I am myself the researcher as well as the translator / interpreter in the communicativecases between dentists (dental doctors) and patients or clients in Hoan Kiem dentalclinic, Hai Phong city
Before carrying out this thesis, most of the translation methods I have used are ofliteral translation However, for the technical terms, the listeners have found it difficult
to get the message I had sometimes to use the “google translation” to gain the effect ofthe communication
This thesis has helped to provide more procedures in translation that I can apply in theprocess of doing my real job as a translator
3.5 Mixed method procedures
3.5.1 Quantitative data
a Sources of quantitative data
There are two main sources of data in the thesis: one has been verified and publishedand the other is subjective and has not been verified
The verified source is from the dictionary “Thuật ngữ Răng Hàm Mặt” (1993) and thebook “Dental Terminology” (2012)
The other source is from the direct dialogues between the doctor and patients or clients
in Hoan Kiem dental clinic, which are recorded into a memo book, and the indiectconsulting conversations via social media (zalo, messenger, viber) between thefanpage Nha Khoa Hoan Kiem Hai Phong and the clients
Moreover, proceeding from the reality of being a translator or a medium consultantbetween the doctor and patients or clients and using mostly one translation procedure:Literal translation, I decided to carry out this thesis to study the overall translationprocedures with the references of the dictionary “Thuật ngữ Răng Hàm Mặt” (1993)
Trang 28b Data collection process
From all the quantitative data sources, I have collected 450 words / phrases altogether,which are the most commonly used in my every day job Among them, there are 250technical terms, which occupies 55%, and there are 200 descriptive terms, whichoccupies 45 % of all
For the 250 technical terms, there are 50 terms from direct dialogues (20%), 50 termsfrom indirect conversations (20%), 100 terms from the book “Dental terminology”, 2012(40%) and 50 terms from the dictionary “Thuật ngữ Răng Hàm Mặt” (1993) (20%)
For the other 200 desctiptive terms, there are 100 terms from the dictionary “Thuậtngữ Răng Hàm Mặt”, 1993 (50%), 50 terms from direct dialogues (25%) and 50 termsfrom indiect conversations (25%) No descriptive terms have been found in the book
“Dental terminology” (2012) (0%)
3.5.2 Qualitative data
These qualitative data mentioned here refer to a questionnaire used to survey thesatisfaction of the foreign patients / clients about the translator at the end of the wholedental treatment The questionnaire results have shown four levels: Satisfied –Dissatisfied – Indifferent – Other ideas
3.5.3 Study instruments
In this significantly integrating and developing society, the study instruments or toolsare abundant They vary not only of direct communicating methods, but also via socialmedia, specifically via zalo, messenger, facebook comments or viber
One more useful instrument / tool is the researcher’s memo book, in which I havetaken all the necessary notes from the advantages and disadvantages of my job
Phone, mails, forums or other online means are not used in this thesis
3.6 Data analysis
3.6.1 Quantitative data analysis
The first stage of quantitative data analysis and interpretation is data preparation, whereraw data is converted into something meaningful and readable In this thesis, because thesources of data are pretty wide and contain so many unpopular words / phrases, theresearcher has to narrow them into a list of 450 words / phrases that are commonly used in
my communication between doctors and patients / clients The data then are classified intotwo groups: technical terms and descriptive terms After that, I devide the technical termsinto four sub-typed, based on the formation of the words/phrases, those are prefix-
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Trang 29added terms, suffix-added terms, eponyms, abbreviation or acronyms and consisted terms.
