Evaluating english translation of the short story the general retires by nguyen huy thiep based on j houses model

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI
UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES
FACULTY OF POST-GRADUATE STUDIES
*****************

NGUYỄN THỊ NGỌC HÒA

EVALUATING ENGLISH TRANSLATION
OF THE SHORT STORY "THE GENERAL RETIRES" BY
NGUYEN HUY THIEP BASED ON J.HOUSE'S MODEL

(ĐÁNH GIÁ BẢN DỊCH VIỆT - ANH CỦA TRUYỆN NGẮN
'TƯỚNG VỀ HƯU" CỦA NGUYỄN HUY THIỆP DỰA TRÊN MƠ HÌNH
CỦA J.HOUSE)

MA. MINOR THESIS

Field:

English Linguistics

Code:

60220201

HANOI - 2014


VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI
UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES
FACULTY OF POST-GRADUATE STUDIES

******************

NGUYỄN THỊ NGỌC HÒA

EVALUATING ENGLISH TRANSLATION
OF THE SHORT STORY "THE GENERAL RETIRES" BY
NGUYEN HUY THIEP BASED ON J.HOUSE'S MODEL
(ĐÁNH GIÁ BẢN DỊCH VIỆT - ANH CỦA TRUYỆN NGẮN
'TƯỚNG VỀ HƯU" CỦA NGUYỄN HUY THIỆP DỰA TRÊN MƠ HÌNH
CỦA J.HOUSE)

MA. MINOR THESIS

Field:

English Linguistics

Code:

60220201

Supervisor:

Assoc. Prof. Dr. Lê Hùng Tiến

HANOI - 2014


DECLARATION

I hereby declare that this thesis, which is entitled Evaluating English
translation of the short story "The General Retires" by Nguyen Huy Thiep based
on J.House's model, has not been submitted as an exercise for a degree at this or
any other university. This work is the result of my own original research and, to the
best of my knowledge and belief, contains no material previously published or
written by another person, except where due reference has been made in the text.

Signature

NGUYỄN THỊ NGỌC HÒA

i


ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

Translation has always been my favorite subject, and I became truly interested
in the issue of translation quality assessment since I registered and attended the
course of Assoc.Prof.Dr Le Hung Tien on subject Translation Study. From that
time, I always bear in my mind the idea of doing my thesis on a topic in such field.
My very first and deepest thank goes to my Supervisor, Associate Professor Le
Hung Tien for his encouragement, patience and profound knowledge. Without his
whole-hearted guidance, insightful comments and suggestions, this thesis would not
have been possible.
I also would like to express my sincere thank for my beloved teachers in the
course, Professor Hoang Van Van and Doctor Huynh Anh Tuan for their lectures
that inspire me to the relevant knowledge of this thesis. My special thank to Ms Ngo
Thanh Thuy, who did not mind pouring rain or scorching sun to guide us
throughout the course.
I highly appreciate advices and comments given by my classmates, Mr Trang

and Ms Quynh, who are always willing to give me great help while I gather
materials and conduct details of this thesis.
I am in debt to my family who does a great spiritual support by their simple but
careful actions. Despite of the fact that their supports are obviously indirect, they
always possess the distinguish motivation source for the formation of my thesis.

ii


ABSTRACT

That translation literature has been put in the race for quantities and time
triggers the need for an effective tool for assessing quality of translation. This paper
applies translation quality assessment model developed by House (1977) for
evaluation of an English translation of a famous Vietnamese short story. The study
firstly emphasizes features and critical problems that translation literature has been
facing. Secondly, the original and the translation are both analyzed in accordance
with House's model before they are put in comparison with each other for
mismatches to be found. Finally, these mismatches are employed to generalize
quality of selected translation and to suggest some recommendations for quality
improvement of the selected translation.

iii


LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS

SL: Source Language
TL: Target Language
ST: Source Language Text

TT: Target Language Text

iv


LIST OF FIGURES AND CHARTS

Figure 1.:A model for translation quality assessment by House (1977) .......... Page 14
Figure 2.:A Scheme for Analyzing and Comparing Original and Translation
Text in by House (1997) ................................................................................. Page 17
Figure 3:Some instances of semantic translation of dominated verb bảo in
TT ..................................................................................................................... Page 21
Chart 1:Statistical frequency of engaging in conversation of each
interlocutor ....................................................................................................... Page 27

