De l’infinitive de perception dans la pratique traductologique

• Authors: Fabrice Marsac , Witold Ucherek , Magdalena Dańko

Title variants

EN

On the translation of the infinitive clauses introduced by a perception verb

• Languages of publication: FR

Abstracts

FR

The subject of the study are the infinitive subordinate clauses (ICP). These infinitive structures, introduced by a perception verb like voir (‘see’), regarder (‘watch’), entendre (‘hear’), écouter (‘listen’) and sentir (‘smell’), are composed of two complements: a noun phrase and a verb infinitive (j’entends les oiseaux chanter ‘I hear birds sing’). We are interested in ICP in a French-Polish traductological perspective. As this structure, so widespread in French, is not to be found in Polish, this Slavic language offers at least eight different ways of translating it (observed in the corpora), the most frequent of which turns out to be the jak P (‘as P’) structure (*słyszę ptaki śpiewać/śpiewać ptaki ‘I hear birds sing/I hear sing birds’; słyszę, jak ptaki śpiewają/śpiewają ptaki, literally ‘I hear as birds sing/sing birds’). Even though we regularly come across this linguistic phenomenon in our profession (we teach French to Polish bachelor students), there is one basic issue that intrigues us: how do the translators choose one of the eight available structures in their native language? Are their choices random, or lingustically constrained? To answer this thorny question, we have decided to adopt as a theoretical framework (adapting them to ICP) the research tools proposed by Professor Eugeniusz Ucherek (University of Wrocław, Poland, 1982), who originally constituted a method of contrastive French-Polish analysis of prepositions.

EN

The subject of the study are the infinitive subordinate clauses (ICP). These infinitive structures, introduced by a perception verb like voir (‘see’), regarder (‘watch’), entendre (‘hear’), écouter (‘listen’) and sentir (‘smell’), are composed of two complements: a noun phrase and a verb infinitive (j’entends les oiseaux chanter ‘I hear birds sing’). We are interested in ICP in a French-Polish traductological perspective. As this structure, so widespread in French, is not to be found in Polish, this Slavic language offers at least eight different ways of translating it (observed in the corpora), the most frequent of which turns out to be the jak P (‘as P’) structure (*słyszę ptaki śpiewać/śpiewać ptaki ‘I hear birds sing/I hear sing birds’; słyszę, jak ptaki śpiewają/śpiewają ptaki, literally ‘I hear as birds sing/sing birds’). Even though we regularly come across this linguistic phenomenon in our profession (we teach French to Polish bachelor students), there is one basic issue that intrigues us: how do the translators choose one of the eight available structures in their native language? Are their choices random, or lingustically constrained? To answer this thorny question, we have decided to adopt as a theoretical framework (adapting them to ICP) the research tools proposed by Professor Eugeniusz Ucherek (University of Wrocław, Poland, 1982), who originally constituted a method of contrastive French-Polish analysis of prepositions.

Keywords

FR

infinitive subordinate clause; verbs of perception; translation; traductology; linguistic constraints; Eugeniusz Ucherek (University of Wrocław; Poland); method of contrastive analysis (French- Polish); infinitive subordinate clause; verbs of perception; translation; traductology; linguistic constraints; Eugeniusz Ucherek (University of Wrocław; Poland); method of contrastive analysis (French- Polish)

EN

infinitive subordinate clause; verbs of perception; translation; traductology; linguistic constraints; Eugeniusz Ucherek (University of Wrocław; Poland); method of contrastive analysis (French- Polish)

• Publisher: Uniwersytet im. Adama Mickiewicza w Poznaniu
• Journal: Studia Romanica Posnaniensia
• Year: 2019
• Volume: 46
• Issue: 1
• Pages: 115-136

Dates

published

2019-05-30

Contributors

author

Fabrice Marsac

• Université d’Opole, Pologne, Université Matej Bel de Banská Bystrica, Slovaquie

author

Witold Ucherek

• Université de Wrocław, Pologne

author

Magdalena Dańko

• Université d’Opole, Pologne

References

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Identifiers

DOI

10.14746/strop.2019.461.007