Definition of slang

U.M.Skrebnev defines slang as a part of the vocabulary consisting of commonly understood and widely used words and expressions of humorous or derogatory character-intentional substitutes for neutral or elevated words and expressions.

M. Goldenkov gives the following definition:

“Slang is everything which is out of the books.”

Slang is also the idiom of the life force. It has roots somewhere near those of sexuality, and it regularly defies death.

“Nonstandard vocabulary composed of words or senses characterized primarily by connotations of extreme informality and usually by a currency not limited to a particular region. It is composed typically of coinages or arbitrarily changed words, clipped or shortened forms, extravagant, forced, or facetious figures of speech, or verbal novelties”/11/.

The term “slang” is ambiguous because, to use a figurative expression, it has become a Jack-of-all-trades and master of none.

There are a lot of definitions of slang and all of them seem to be correct. They characterize this many-sided phenomenon from all the points of view.

The Oxford English dictionary provides a more judicious account: “Language of a highly colloquial type, considered as below the level of educated standard speech, consisting either of new words or of current words employed in some special sense”. In a related definition, it also describes slang as “language of a low or vulgar type” and “the special vocabulary or phraseology of a particular calling or profession”. This sums up the paradox of slang very well. People look down on it, but can hardly avoid using it.

Though some scholars ignore slang the English language contains a rich array of slang words and phrases. This can be particularly seen when examining the day-to-day language of an average speaker. Some words and phrases are perhaps not suitable for general consumption and have omitted these. Even so, many of the following will offend some people and it is worth stating that their inclusion is to provide a realistic representation of the language, not to be sensational or abusive. It’s the nature of slang that it is either used to replace taboo phrases or to playfully enhance them.

In some cases slang may provide a needed name for an object or action (walkie-talkie, a portable two-way radio; tailgating, driving too close behind another vehicle), or it may offer an emotional outlet (buzz off! for go away!) or a satirical or patronizing reference (smokey, state highway trooper). It may provide euphemisms (john, head, can, and in Britain, loo, all for toilet, itself originally a euphemism), and it may allow its user to create a shock effect by using a pungent slang expression in an unexpected context.

Slang is used for many purposes, but generally it expresses a certain emotional attitude; the same term may express diametrically opposed attitudes when used by different people. People use slang consciously and unconsciously in the course of ordinary, every day interaction. Essentially, slang allows speakers the freedom to play with and enjoy the language, make words up, adopt new expressions indiscriminately, and use language for humor, irony, sarcasm, and irreverence. Also slang allows people to name things indirectly and figuratively, especially through metaphor, metonymy, and irony. Many slang terms are primarily derogatory, though they may also be ambivalent when used in intimacy or affection. Some crystallize or bolster the self-image or promote identification with a class or in-group. Others flatter objects, institutions, or persons but may be used by different people for the opposite effect. "Jesus freak," originally used as ridicule, was adopted as a title by certain street evangelists. Slang sometimes insults or shocks when used directly; some terms euphemize a sensitive concept, though obvious or excessive euphemism may break the taboo more effectively than a less decorous term. Some slang words are essential because there are no words in the standard language expressing exactly the same meaning; e.g., "freak-out," "barn-storm," "rubberneck," and the noun "creep." At the other extreme, multitudes of words, vague in meaning, are used.

H.Wentworth and S.Flexner in their “Dictionary of American Slang” write: “Slang is the unescapable means of communication. Sometimes it is used to escape the dull familiarity of standard words, to suggest an escape from the established routine of everyday life. When slang is used, our life seems a little fresher and a little more personal. Also, as at all levels of speech, slang is sometimes used for the pure joy of making sounds, or even for a need to attract attention by making noise. The sheer newness and informality of certain slang words produce pleasure. But more important than this expression of a more or less hidden aesthetic motive on the part of the speaker is the slang’s reflection of the personality, the outward, clearly visible characteristics of the speaker. By the large, the man who uses slang is a forceful, pleasing, acceptable personality.”

The professors of Moscow Gymnasium of Humanities N.V.Pavlova and Y.A.Kuleshova state that there is something that attracts people to slang. They can use slang for different reasons:

to make an impression;

to be on a colloquial level;

to lend an air of solidity;

to be novel; to be different;

not to be understood by somebody;

to demonstrate the class that one belongs to;

to be an interesting speaker;

to enrich the language;

to induce friendliness.

Slang may appeal, or it may be disgusting. It may be popular, or may be ignored. But it is really used, so it has to arouse some interest.