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TABLE OF CONTENTS
DECLARATION ........................................................................................................ i
ACKNOWLEDGEMENT ........................................................................................ii
ABSTRACT ............................................................................................................. iii
LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS.................................................................................. iv
LIST OF FIGURES AND CHARTS ....................................................................... v
PART A. INTRODUCTION .................................................................................... 1
1.Rationale ................................................................................................................. 1
2.Significance of the study ........................................................................................ 2
3.Scope and objectives of the study ......................................................................... 2
4.Research method .................................................................................................... 3
5.Structure of the study ............................................................................................ 4

PART B. DEVELOPMENT ..................................................................................... 5
Chapter 1. LITERATURE REVIEW ..................................................................... 5
1.1 Literary translation ............................................................................................. 5
1.1.1 Typical features of literary translation .......................................................... 5
1.1.2 Problems of literary translation ...................................................................... 6
1.2 Translation quality assessment ........................................................................ 10
1.2.1 Researches in translation quality assessmen ............................................... 10
1.2.2Julian House and A Model for Translation quality assessment ................. 12
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Chapter

2.

AN

APPLICATION

OF

HOUSE’S

MODEL

INTO

TRANSLATION QUALITY ASSESSMENT ...................................................... 18
1.1Source Language Text analysis ......................................................................... 18
1.1.1 Source Language Text background.............................................................. 18

1.1.2 Analysis of Source Language Text in accordance
with House’s mode .................................................................................................. 18
1.1.3 Statement of function ..................................................................................... 31
1.2 Source Language Text and Target Language Text comparision and
statement of quality ................................................................................................. 33
1.2.1Source Language Text and Target Language Text comparision
for mismatches ......................................................................................................... 33
1.2.2 Statement of quality ....................................................................................... 38
PART C. CONCLUSION ....................................................................................... 39
1.Recapitulation ....................................................................................................... 39
2.Concluding remarks............................................................................................. 40
3.Recommendations for quality improvement of the translation ....................... 40
REFERENCES ........................................................................................................ 43
Appendix A. Source Language Text: Vietnamese original ................................... I
Appendix B. Target Language Text: English translation .............................XXIV
Appendix C. A list of colloquial and cultural featured lexical items
and English equivalences (Sorted A – Z............................................................. LIX
vii


PART A. INTRODUCTION
1. Rationale:
For a long time, literary translation has been discussed by people all around
the world. During current globalization, the growing trend against the
dominance of a few languages emphasizes the role of this translation variant.
Vietnam literature is developing towards diversification, in which there is active
presence of literary translation, which plays an important role in "importing" and
"exporting" literature and culture. Literary translation has been immigrating to
the center of national literature and it cannot be denied that, with such
movement, readers have been being given the change to enjoy quintessence and

value of world literature. At the same time, literary translation is the one which
contributes much to the richness of knowledge in world culture. Famous
translators such as Trinh Lu, Tran Dinh Hien, Le Bau, Nguyen Bich Lan, Thuy
Toan, Huu Viet are typical for their seriousness in translation of literary and
were awarded by Vietnam Association of Literature.
However, not every translated work has been welcome with compliments or
assessed specifically and appropriately. There are cases, of which translations
were done carelessly and hastily, resulted in contradictory reactions since wise
readers and critics recognize mismatches between translation and original.
Meanwhile, it seems that in Vietnam, proper and serious attention paid to
research and assessment in literary translation is somewhat limited. The quality
of translation thus has always been a critical issue because of the appearance of
incidents where the translations were navigated too much from the original. We
have seen blooming of translated books with many translation supporting tools
(software, dictionary, search engine, etc.), but the question of quality remains
controversial, especially translations in specific fields. As the result, there is a
need for an effective and trustful tool, which can be used to evaluate the quality
of such translations from a more scientific view.
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This study is carried out with two grounds in mind. Firstly, it is a modest
effort to contribute to translation assessment field in Vietnam by giving an
evaluation on a work in literature. Secondly, it pays a revisit to Tướng về hưu,
one famous story which impressed readers since it first appreared and in years
later. This story was written by Nguyễn Huy Thiệp in 1986 and then was
translated into English titled "The General Retire" by Greg Lockhart and was
published in 1993 by Oxford University Press.
2. Significance of the study
Until now, researches and works in evaluation of translation (English Vietnamese, Vietnamese -English) are not remarkable. In Vietnam National

