Response Paper on “The Nature and Role of Norms in Literary Translation” by Gideon Toury
In an attempt to develop his idea of translation as a norm-governed activity in “The Nature and Role of Norms in Literary Translation”, Gideon Toury first sets out to draw a picture of the translator as a “social practitioner” and the translational activity s/he carries out as culturally significant. In that respect, the translator who is inevitably bound by cultural constraints, in other words, Norms, acts in accordance with them.
Toury postulates that there are at least two sets of norm-systems, which derive from two sources, that of the source and the target culture. While on one level, occupying a position in a certain culture and language is required for a text to of value, on the other level, constituting a representation in another culture and language is a must. The gap between both levels is often a consequence of great incompatibility but thanks to regulating mission of norms, it is reduced to the lowest possible degree. For Toury, it is up to the translator to determine her/his “initial norm” in pursuit of adequacy or acceptability, comprising two poles of a continuum. While adherence to norms of the source text characterizes an adequate translation, subscribing to the target culture norms determines acceptability. Although still norm-governed, both strategies require shifts from source texts. However, deviation from norms, thus the lack of appropriate shifts, may result in an idiosyncratic product, which is considered to be too unusual to be accepted by the society.
In an overview of translational norms, Toury distinguishes two types of norms, namely preliminary and operational. Preliminary norms firstly concern translation policy whereby human agents govern the choice of text-types, e.g. literary vs. non-literary. In that respect, Itamar Even-Zohar’s postulate regarding the position of translated literature within a literary polysystem of target culture is to be observed. The choices made in accordance with the translation policy is non-random, an idea which he later elaborates on in his article “Translation as a Means of Planning and the Planning of Translation”. What is to be translated and when and how are the questions to be taken into consideration as well as considerations concerning directness of translation, which is mainly about whether translating from languages other than the ultimate source language is permitted.
Operational norms, on the other hand, marks the importance of translation as a decision making process and the translator as a decision maker. Toury divides operational norms into two groups; matricial norms that govern the existence of target language material to serve as a substitute for the source language material as well as its location and segmentation in the target text. The second group, textual linguistic norms, controls the selection of material to replace the original textual and linguistic material.
Toury moves the attention from source-orientedness to target-orientedness while placing the notion of equivalence in a dynamic context. According to Toury, “it is norms that determine the (type and extent of) equivalence manifested by actual translations.” Equivalence, then, turns into a “functional – relational” notion, realized by a thorough study of norms through which Toury expects to reach a conclusion that position of translation in the target culture determines the translational norms. As to be expected, there is a multiplicity of norms that may be abided by the translator while working on a certain text of a certain culture. They are either socio-culturally specific, which means that they do not necessarily apply to the society as a whole but may be relevant to subsystems within a society; and they are also unstable in nature. Toury maintains that norms are not directly observable but the products of norm-governed behavior can shed a light on them. Translational norms have to be reconstructed by the analysis of their effects, textual and extratextual. While target texts compose textual sources, semi-theoretical or critical formulations make up the extratextual materials.
However, in my opinion, Toury’s claim that there are different sets of norms for each individual text within their respective cultures and even their subsystems, makes the identification of translational norms even harder since it requires a diligent work specific to each product as well as an analysis of its diachronic and synchronic study with regards to its assumed position in a literary polysystem. Actually, Toury seems to be aware of this problematic too and suggests resorting to “our intuitions” based on knowledge and experience in dealing with norms but this also makes “the formulation of general laws of translational behavior”, which he aspires to reach, improbable any time soon.
In an attempt to develop his idea of translation as a norm-governed activity in “The Nature and Role of Norms in Literary Translation”, Gideon Toury first sets out to draw a picture of the translator as a “social practitioner” and the translational activity s/he carries out as culturally significant. In that respect, the translator who is inevitably bound by cultural constraints, in other words, Norms, acts in accordance with them.
Toury postulates that there are at least two sets of norm-systems, which derive from two sources, that of the source and the target culture. While on one level, occupying a position in a certain culture and language is required for a text to of value, on the other level, constituting a representation in another culture and language is a must. The gap between both levels is often a consequence of great incompatibility but thanks to regulating mission of norms, it is reduced to the lowest possible degree. For Toury, it is up to the translator to determine her/his “initial norm” in pursuit of adequacy or acceptability, comprising two poles of a continuum. While adherence to norms of the source text characterizes an adequate translation, subscribing to the target culture norms determines acceptability. Although still norm-governed, both strategies require shifts from source texts. However, deviation from norms, thus the lack of appropriate shifts, may result in an idiosyncratic product, which is considered to be too unusual to be accepted by the society.
In an overview of translational norms, Toury distinguishes two types of norms, namely preliminary and operational. Preliminary norms firstly concern translation policy whereby human agents govern the choice of text-types, e.g. literary vs. non-literary. In that respect, Itamar Even-Zohar’s postulate regarding the position of translated literature within a literary polysystem of target culture is to be observed. The choices made in accordance with the translation policy is non-random, an idea which he later elaborates on in his article “Translation as a Means of Planning and the Planning of Translation”. What is to be translated and when and how are the questions to be taken into consideration as well as considerations concerning directness of translation, which is mainly about whether translating from languages other than the ultimate source language is permitted.
Operational norms, on the other hand, marks the importance of translation as a decision making process and the translator as a decision maker. Toury divides operational norms into two groups; matricial norms that govern the existence of target language material to serve as a substitute for the source language material as well as its location and segmentation in the target text. The second group, textual linguistic norms, controls the selection of material to replace the original textual and linguistic material.
Toury moves the attention from source-orientedness to target-orientedness while placing the notion of equivalence in a dynamic context. According to Toury, “it is norms that determine the (type and extent of) equivalence manifested by actual translations.” Equivalence, then, turns into a “functional – relational” notion, realized by a thorough study of norms through which Toury expects to reach a conclusion that position of translation in the target culture determines the translational norms. As to be expected, there is a multiplicity of norms that may be abided by the translator while working on a certain text of a certain culture. They are either socio-culturally specific, which means that they do not necessarily apply to the society as a whole but may be relevant to subsystems within a society; and they are also unstable in nature. Toury maintains that norms are not directly observable but the products of norm-governed behavior can shed a light on them. Translational norms have to be reconstructed by the analysis of their effects, textual and extratextual. While target texts compose textual sources, semi-theoretical or critical formulations make up the extratextual materials.
However, in my opinion, Toury’s claim that there are different sets of norms for each individual text within their respective cultures and even their subsystems, makes the identification of translational norms even harder since it requires a diligent work specific to each product as well as an analysis of its diachronic and synchronic study with regards to its assumed position in a literary polysystem. Actually, Toury seems to be aware of this problematic too and suggests resorting to “our intuitions” based on knowledge and experience in dealing with norms but this also makes “the formulation of general laws of translational behavior”, which he aspires to reach, improbable any time soon.
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