Features of overcoming the linguistic-ethnic barrier in translation (based on the material of Vasily Shukshin’s works and their translation into English)

The article presents an analysis of cases of the linguistic-ethnic barrier when translating fiction and ways to overcome it. The material of the study was stories by Vasily Shukshin and their translations into English from the collection Vassily Shukshin: Short Stories published in 1990. Ten stories were selected from the collection, translated by one translator, Robert Daglish. Vasily Shukshin, thanks to his special style, can be considered as one of the most “difficult” Russian-speaking authors for translation. The features of Shukshin’s style are considered difficult for foreign readers to perceive. This is explained by the individual manner of the writer, jargon, and dialect vocabulary, as well as the image of the village color with its everyday life and realities, which are not familiar or not fully understood by foreign readers. In this work, the author used the continuous sampling method, comparative translation analysis, the dictionary definition method, as well as elements of the statistical method. From this material, 117 language units were selected by a continuous sampling method, which can be a linguistic-ethnic barrier, as well as their translation into English. For each language unit selected in Shukshin’s texts, as well as for the translation of this language unit into English, a comparative analysis of the translation was applied to track how the form and content of the original changed during the translation. This analysis reveals difficulties justified by the specificity of the original language that the translator may encounter. On the basis of the analyzed material, the percentage of non-translation and inadequate translation of language units was received, recommendations were made to overcome the linguistic-ethnic barrier in the translation of literary works. At the final stage of the work, the author applied elements of the statistical method. Based on the 117 selected language units, she calculated their percentage ratio in Shukshin’s texts and found out what language means are used most often. Then, after analyzing the material, the author expressed the degree of translatability in percentage terms. In addition, she calculated the percentage of translatability of each analyzed language unit and concluded which components of Shukshin’s texts pose the greatest difficulty in overcoming the linguistic-ethnic barrier. In conclusion, the author made recommendations to overcome the linguistic-ethnic barrier in translating literary works, explaining difficulties the translator may encounter when working with a text of fiction, as well as ways of helping the translator eliminate barriers to adequate translation. The author declares no conflicts of interests.

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