University, at MA degree, within 5 years, there have been about 50 researches
conducted in translation, provisionally distributed in 5 main topics such as
translation method (of texts and specialized terms), equivalence, translation and
its application in teaching, translation assessment and others in which theses on
translation quality assessment only make up approximately 10% (figures
updated until end of 2011). These theses, although present researchers' efforts in
evaluating of texts of different genres and fields from a scientific view, seem
insufficient for those who want to get more general view of current status on
translation assessment in Vietnam.
In this paper, the quality of English translation of the story is about to be
evaluated basing on model developed by Julian House in 1977. It is expected
that what are found will be useful for further refinement of the translation. On
the other hand, this study is assumed to, with its particularity, contributes to
researches in the field and triggers similar studies in Vietnam.
3. Scope and objectives of the study
3.1 Scope of the study

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Base on House's translation quality assessment model, this study addresses the
quality assessment of the entire English translation of a Vietnamese short story
named Tướng về hưu. The translation lasts for 21 pages (pp. 115 – 136) and was
entitled "The General Retires". The translation assessment is thus limited in literary
text where difficulties in translation of such texts are described attentively. Putting
into practice House's translation assessment model, this study applies some issues
addressed in discourse, pragmatics, grammar, speech act theory and systemic
functional grammar.
3.2 Research questions:
This study is conducted with the aim of shedding a light on following

questions:
1. How good is the translation in accordance with House's model?
2. What can be done to improve the quality of the translation?
4. Research method
Supposing that translation in literature encounters numerous problems, a text in
the field was selected for assessment. The next step is to choose an assessment
scheme which should make it possible for a relatively comprehensive and linguistic
based analysis. Therefore, the assessment model that Julian House developed in
1977 acts as the crucial analytical frame and the pragmatic and disourse based
appoach was utized.
With House's model used as a system of reference, analysis includes the
description of ST and TT and a comparison between them. Descriptive and
comparative methods were thus employed respectively in order to work out answer
for 2 above research questions. Descriptive method is useful for gathering set of
data constituted by features found in each dimension during description of each text,
while comparative method was taken its full advantage for comparing dimension by
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dimension the features picked up in order to find out the mismatches as a precondition to evaluate the quality of selected translation.
Observation method was used to the search of non-dimensional mismatches
which are visible and could be observed directly during line-by-line comparison of
two texts. During analysis, quantitative evidence was also collected to support for
given points.
To make it convienient for description and comparision of ST and TT, each text
was marked using conventions of numbering. Each paragraph was numbered by
Roman numeral while each sentence was numbered by Arabic numerals. These
texts can be found in Appendix A and B of this paper.
For statement of function of ST and quality of TT, generalization technique was
utilized. It should be noted that only description of ST was presented to fit well for

length of this thesis. The presented analysis is thus limited in description of ST,
statement of function, covert and overt mismatches and statement of quality.
5. Structure of the study
This paper comprises following major parts:
PART A. INTRODUCTION
PART B. DEVELOPMENT
Chapter 1: LITERATURE REVIEW
Chapter

2:

AN

APPLICATION

TRANSLATION

OF

HOUSE'S

QUALITY ASSESSMENT

PART C. CONCLUSION

4

MODEL

INTO

PART B. DEVELOPMENT
Chapter 1. LITERATURE REVIEW
1.1 Literary translation
1.1.1 Typical features of literary translation
We take it for granted that doing translation in literature field is nothing easy. To
perceive a literature text is the task of reader, to understand and convey the text into
another language is the task of a translator. The task for the translator is thus always
doubled both in term of quantity and difficulty. For literary texts, translation is an
art while for non literary texts; translation is a science (Newmark, 2004: 10).
As a special type of translation, literary translation shares common features with
others while persists inside itself the distinguished ones. Those distinguished
features make up the differences and originally bring hard tasks to those who want
to translate any variant of literary texts. With an effort to define literary translation,
Schulte (2010), the president of American Literature Translator Association
(ALTA), characterizes it as follow:
Literary translation bridges the delicate emotional connections between cultures
and languages and furthers the understanding of human beings across national
borders. In the act of literary translation the soul of another culture becomes
transparent, and the translator recreates the refined sensibilities of foreign
countries and their people through the linguistic, musical, rhythmic, and visual
possibilities of the new language
In this definition, which seems to be experience-based and function focusing,
exists two outstanding notions: one is culture, and the other is language. These two
notions are interlinked in a special relationship in which translation language is
recognized as a mean of cultural reflection. This definition is similar to what is
meant by Lander (2011:7) when he called literary translation "courier of culture".

