ФРАЗЕОЛОГИЧЕСКИЕ ЕДИНИЦЫ С КОМПОНЕНТОМ – НАИМЕНОВАНИЕ ПРОФЕССИИ (НА МАТЕРИАЛЕ АНГЛИЙСКОГО И РУССКОГО ЯЗЫКОВ)
презентация к уроку (11 класс) по теме

VII городская научно-исследовательская

Конференция школьников имени Д.С. Лихачева

Секция: иностранный язык

Исследовательская работа

 Происхождение английских ФЕ c  элементом цветообозначения в своей семантике  и способы их перевода на русский язык

(The origin of the English idioms containing colour elements in their semantics and ways of their translation into Russian)

Салахутдинова Феруза Барыевна

МБОУ «Гимназия № 140», Советский район, г. Казань

11 класс

Научный руководитель:

Бикмиева Нурия Зиннуровна,

учитель английского языка

высшей квалификационной категории

МБОУ «Гимназия № 140»

Советского района г. Казани

Казань 2013

Contents

1. Introduction
2. The source of the origin of the idioms with a colour element in English. The primordial and the adopted idioms:

1. the primordial English idioms;
2. the interlingual English idioms, that were adopted from many foreign languages through the different ways of translation;
3. the intralingual English idioms that were adopted from the American and other variants of the English language.

3. Appropriate translation of the idioms containing colour elements.
4. Conclusion
5. The list of literature

Introduction

        This research work has for an object of the study the origin of the English idioms containing colour elements in their semantics and ways of their translation into Russian.

        Besides the aim of my research work is the studying of foreign words that have become a part of the modern Russian language. In my work the methods of the observing prevail and the research work discovers different aspects of the bilingual problems (English and Russian languages) as well.

English is not an old language and its history is not so long as the other languages have, it has become the main global mean of communication in the modern world. English language is very flexible and due to this feature it could adopt lots of words, phrases, idioms and proverbs. The problem of word adoption in Russian and English languages has been discussing for a long time and can be explained by great social and political process that our society lives out. A language changes together with a society that uses it.

The process of the use of foreign idioms in any language is as old as the world itself. A human being is a curious creature. Nations, inhabiting different countries cannot live isolated from one another, so the contacts among them lead to the interchange of the words, phrases and proverbs. We are living in the time when the words from British and especially American English have practically crowded out typical Russian equivalents. We can observe this process on television, radio and press. So there is a reasonable question «why? » and how foreign words exist in the company of Russian words and how should we treat to this process. A large amount and diversity of the adopted factors, which have appeared due to the existing reality, leads to different interpretation of the reasons of adoption. Some of them are extra linguistic and some are inner linguistic.

A special attention should be paid to the linguistic factors. The existence of various objective reasons makes it possible to adopt practically any English word or phrase into the Russian language. But the certain system and special order of lexical and grammatical structure of the Russian language, especially literary Russian language, limits and normalizes the selection and meaning of adopted English words.

Symbolically all the idioms can be divided into two groups: the primordial and the adopted ones.   The adopted idioms, by-turn, are divided into: the interlingual and the intralingual ones. Thereby, three groups of idioms can be singled out:

1. the primordial English idioms;
2. the interlingual English idioms, that were adopted from many foreign languages through the different ways of translation;
3. the intralingual English idioms that were adopted from the American and other variants of the English language.

The research work also deals with Biblical idioms containing colour elements (golden rule, whited sepulcher); adoptions with colour elements, taken from Shakespeare’s works and works of other English writers (green-eyed monster,  be caught red-handed); idioms with colour elements adopted from other languages (the golden age, blue blood); adoptions from American English (gold rush, back the wrong horse) and some others.

II. The source of the origin of the idioms with a colour element in English.  The primordial and the adopted idioms.

The source of the origin of the idioms in the modern English language is quite various. Symbolically all the idioms can be divided into two groups: the primordial and the adopted ones.   The adopted idioms, by-turn, are divided into: the interlingual and the intralingual ones. Thereby, three groups of idioms can be singled out:

-the primordial English idioms;

-the interlingual English idioms, that were adopted from many foreign languages through the different ways of translation;

-the intralingual English idioms that were adopted from the American and other variants of the English language.