letter-After completing the first stage, the data are ready for analysis, a descriptive statisticalmethod and the inferential statistical method are used Based on the theory framework
of Newmark (1995) about translation procedures, I apply those translation proceduresinto translating each type of terms, mainly the technical terms Of all the twelvetranslation procedures by Newmark (1995) mentioned in chapter 2, there are nineprocedures which are applied in translating technical terms, whereas only twoprocedures are applied in translating descriptive terms Similarities, differences, aswell as advantages and disadvantages are brought to consider in this thesis
3.6.2 Qualitative data analysis
Qualitative data analysis is the process of moving from the qualitative data collectedinto some form of explanation or interpretation of the subject under investigation.Here in this thesis, the questionnaire results are collected and organized with thepurpose of showing the satisfaction of the patients / clients about the translating jobeffect in Hoan Kiem dental clinic, Hai Phong city
3.7 Summary of the chapter
The goal of this chapter is to outline the research methods used to answer the researchquestions A mixed method study is relevant in this study in which a discussion of theprocedure, study participants, data collection and the procedures of analysis outlinesthe specifics of how the study has been conducted A translation theory on translationprocedures by Peter Newmark (1995) has been used to help analyse the quantitativeand qualitative data All of those procedures have contributed to this study to produceusedul translation procedures of dental terms from English to Vietnamese so that theinterpreters, doctors, and patients or clients can make use of it The purpose of the nextchapter is to provide results and demonstrate that the methodology described inchapter 3 was followed
Trang 30CHAPTER 4: FINDINGS AND DISCUSSIONS
The findings of the mixed method research are the combined results of the twomethodologies: quantitative and qualitative studies Stemming from the classificationinto the two types of dental terms: technical terms and descriptive terms of thequantitative data, as well as the analysis of the qualitative data results, the researcheruses the theory framework about translation procedures by Newmark (1995) to findout the commonly used ones for each type of dental terms
I have collected about 20 questionnaire results of the foreign patients / clients, in which,
12 results show the satisfaction (60%), 3 results express the dissatisfaction (15%), 2results present the indifference (10%), and 3 last results give other ideas (15%)
The findings of the thesis show that: six useful translation procedures are drawn out, inwhich the procedures of paraphrasing and synonymizing are more used for technicalterms, whereas the procedures of literal translation or cultural and functionalequivalence are prefered for descriptive terms
From the results of the research, the two research questions are adequately answered.Some implications and applications are extracted despite some limitations of the studythat are all mentioned in chapter five of the thesis After this study, some furtherprojects are suggested to develop the research upto a higher level
Admittedly, translating dental terms is not as simply as translating a daily life article or
a normal communicative segment The most difficult matter is to deal with technicalterms, which include many types of technical prefixes, suffixes and different roots asclassified in chapter two So as in chapter two, twelve translation procedures based onNewmark (1995)’s theory were discussed However, the frequency of using thoseprocedures varies due to the reality of communication between the doctors and foreignpatients in the place of research – Hoan Kiem Dental clinic, Hai Phong city
In this chapter, I divided the investigation into two main parts: Translation proceduresfor dental technical terms and translation procedures for dental descriptive terms andhow I have applied the procedures of Newmark (1995) to translate them
4.1 Translation procedures for dental technical terms
Figure 1 below shows the proportions of technical terms compared two descriptiveterms in the total of 450 words / phrases to study
Figure 2 shows the proportions of applying the translation procedures
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Trang 31Dental terms
Technical terms
Figure 1: The number of dental technical terms compared to dental descriptive terms
Translation procedures for technical terms
120 100 80 60 40 20 0
Figure 2: Proportions of applying the translation procedures.
4.1.1 Literal translation
Newmark (1995) presented that “literal translation is the basic translation procedure, both
in communicative and semantic translation, in which translation starts from there”
Literal translation has also been the first procedure that I applied in translating dentalterms in both technical terms and descriptive terms However, I used it less for technicalterms than for descriptive terms, which I would state in part 4.2 of this chapter
I just applied literal translation for short and few meanings terms They are almostnouns, verbs and adjectives, which are listed below:
Trang 324.1.2 Transference or naturalization procedures
The first translation procedure to study in this part is the transference or naturalization
I have found there is almost no gap between the two procedures because the terms inthe SL are either transferred the whole words and the transciption of the words in thecase of transference procedure, or to naturalize the pronunciation and morphology ofthe words to the TL
Newmark (1995: 81) stated that “loan word is an SL word which is directly taken intothe TL text with no translation” The procedure is becoming more and more popular inthe translation of terms which are not lexicalized in the TL Because of the culturalnon-equivalence, it is very hard and challenging to create a new name of the newconcept Therefore, many loan words are transferred to the TL with their pronunciationtranscripts