5

Another feature of literary translation is the TL text's limited degree of sameness
to the SL text. This fact is summarized by Newmark (2004) when he distinguished
literary and non-literary texts. His point is that after using many types of
"compensatory procedures", only "near perfection" can be expected to happen to the
case of non-literary translation. One reason for this fact is, he explained, the
searching for connotative and denotative meaning, of which only a limited amount a
translation can capture. Another reason, he further emphasized, originated from
basic features of two languages, which he called the "tools" for translation. Each
language is "unevenly and variably equipped with words, have different sounds and
grammar and different word-orders, and different lexical gaps and deficiencies".
Hence, the translator must follow an anticipated path, which is somehow relative to
what Bester said “Translation, like politics, is an art of the possible; compromise is
inevitable and universal” (John Bester, as cited in Landers, 2011: 10).
Since the literary texts function is to deliver "the world of the mind and the
imagination" (Newmark, 2004), the aesthetic and allegorical aspects of the text are
expected. The readers of SL texts are basically more "lucky" to those of TL texts
because they possess the chance to directly perceive the text. The readers of TL
texts, who sometimes are "unaware of the foreign origins of some literary text"
(Lambert, 1998:130), are more passive and even totally dependent on translators.
Aesthetic and allegorical, which Newmark (2004: 12) called the truth, are
respectively defined as "the beauty of its form and of its sound" and as "the fusion
of imagination and ethics" in literary translation. The task of translators now is that
they should convey these two truths in such manner that is perceivable to the
intended readers while trying to keep specific values of the ST so-called the
aesthetic and expressive values.
1.1.2 Problems of literary translation
Due to its distinctive features, literary translation brings to translators bunch of
hard tasks. Lander (2011:7) considered it as "the most demanding type of

6


translation" and really it is. He (2011:8) continued to summarize the case "a
translator must command: tone, style, flexibility, inventiveness, knowledge of the
SL culture, the ability to glean meaning from ambiguity, an ear for sonority, and
humility. Why humility? Because even our best efforts will never succeed in
capturing in all its grandeur the richness of the original” Perhaps someday we see
on a G7 coffee box (a famous coffee brand in Vietnam) famous words of Sebastian
Without my morning coffee I'm just like a dried up piece of roast goat. The question
is how we should translate the simile of roast goat, and whether we accept the
translation that was used Khơng có cà phê buổi sáng cuộc sống của tôi trở nên khô
khan và vô vị. Apparently there's no image of "goat" here and for the intended users
(Vietnamese customers), given translation seems to be an adaptation. The case of
literary translation is even more complex with a number of issues taken into
consideration.
Basically, translators should own certain knowledge in order to make his/her
translations work since this translation variant more or less reflects ST cultures. On
the other hand, most of the time, they are likely to struggle with uniqueness of style
that comprise the distinctiveness of the SL texts in order to generate TL texts that
deliver as much effect as SL texts do as possible.
Not every translator has the chance of living in two cultures in such time that is
sufficient for her/him to transfer comprehensively the culture of this language into
another language. According to Bush (1998:27), translator of literature is "bilingual
and bicultural and thus inhabits a landscape which is not mapped by conventional
geographies; s/he is at home in the flux that is the reality of contemporary culture,
where migration is constant across artificial political boundaries" and that "involved
at a keen point of cultural convergence". His hidden comparison reveals much about
nature of literary translation in its relation with cultures. Firstly, translator must try
to survive in an abnormal land which is resulted in the intersection between 2

cultures, one of SL texts and the other of TL texts. Secondly, (s)he must be of sound
7