The primordial English idioms

English idioms are mostly original idiomatical phrases and the source of their origin is not identified. Such idioms are connected with traditions and customs of the English folk, its realities and historical facts. For instance, the idiom blue stocking (синий чулок) is usually used in the scornful sense and means a dried-up and pedant woman deprived femininity. Nevertheless, primarily the idiom appeared in the XVIII century thanks to the British admiral Boscawen, who used to come to one of the literary London clubs, wearing blue stockings. Thus the members of the literary society were called “blue stockings”. Blue stocking is a disparaging term, no longer in common use, for an educated, intellectual woman. Bluestocking may also refer to Bluestockings (bookstore), an infoshop in New York City Bluestocking journal and a Japanese anarchy feminist newsmagazine.

Another English idiom, containing colour in its semantics is a black sheep (паршивая овца ), that is a part of the proverb There is a black sheep in every flock. It was supposed that a black sheep is marked by the devil’s stamp and can make troubles to a family. Into Russian the idiom is usually translated as “В семье не без урода”. Though the lexical forms in the English idiom differ from the Russian one the semantic contents in both idioms is the same – disgrace for the family.

One more English idiom with a colour inside itself is A thin red line (отстаивать принципы). This idiom was used initially in 1877 during the Crimean war and later by the English philosopher and writer B. Russell. The British soldiers wearing red colour uniform altogether formed a red line. Nowadays the idiom means not to give up and to protect ones principles.

Biblical phrases containing elements of a colour.

Biblical phrase have always been a very important source of phraseology. It has been said and written a lot about the colossal influence of the biblical translations on the development of the English language. For a long period of time the Bible was one of the widely read and often quoted books, not only in England, but in many other European countries as well. Not only certain words, but whole idiomatic phrases have infiltrated into English. Sometimes they are idioms taken from Hebraic or Ancient Greek languages which are usually translated into English word by word. The number of biblical words and phrases is so large that it would a rather difficult task to bring them together or just to list them. Biblical idioms are entirely assimilated ones. Here are some examples:

The golden rule (Золотое правило) – an extremely useful and wise rule that can help anybody. Originally the idiom sounded like: treat others in the way you would them to treat you. 

A whited sepulcher (двуличный, неискренний человек) - a biblical idiom – an allusion to Mathew, that means to be hypocritical or insincere. First these biblical words meant desecration of the graves, later it has been used to describe double-faced people.

Biblical idioms are quite often varied from their biblical prototypes and lots of different aspects of this problem are still actual.

Adoptions with a colour element, taken from Shakespeare’s works and the works of other English writers.

Phrases taken from the Bible exceed in number only Shakespeare’s phrases, which are spread both in spoken and in literary English language. There are more than 100 idioms taken from Shakespeare’s books and they are called in Russian Шекспиризмы. Most of such phrases have got a constant form and are usually invariable.

Let’s take for example the phrase from one of the most famous Shakespeare’s works “Othello” - the green- eyed monster (чудовище с зелёными глазами). It means jealousy. Though the phrase is supposed to have a bookish style and old fashioned, nevertheless its meaning is clear to anyone who come it across.

At the same time some of the Shakespeare’s phrases have been transformed. An example of such transformation can be the phrase Buy golden opinion, taken from “Macbeth”. The phrase means be met with approval, worthy of admiration and respect. But in the modern English this phrase has changed into win golden opinion. As a result of the metaphorical transformation this phrase, like some others, was reconsidered.

Beside Shakespeare lots of other genius writers enriched English language and especially its phraseology. Among them are J. Choser, J. Milton, J. Swift, Ch. Dickens, W. Scott and others. For instance a phrase taken from the novel by W. Scott – be caught red-handed (застать на месте преступления), means to catch somebody at the scene of the crime or have over the barrel.

Idioms with colour elements, adopted by English from other languages.

Plenty of English idioms with a colour element are connected with the ancient history and literature, so no wonder that lots of them have got international characteristics and are widely spread in many languages, especially European ones.

Let’s take the idiom The golden age (Золотой век). This idiom was first used by the ancient Greek poet Gesiod in his poem “Labour and routine”. The author described a happy century Saturn, when people lived happily, like gods without any sorrows or troubles. There were no any wars or discords. There were no slaves or oppressed people, everybody was equal before the gods and the law. In modern English the idiom golden age is traditionally used while speaking about prosperity and flourishing of art and culture. This idiom is also often used concerning the period of the XVIII century when it was the golden age in the English classical school.

        Some of the idioms with colour elements in the modern English language refer to the fables of the ancient Greek poet Aesop. One of such examples can be the idiom Kill the goose that lays the golden eggs- убить курицу, несущую золотые яйца.

        Among the idioms that are connected with the ancient Rome literature the next one is quite common in the modern English - the golden mean (золотая середина). This idiom was used by the medieval poet Goracio and originally it sounded in Latin like aurea mediocritas.