a Translating loan words as the chemicals or materials
Actually, a number of names of chemicals and materials are very popular and accepted
to use as an international language They are derived from Latin or Greek andnormally fixed in any text, both in Vietnamese and English
Below is the table of loan words and their Vietnamese equivalents taken from thedictionary “Thuật ngữ Răng Hàm Mặt” (1993)
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Trang 33b Translating eponyms
Eponyms in dental terms are not as many as other types of technical term However, inorder to translate this type of terms, the translator need to have the backgroundknowledge of dentistry field to add more descriptions to the terms so as that they canmake sense to the listeners
The table below contains the English eponyms taken from the dictionary “Thuật ngữRăng Hàm Mặt” (1993) and their Vietnamese meanings However, in fact, I had to addmore information to the terms to explain them to the patients / clients in the clinic
Trang 34Ivy loop wiring : buộc vòng Ivy / nút buộc Ivy
Rubber dam clamp : cặp đê cao su (để điều trị tủy)
Frankfort mandibular incisor angle : góc răng dưới mặt phẳng Frankfort
c Translating abbreviations or acronyms
Translating abbreviations or acronyms is similar to translating eponyms because it alsoneeds the explanation after their main meanings used
In this illustrative table below, the acronyms are taken from the book “Dentalterminology” (2012) and their meanings are in the dictionary “Thuật ngữ Răng HàmMặt” (1993)
English terms
BID (bis in die)
BUN (blood urea nitrogen)
TMJ (temporomandibular junction)
MGJ (muco-gingival junction)
Some more examples are mentioned, such as, MPD (maximum permissible dose): liều tối đa cho phép; MOD (mesioclusion distal): khớp cắn xa giữa / khớp cắn ngoại biên; DMD (Doctor of medical dentistry): bác sĩ nha khoa; MGJ (mucogingival junction): đường nối lợi dính Source: “Thuật ngữ Răng Hàm Mặt” (1993)
However, those terms are not very popular in daily used context
d Translating letter-contained terms
In the total of studied terms, there are some terms that contain one or more letters in itsformation I arrange them in this part However, when translating them, there are noequivalents for those letters, I had to keep the original letters in the TL equivalents
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Trang 35For instance: the term “X-ray tube” contains the letter “X”, it is translated in the way that the equivalent contains the letter “X” (ống tia X-quang) In another example, “T- strips”, the English term contains the letter “T”, and the Vietnamese translation also consists of that letter (nút buộc chữ T) The term “X-bite” is in the same case: we have
to translate it “cắn chéo chữ X” Source: “Thuật ngữ Răng Hàm Mặt” (1993)
4.1.3 Translation by cultural equivalence procedure
Most of the terminology fields are influenced by the cultural elements, and the dentalterminology is not the exception In TL’s area (Vietnam), the country is divided intothree regions: The North, the Middle and the South Along with the regionalcharacteristics are the differences in the language uses Although there are not manywords of the cultural aspect, the thesis takes some examples to illustrate the procedurementioned
For instance: The term “gum / gingiva” in the SL is translated into two SL words of the two regions in Vietnam as “lợi (the North’s use)” and “nướu (the South’s use)”.
The term “crown” is of the same case The TL meaning used in the North is “chụprăng” whereas in the South is “mão răng” Source: “Thuật ngữ Răng Hàm Mặt” (1993)
4.1.4 Translation by descriptive equivalence procedure
Due to the special features, some of the dental terms are translated by explaining to bemore easily understood In my job, I had to add more information to explain the cases tothe listeners For instance: When the doctor appointed to make a false tooth to the client,
he used the word “tooth crown” However, when I conveyed the doctor’s direction, I had
to explain the word “tooth crown” as “a false tooth that is made of porlain in the shape of
a crown to put on the real tooth which has been ground smaller”.
In the illustrative table below is a list of some English terms that I explained to thelisteners when I did my translation job, with the references from Dr Tuan Vu Afterthat I translated the references into English to foreign patients / clients
English terms
Cartridge
Interocclusal
Crown
Trang 384.1.5 Translation by synonymy
In some cases, the listener did not understand the first TL term I translated, then I had
to use another term, usually its synonym to make it clear Therefore, the preferedprocedure for these cases is the synonymy
For instance: When the doctor or technician gave the instruction to the client of “vệsinh răng miệng bằng lấy cao răng”, then I had to translate into English as “do thehygiene by taking out the tartar” However, sometimes, the foreign client did notunderstand the term “tartar” At that time, I had to use its synonyms as “calculus” tohelp him understand it
Below is the data of some English terms and their synonyms taken from the book
“Dental terminology” (2012) with the references of Vietnamese meanings from thedictionary “Thuật ngữ Răng Hàm Mặt” (1993) to illustrate this procedure
4.1.6 Translation by paraphrasing technical terms into commonly-used words
Apparently, this study has shown that the procedure of paraphrasing has been used themost and the most effectively in the process of being a translator In the total of studiedwords/phrases, the large number are technical terms and of “the academic andprofessional styles” (Newmark, 1995) Therefore, when I used exactly those terms incommunicating, most of the patients or clients did not get the messages However,when I paraphrased them into the more popular or descriptive ones, they got the ideas
In this thesis, due to studying the dictionary “Thuật ngữ Răng Hàm Mặt” (1993) andthe book “Dental terminology” (2012), I have drawn out lists of root words, prefixes orsuffixes that are paraphrased as follows:
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