mind to realize the contemporary mixed culture (s)he is living in. Basically, it is
likely that most of the SL texts, or the materials and TL texts, or the products are
processed in each own culture, but the processors must always place themselves in
the margins in order to balance and close the gap. In this process, a special resource
must be used, which Lefevere (1998) called "cultural capital" and is defined as
"what makes you acceptable in your society at the end of the socialization process
known as education" (1998:42). In his opinion, owning a cultural capital means that
whoever you are, you should be able to take part in conversation on certain topics of
your culture and this kind of special capital is, in contrast to economical capital,
what "intellectual can still claim to have"(1998:42). He (1998:44) continued to
explain three factors that directly drive the distribution and regulation of cultural
capital, which are (1) audience's need, (2) translator initiator and (3) relative
prestige of source/target languages and their cultures. By audience's need, he
referred to the main reason for translator's translating strategies. By translator's
initiator, he meant the motivation for translation, such as giving the work to the
public or being suggested by the other. The last factor indicates expectation of
possible readers, some care about the content, some care about how the translator
process the SL texts (this is the case of translation assessment). Hence, the
translators must own not only cultural capital of 2 languages at the same time but
also wise strategies to spend these capitals in order to avoid losses. Here raise the
issue of a subcategory called equivalence at different levels in literary texts. This is
not as simple as procedure of replacing this word by the other word, not to mention
the case of no equivalence. Be focused in this study is level of words and phrases
which, perhaps ranging from colloquial words to idioms, are "culture bound" (Susan
Bassnett, 2002: 32). This problem is critical because it seem to assessors of
translated texts that any careless translation of cultural words can be easily

recognized and to (bilingual) targeted readers that their intrinsic backgrounds will
prevent them from reception of new norms and definitions. The frequent technique

8


tent to be made use of by translators shall then be paraphrasing, which subsequently
resulted in anticipated mismatches between ST and TT.
Another issue, the text's style, one of the most important think that a translator
has to capture and recreate it in his/her product,was illustratedby Lander (2011:7),
who gave an interesting comparison between technical and literary translation. He
said:
In technical translation the order of the cars is inconsequential if all the cargo
arrives intact. In literary translation, however, the order of the cars - which is to
say the style - can make the difference between a lively, highly readable translation
and a stilted, rigid, and artificial rendering that strips the original of its artistic and
aesthetic essence, even its very soul
Lander emphasized the controversial role of style over the quality of translation
process product. This is similar to what Reiss (1976) stated when she emphasized
that translator should mirror the form of the original in TL text if the primary
function of the SL text is to convey "artistically shaped creative content". Literary
translation is different from the other forms of translation requiring certain levels of
accuracy (technical, financial, scientific…) is that it can be creative. Here raise the
question of whether translator should be stylistically faithful to the original or be
flexible. As being said before, the idea of completed sameness or perfection will
never be reached, but if a translator wants to create the same effects as the author
did with his/her work, faithfulness seems to be a better choice, although this is
really a big challenge.
Taking into account now the problem of the structure of the work that is meant
for translation. Bassnett (2002:122), who emphasized much on the relation between

the text and its components, said "Every prime text is made up of a series of
interlocking systems, each of which has a determinable function in relation to the
whole, and it is the task of the translator to apprehend these functions". The crucial
9


point that Bassnett made in her concerns of problems in literature translation is the
relationship between the content and the form. In other words, the problems are
translator's failure of relating the overall structure of the text and his/her isolate care
of content leading to the anticipated failure of appropriate interpretation of the text.
In her words "the translator stresses content at the expense of the total structure"
(Bassnett, 2002:114). As for the prose translation, a fact was mentioned that ones
who are translators or carry out the work of translators tend to ignore the overall
structure and will start immediately the translation of lines (s)he may encounter.
The result, therefore, can be mismatches between the form of SL texts and that of
TL texts; for example, loss of effects created by stylistic devices used in the SL
texts. Bassnett (2002: 115) stated the situation of translator of novels which,
however, might happen with most of translation variants:
Again and again, translators of novels take pains to create readable target
language texts, avoiding the stilted effect that can follow from adhering too closely
to source language syntactical structures, but fail to consider the way in which
individual sentences form part of the total structure
Once entering into the translation of a novel, a prose, a poem, a drama or such
types, translators must bear in mind the higher risk of being criticized by the
intended and possible readers. Translators placed themselves into a little-profit-butmuch-challenged battle, and the of-all-time biggest question remains that how to
minimize the possible distortion from the SL text after it is molded by one or more
than one translator in different times. But, prior to that, a trusthful tool for
translation quality assessement should be determined.
1.2 Translation quality assessment
1.2.1 Researches in translation quality assessment.

