《translation studies and the cognitive theory of metaphor》.pdf

Translation Studies and the cognitive theory of metaphor* Eva Samaniego Fernández UNED Although metaphor has always been a main concern in TS, little has been done to apply a far-raging cognitive theory of metaphor and metonymy to transla- tion. As a rule, the few authors that have tried to deal with it are eclectic in their cognitive approach and show a prescriptive bias as concerns translation theory. However, thanks to the influence of disciplines like Cognitive Linguistics, among others, Descriptive Translation Studies (DTS) can undertake a more realistic study of metaphor translation which reflects the true nature of metaphor and the underlying regularities of its interlinguistic transfer, including cases excluded a priori by traditional studies for being ‘unfaithful’, ‘anomalous’ or ‘incorrect’ renderings. Keywords: cognitive theory of metaphor, Translation Studies, metaphor translation 1. Is metaphor translatable? In spite of metaphor’s “astounding popularity” in Translation Studies (Dobrzyn- ska, 1995, p. 595), it is “largely unmapped by translation theory” (Kurth, 1999; see Kurth, 1995), essentially due to the fact that it presents a particularly searching test of the translator’s ability (Dagut, 1987, p. 77), which would explain why “metaphor and translation enjoy an uneasy relationship” (Gentzler, 2000, p. 941). For transla- tors, metaphors are an area of “great unpredictability” (Menacere, 1992, p. 568). Newmark (1988b, p. 113) believes that metaphor is the epitome of all translation, and for Toury (1995, p. 81) it is “a kind of ultimate test of any theory of translation”. Tabakowska (1993, p. 67) agrees, since metaphor often presents “unsurmountable problems for translation”. In Translation Studies (henceforth TS) two of the main issues