It has been claimed that slang is created by ingenious individuals to freshen the language, to vitalize it, to make the language more pungent and picturesque, to increase the store of terse and striking words, or to provide a vocabulary for new shades of meaning. Most of the originators of slang, however, are probably not conscious of these noble purposes and do not seem overly concerned about what happens to their language /20/.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

CHAPTER 2. FEATURES OF THE SLANG TRANSFERRING.  
2.1 The problem of translation of the reduced vocabulary 
    The starting point for translating of  a reduced vocabulary of the source language should be considered as a possible search for analogues of reduced vocabulary of elements in the target language. The convenience of this path lies in the fact that such analogues are exist in any language. Since the translation of the English slang is quite difficult, and the categories that make up the reduced vocabulary, closely related to the vernacular, and often go into it, then the translator can resort to the vernacular.

Why don’t you speak ordinary English?—she said coldly.

-Me? Ah thowt it wor’ ordinary.

–Почему вы не говорите на нормальном английском?— спросила она холодно.

Я штоль?— А я-то, кумекал, что мой английский самый ни на что есть нормальный [Лоуренс 2002 : 532].

2.2 Methods of Slang Translation    

When we translate a reduced vocabulary lexic and vernacular, we can use the same methods and ways of translating that are used to translate a literary language. 
First of all, there are  two basic ways  which the translator follows: direct or literal and indirect transfer.

The first way is partially acceptable when translating units of the reduced lexicon as principles of translational adequacy and usual norms of target language are broken.

« What can I say? He’ll never shit a seamen’s turd» [Лоуренс 2002 : 473]. 

This phrase is used in reference to someone who will never be a good sailor. 
It is impossible to translate this phrase literally, as it will be violation of usual norms of Russian, or at least because here the translator faces with the distinctions of communicative norms of two languages: in modern English, especially in the American one, the use of rough words of the “shit” type — almost norm, in Russian such is unacceptable, because Russian equivalents of English vulgarizm are much more rough.

Therefore the adequate translation of the similar phrase will be approximately such:

«А чего сказать-то? Этому  щенку никогда не бывать морским  волком.

It is also possible to allocate two translational receptions, relating to the first way: transcription (transliteration) and calque. Their application is possible only on condition that value of the transcribed (transliterated) or calque word is clear from a context and transfer doesn't break usual norms and adequacy and equivalence principles.

« …old Dim at the back near laughed his gulliver off—ho, ho, ho.» — «…старик Туп на заднем сиденье  смеялся до полусмерти, тряся гулливером—хо, хо, хо». [Берджесс 2004 : 221].

Here the meaning of gulliver (head) is clear from the context of the phrase. 
  But this technique can be used only in rare cases and only when the meaning is clear to readers without any special comment. 
     More often  translators resort to indirect methods of interpretation or translationtransformations. Their main function is to create the most lexically accurate,adequate translation product in the absence of the regular language of correspondences. At the same time an adequate translation is impossible withoutthe stylistic side of the original, as well as translation involves the creation ofstylistic equivalent of the original. Stylistic content of the text or utterance consists of stylistic values ​​of its constituent units, and require recoding in the translation, which is in the process of changing plans, content and expression of language units of the source text in the text of the translation. We consider the most common types of lexical transformations in classification of Barkhudarov LS

When lexical substitutions are used, the replacement of individual lexical items (words and collocations) of the source language appears, lexical units transforming who are not their lexical equivalents, that is, taken in isolation, have a different referential significance than they sent in a translation unit of the source language. Most often, there are three cases - specification, generalization and replace based on causal relationships (cause and consequences of replacement of the reasons for the result). [Barkhudarov 1975: 210]

2.3 Concretisation

Concretisation is a replacement at the left or word combinations of a source language with wider referential value a word or a word combination of translating language with narrower value. The concretisation can be lingual and contextual (speech). At the language concretisation replacement of a word with wide value with a word with narrower value is caused by divergences in a system of two languages — or because of absence in translating language of the lexical unit having so wide value, as transferred unit of a source language, or divergences in their stylistic characteristics, or requirements of a grammatical order (necessity of syntactic transformation of the offer, in particular, replacements of a nominal predicate verbal, examples of that will be given more low). So, an English noun "thing", which has a very abstract value, is almost pronominal (The Shorter Oxford Dictionary defines it as "an entity of any kind", "that which is or may be in any way an object of perception, knowledge, or thought") is translated by a concrete definition: a thing, a subject, business, the fact, a case, circumstance, product, a being and so forth.