Much attention has been paid to translation quality by researchers in the field
with attempts to work out proper criteria and similar in order to determine how a
10


translation should be evaluated as satisfactory. These criteria range from basic to
advanced level as well as corresponding requirements of assessor's competence.
In his paper, Benjamin (1923, as cited in Munday, 2008: 169) made a rather
abstract statement on the characteristics of a "real translation", which is
"transparent" and "does not cover the original, does not block its light, but allows
the pure language, as though reinforced by its own medium, to shine upon the
original all the more fully." 55 years later, Newmark (1988:192) made it brief as he
described "a good translation fulfils its intention".
Reiss (1976) concluded that in the process of translation assessment, the
assessor must do 3 tasks, which are (1) determining SL text's kind of texts (text type
and text variety), (2) finding the translator's conception of the translation (expressed
in translator's translating manner or preface statement) and (3) defining the aim of
the translated text. In Reiss's opinion, by doing so, one can avoid the risk of taking
absolute and biased criterion for translation assessment from one amongten
translation principles listed by Savory (1957, as cited in Reiss, 1976:112). These
principles, according to Reiss (1976:112), are "directly contradictory" and
"mutually complementary" but created "an impressive picture" to describe "what a
correct translation should be like". The list is as follows:
1. A translation must give the words of the original.
2. A translation must give the ideas of the original.
3. A translation should read like an original work.
4. A translation should read like a translation.
5. A translation should reflect the style of the original.
6. A translation should possess the style of the translation.
7. A translation should read as a contemporary of the original.

8. A translation should read as a contemporary of the translation.
9. A translation may add to or omit from the original.
10. A translation may never add to or omit from the original.
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Until now, some great names in the field such as Newmark, House, Koller,
Reiss, Wilss and others have shownconcerns in translation quality and spent much
effort on creating a framework for translation assessment. Two outstanding and
comprehensive models are that of Newmark (1988) and House (1977, revised in
1997), which will be further discussed in the next lines.
Newmark (1988:186) used the term "translation criticism", of which a
comprehensive one, in his opinion, must cover 5 topics:
[1] a brief analysis of the SL text stressing its intention and its functional
aspects;
[2] the translator's interpretation of the SL text's purpose, his translation method
and the translation's likely readership;
[3] a selective but representative detailed comparison of the translation with the
original;
[4] an evaluation of the translation - (a) in the translator's terms, (b) in the critic's
terms;
[5] where appropriate, an assessment of the likely place of the translation in the
target language culture or discipline
His model has been evaluated as having practical basis and clear path and thus
adopted widely due to its advantages over other models. Its practical application
originated, according to Le (2006), perhaps from its author, who has a lot of
practical experience as a translator. However, Le (2006) also noted that the
theoretical background that this model was established on is not as firm as in case of
House's model, which will be presented next and also the model applied in this
paper.

1.2.2 Julian House and A Model for Translation quality assessment
Julian House (1942) is a German scholar and linguist. She contributed to
translation theory A Model for Translation Quality Assessment, which was
12


originally developed in 1977, edited in 1981 and further refined in revisited version
in 1997 with consideration to comments and evaluation given by other researchers.
The refined model has been recently referred to as A Functional-Pragmatic model
of Translation Evaluation (House, 2011), which reveals much about its nature. Until
now, different versions of this model have been evaluated as among the most
effective academic models for assessing translation, even though they have been
presenting challenges to applicators with requirements of high linguistic
competence and combined application of many linguistic branches such as
pragmatic, functional grammar, syntax, speech act theory, etc., (Le, 2006).
For House, assessing the quality of translation means addressing the nature of
translation which are (1) the relationship between (features of) the text(s) and how
they are perceived by human agents (author, translator, recipient(s)), and (3) the
consequences views about these relationships have for determining the borders
between a translation and other textual operations. House said (1977:25) "the
essence of translation lies in the preservation of "meaning" across two different
languages" She then listed three aspects of "meaning" which are semantic,
pragmatic and textual aspect. In her opinion, "an adequate translation text is a
semantically and pragmatically equivalent one" and "the translation text has a
function equivalent to that of its source text" (House, 1977:30). In this connection,
to assess a translation is to search for functional equivalence between source and
that translation text.
In order to do so, each text must be analyzed individually for establishment of
corresponding textual function, which was defined by House as "the use of the text
in a particular situation" (House, 1977: 38). This situation bounds the text and for

the purpose of analysis, it is broken down into specific situational dimensions,
which are presented in her model as follows:
A. Dimensions of Language User

