cultural translation

This paper addresses the issue of culture specific references in translating a literary work taking as a case study the novel Cette aveuglante absence de lumière written originally in the French language by Taher Benjelloun and translated into the English language under the title The Blinding Absence of Light by Linda Coverdale . The study offers insight into the distribution of these references in the novel eliciting data related to Moroccan, French, American, Oriental and other culture specific references along with their comparison. There is also room for a theoretical background regarding the procedures and strategies that have been elaborated by translation theorists to account for the translation of cultural references. My analysis focuses on the strategy adopted by the translator and procedures employed in the translation of these references into the English language. The paper ends with a discussion of the attained results taking into consideration cultural attractiveness and its impact on the perception of the characters and their future desires.

Some religious modernists believe that correct and scientific comprehension of the Qur’an is merely provided through historical and cultural study of the context of revelation time. Others, on the other hand, advocate that knowing interior and connected evidence suffices for Qur’an comprehension. Further, they say that exterior and unconnected evidence such as cultural and historical studies can have little effect on Qur’an comprehension. These various attitudes made us research them and represent a model to assess the dependency of Qur’an comprehension on cultural and historical conditions of revelation time. The present study examined works of scholars in this field such as Nasr Hamid Abu Zayd, Khorramshahi, and Tabatabaei through a descriptive and analytical method. Then, a model was recommended to evaluate the dependence of understanding of the Qur’an on the cultural and historical conditions of revelation time. The model includes four components: cause of revelation; vocabulary; subject matter; expressions which encompass twelve rules based on the features of verses in each component. Input of the model is one verse and its output is a dependent, independent, or semi-dependent mode.