'So what?' I said.

- Ну так что же? спрашиваю я. [Селинджер : 6]

Не told us we should always pray to God…

И нам тоже советовал всегда молиться богу... [Селинджер : 6]

Reception of a specification is used as well by transfer of other words with wide value.

Dinny waited in a corridor which smelled of disinfectant.

Динни ожидала  ее в коридоре, пропахшем карболкой.  [Голсуорси : 17]

In general, for translation from English into Russian is characterized by replacement of the general meaning of words like the man, the woman, the person, the creature on the specific proper names or nouns such as  старик, солдат, прохожий, хозяйка, собака, кошка etc. It is especially important when translating fiction in which too frequent use of words of the abstract, generalized value is inappropriate.

You could hear him putting away his toilet articles

Слышно было, как он убирает  свои мыльницы и щетки. [Селинджер : 231]

 

2.2.2 Generalization 
Generalization is the phenomenon that is  inversed to concretisation - the replacement of unit of of the source language, which has a narrower meaning with the unit of target language with a broader meaning. [Barkhudarov 1975: 216]. Here are some examples of generalization in the translation of the novel by J. Salinger:

...Не comes over and visits me practically every weekend.

...Он часто ко мне  ездит, почти каждую неделю.

Then this girl gets killed, because she's always speeding.

А потом девушка гибнет, потому что она вечно нарушает правила.

"Who won the game?"! said. "It's only the half"

- А кто выиграл? —  спрашиваю. — Еще не кончилось.

Here generalization is combined with antonimical transfer; the verb "said" is exposed to concretisation.

2.2.4 Compensation 
One of the ways to achieve the equivalency of translation is a special kind ofsubstitution, which bears the name of compensation. This technique is used in cases where certain elements of the text in the source language for some reasons do not have equivalents in the target language and can not be transferred to his means, and in these cases in order to compensate ("offset" a semantic losscaused by that a particular unit of of the source language,  remains untranslated orpartially translated (not in the entire volume of its value), the interpreter conveys the same information by any other means, not necessarily in the same place in the text, as in the original. [Barkhudarov 1975: 217]

..My parents would have about two haemorrhages apiece if I told anything pretty personal about them.

...У моих предков, наверно,  случилось бы по два инфаркта  на брата, если бы я стал болтать про их личные дела.

At first sight, one might get the impression that this translation is not completely equivalent, because the English words "tell" and "parents" have a neutral stylistic and registry characteristics, while the Russian “предки” (within the meaning of'parent') and “болтать” are refered to  familiarly register .

...Не made a speech that lasted about ten hours.

...Он отгрохал речь  часов на десять.

Meanwhile, this translation, like all such cases should be considered fully equivalent. The fact that the using of marked by style and register words предки, болтать, отгрохать, итд,  instead of the neutral parents, tell, make and so here is nothing more than a compensation, which compensates for the loss of the corresponding register and stylistic characteristics in other places of the translated text, such as:

If there is one thing I hate, it's the movies.

Если я что ненавижу, так это кино.

...She had on those damn falsies that point all over the place...

... У нее... в лифчик что-то подложено, чтоб торчало во все стороны...

The method of compensation clearly illustrates the position that we haveemphasized repeatedly: the equivalence of the translation is provided not atseparate text elements (eg words), but at the  translated text as a whole. In other words, there are untranslatable particular, but there are no untranslatable texts.[Barkhudarov 1975: 213]

 

2.2.5 Antonimical translation 
Under this title in the translation literature a widespread complex of lexical-grammatical substitution is known, the essence of which lies in thetransformation of the structures in the affirmative to a negative or vice versa,negative in the affirmative, followed by replacement of one of the words translated FL offers its antonym in the target language. (The term "antonym" is usually used in relation to the words of the same language, here we apply it to describe the relationship between the words of two different languages ​​- the source language and target language, which have opposite values.) [Barkhudarov 1975: 212]

Stradlater didn't say anything.

Стрэдлейтер промолчал. [Селинджер : 4]

Here the English negative construction will be passed on Russian in the affirmative way, and the verb "to say" is replaced by the Russian antonym "промолчать". This double "replacement of a sign" gives  the same meaning to a sentence as a whole. [Barkhudarov 1975: 215]

I meant it, too.

И я не притворялся.