1. Geographical Origin
13


2. Social Class
3. Time
B. Dimensions of Language Use

1. Medium: simple/complex
2. Participation: simple/complex
3. Social Role Relationship
4. Social Attitude
5. Province

Figure 1: A model for translation quality assessment by House (1977)
The theoretical framework for above scheme is Crystal and Davy (1969)'s
model, of which most of dimensions were adopted by House, those of Time,
Medium, Participation and Province.
The next task, according to House, is to figure out how above situational
dimensions "are realized syntactically, lexically and textually" (House, 1977:51).
To do so, analyzer shall, in each dimension, pick up syntactic, lexical and textual
means which are"text-specific linguistic correlates to the situational dimensions"
(House, 1977:52). The basis for those linguistic correlates were taken by House
(1977: 51-61) from linguistic theories such as grammatical models of Quirk and
Greenbaum (1973), treatment of the textual means based on Enkvit (1973), themerheme distribution of Prague school, types of text constitution of Söll (1974) and
illocutionary forces. What are found will lead analyzer to statement of in ST's

functions composed by ideational and interpersonal textual components, two terms
that House adopted from Halliday (1970, 1971, 1793).
Taken together, the prime purpose of her model is to analyze the SL text and
TL text according to given situational dimensions of the model to get the respective
textual profiles, and that of SL text will be further used as norm to judge the
appropriateness of the TL text (House, 1997: 52). The secondary purpose is to
underline the possible mismatches between original and translation one. The above
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mentioned detailed comparison of text by situational dimension helps to reveal
possible mismatches, and such mismatches were named covertly erroneous errors.
This type of error, as it was named, on the other hand, suggests another type: overtly
erroneous error, which is used to describe the mismatches in denotative meaning or
breaches of TL system. Finding of mismatches, as the result, lets accessors reach
the ultimate purpose of the model: statement of the quality of the examined
translation.
The operation of House's model, as summarized by Le (2006: 242) experienced
through 3 major steps:
1. Analyze original according to 8 criteria, 3 aspects of language user and 5
aspects of language use
2. Compare and contrast text construction manner according to criteria
analyzed in original
3. Define level of equivalence in form and function between original and
translation to evaluate translation's quality
Realizing the relevance among text typology, textual function, equivalence and
translation, House made a further statement of translation typology by suggesting
two types of translation: overt translation and covert translation, and the concept of
cultural filter. In her definitions, over translation is "one in which the TT addressees
are quite "overtly" not being directly addressed; thus an overt translation is one

which must overtly be a translation, not, as it were, a "second original"(1977: 189)
and covert translation is "a translation which enjoys or enjoyed the status of an
original ST in the target culture" (1977:194).
House's definition of overt and covert translation, according to Munday
(2008:93), was "rather confusing" and the difference between them "is cline rather
than a binary opposite" (2008: 94). To distinguish, House clarified "the ST of
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overt/covert translation is respectively tied/ not tied to source language community
and culture" (1977: 189,194). Consequently, ST of covert translation is tied to
expectation of the target culture addressees while that of overt translation is less
likely to be so. This explains why cultural filter, which was suggested by House
(2001: 251) as "a means of capturing socio-cultural differences in shared
conventions of behavior and communication, preferred rhetorical styles and
expectation norms in the two speech communities", must be applied concurrently to
covert translation. Such application challenged both translator and evaluator by
demanding a considerable consideration of cultural presuppositions of both SL's
community and TL's community, i.e., the translator must, in House's words, "view
the ST through glasses of target culture member" (1977: 196 - 197).
This division has posted crucial implications to translation in that how cultural
presuppositions would be necessary and level of equivalence required. With regards
to translation in literature, her conclusion that "covert translation presenting more
subtle cultural evaluation problems" (1977:207) suggests one typical problem of
such type. In later refined model, classification of text into overt and covert had
been integrated into the model as its last step as reviewed by Munday (2008: 93).
In the later years, this model has been given numerous comments and
criticisms, which led her to further refinement in 1997. The most controversial issue
in her model, according to many critics, is the overlapping of data while analyzing
the text by dimension. One example is the anticipated duplication of data following

dimension of social role relationship and of social attitude.
In later refinement, House added the category of Genre in order to provide
more comprehensive analysis for text profile. The scheme was rearranged and
directed to the application of M.A,K Halliday's theory of Functional Grammar.
Such analysis and comparison of an original and its translation experience 3 levels:
the levels of Language/Text, Register (Field, Mode and Tenor) and Genre. Genre is
a level that lies between individual textual function and register. It amends for the
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