A comparative discussion on the translation of texts of different genres

Inhaltsangabe oder Einleitung

This essay is about the difficulties which a translator has to face when translating texts of different genres and the strategies he or she can use to overcome them. Depending on the audience, the medium it is published in and of course the genre of the text, there are different strategies needed to translate texts. The three texts which are to discuss here, a set of instructions, an advert and an encyclopedia entry, are from different genres and therefore need to be handled differently in a translation. The purpose and the readership of a target text strongly influence the way a source text has to be translated. Hervey, Higgins and Longridge (1996:155) claim that “target texts are purpose-made texts, their manner of formulation heavily influenced, both strategically and in detail, by who and what they are intended for.”
For all three of the discussed text genres, it is advisable for the translator to do some research on the specific topic and read a few parallel texts. Hervey, Higgins and Longridge (1996: 157) recommend translators to “do not produce target texts without having first built up a knowledge of the style of specimen target language texts in the appropriate language.”