Here is a reverse replacement - construction of affirmative to negative, as well as a substitution of the verb mean иметь в виду, говорить серьезно on its antonym притворятся.

2.2.7 Omission 
Omission is called the technique in which lexically and semantically redundantwords are extracting from the text. It can be grammatically redundant elements (articles, possessive pronouns ...) or lexemes, especially paired synonyms.

A little while later I still had it with me when I, Brossard and Ackley got on     the bus.—Я  его всё ещё держал в руках,  когда мы с Броссаром и Экли  сели в автобус [Сэлинджер : 663].

     When I think of some of  the Persians, the Hindus, the Arabs I knew, when I think of the character they revealed, their grace, their tenderness, their intelligence, their holiness, I spit on the white conquerors of the world, the degenerate British, the pigheaded Germans, the smug self-satisfied French.—Когда я думаю о некоторых персах, индусах, арабах, которых я знал, когда думаю о качествах, которые я открыл в них, их изяществе, нежности, уме, их святости, я плюю на белых завоевателей мира: дегенеративных британцев, свиноголовых немцев, самодовольных французов [Миллер : 250].

Smug-limited, self-satisfied (colloquial slang, ). Synonymous with self-satisfied.Also here is omitted the possessive pronoun their, which is in Russian translationexcessive.

2.2.8 Addition 
Addition is opposite to omission and it is an extension of the original textassociated with the need to complete the transfer of its contents. 
There are two types of attachments: 
1. Giving to the text an additional information in order to convey to the reader of the translation that the original native speakers understand original without a clarification.

     Would you like a cup of hot chocolate before you go?—Не выпьешь ли чашку горячего шоколада на дорогу? [Сэлинджер 1975 : 756].

     So what?—I said. Cold as hell — Что же?— спрашиваю я  ледяным голосом [Миллер 2000 : 250].

2. Grammatical addition that apply when there is no semantic similarity of the translation in the language with the semantic similarity to the language of the original lexeme and its grammatical form.

2.2.6 Descriptive Translation 
Also, there is a transformation technique - a descriptive translation. This feature-rich replacement is used to explain the unknown to the reader of the translation words and concepts that require commenting on the inner, or when the recipient ofan unusual word is replaced with a more conventional translation. As a rule, descriptive translation is a generalization of lexical replacement, followed by lexicaladditions. Often, when commenting on the internal word translator retains the wordas transcribed at the same time creating additional designs.

You should’ve seen the steaks. They were these little hard, dry jobs that you   could hardly even cut. You always got these very lumpy mashed potatoes on steak night, and for dessert you got Brown Betty, which nobody ate, except may be the little kids in the lower school that I didn’t know any better and guys like Ackley that ate everything [Селинджер 1960 : 240].

Вы бы посмотрели на эти  бифштексы. Жёсткие как подмётка, нож не берёт. К ним всегда подавали картофельное пюре с комками, а на сладкое «рыжую Бетти», пудинг с  патокой, только его никто не ел, кроме малышей из первых классов да таких, как Экли, которые на всё накидывались [Сэлинджер 1975 : 782]. 

Thus, we can conclude that the translation techniques, including transformation, is a decision taken in context. They should be aimed at achieving the maximum level of equivalence and adequacy and the most accurate transfer of meaning, style andfunction in the translated text on the condition that because of lack of equivalentcorrespondences in the target language that could pass meaningful stylistic direction of the work.

 

 

 

 

2.3 Analysis of the transfer of slang in the translation (based on the work of JeromeD.Selindzher "The Catcher in the Rye") 
The full analysis of the slang translation is proposed in the appendix. In this section, we consider necessary to analyze  the 15 most representative slangexpressions more detailly.

My parents would have two haemorrages apiece if I told anything pretty personal about them.

У моих предков случилось  бы, наверное, по два инфаркта на брата, если бы я стал болтать про их личные дела.

It is possible to consider this transfer quite equivalent as stylistic coloring of speech of the hero story-teller is transferred. English familiar colloquial "pretty" in Russian has no in this context (pretty personal)  the same stylistic coloring, therefore the use of colloquial words "предки" (in value parents) and "болтать" is compensation of an untranslatable site of the English text.

If there is one thing I hate, it’s the movies.

Если я что и ненавижу, это кино.

English "movies" belongs to colloquial style (the reduced register), and Russian equivalent — to a neutral as in Russian  a special stylistic equivalent for the word "movies" isn't present. Therefore here the method of compensation was used which is expressing in replacement of stylistically painted word on the neutral.