        The number of the idioms with colour elements adopted from French is tremendously big.  They have become widespread by means of calking of the original French phrases. By-turn the French idioms go back to the Latin prototypes. In this case it is rather difficult to identify if the idiom was adopted from Latin or from French.

        For example the English idiom blue blood (голубая кровь) is the loan translation or calque from French - le sang bleu, meaning to refer to the upper society, to be an aristocrat. By-turn the etymology of this idiom refers to the Spanish language. The Medieval Spanish nobles of Castilia were proud that they had never entered into mixed-marriages and called themselves “blue blood”.

        As for the adoptions from German they are not so multiple. Moreover some German idioms with colour element shave disappeared in the original language; meanwhile in English they are still often used.

        For instance the idiom Speech is silver, silence is golden used to be a German proverb, but in the fiction it appeared thanks to the English writer of the XVIII century Thomas Carlyle.

        There are adoptions of the idioms with colour elements from many other languages as well, but it is necessary to be very accurate while establishing the fact of the idioms’ source of adoption. It is important to take into account that common social and political development of different folks could cause the emergence of similar phrases, idioms, proverbs. So we can observe idiomatic parallels, not the adoptions.

        In addition, idioms that have a more ancient origin usually contain such basic colours as black, white, red, green and blue.

Adoptions from the American English

Lots of the idioms with a colour element came into the English language from the American English. Such kind of adoption is called intralingual. Some of the American idioms assimilated in the British English so well, that they have practically become native in it. Among those idioms are: A green light (зелёная улица) that means free hands or freedom of actions; paint the town red (предаваться веселью, кутить); gold rush (золотая лихорадка) meaning a strong desire and yearning for being rich, prosperous and wealthy.

American idioms and adoptions, especially slang phrases are notetable for their vivid figurativeness and expressivity. Here are some examples:

Baby boom (пик рождаемости); back the wrong horse (поставить не на ту лошадь) – meaning make a bad choice; tail wags the dog (хвост виляет собакой) – meaning that someone, who is less important keeps matters under his control; raise the devil or raise Cain (буквально разбудить дьявола или Каина); pack rat (барахольщик, Плюшкин); idiot box (телевизор); yes-man (подхалим); fall guy (козёл отпущения) and many other idioms.

III. Appropriate translation of the idioms containing colour elements

Full-fledged translation of the idioms depends generally on the ratio of the lexical units in English and in the language of translation. Regarding the identity and adequacy, the idioms with colour elements can be divided into three groups:

1. Idioms that are total equivalent in Russian
2. Idioms that have analogues in Russian
3. Idioms that don’t have either equivalents or analogues in Russian

As for the first group the idioms that have the same meaning, the same stylistic colour and the same inner form can be referred to it:

As black as coal (ink, night) – чёрный как уголь;

As red as blood – красный как кровь;

Like a red rag to a bull – как красная тряпка на быка;

Yellow press – жёлтая пресса;

Look at something through rose-coloured glasses – смотреть на мир сквозь розовые очки;

White flag – белый флаг (сигнал о капитуляции), etc.

The number of the total equivalents in English and Russian is limited, so it means that the requirements to the translation of such idioms are very high and strict.

As for the second group of idioms they are partial equivalents. They have the same meaning but different inner figurativeness. Such idioms are sometimes called relative ones. They differ from the source idiom on synonymic components, on syntactical order, on morphological combinative power. In other respects those idioms are full-fledged equivalents.

Paint a black picture- в черном цвете;

To be in a black book- попасть в черный список;

Yellow belly- желторотый птенец;

Golden opportunity- блестящая возможность;

Kill the goose that lays golden eggs- убить курицу, несущую золотые яйца;

Grey cells - «серое вещество», мозговые извилины;

White lie- невинная ложь, ложь во спасение;

Put down in black and white — написано черным по белому;

Nevertheless it is necessary to take into account affective evaluation of such idioms and try to find the appropriate equivalents in both languages – English and Russian.

The third group of idioms that don’t have either equivalents or analogues in Russian is the most numerous. For their adequate translation non idiomatic methods of translation are basically used. Non- idiomatic method of translation proposes lexical means of translation and is used in the case, if any of the equivalents or analogues can’t be applied. This way of translation is hardly can be called full-fledged as there are always some losses in expressivity, figurativeness and aphoristic character. Interpreters and translators use non-idiomatic method of translation rather seldom.

Calking, word-for-word or literal translation is preferred if idiomatic method can’t express the basic sense of the idiom. Some of the proverbs don’t have equivalents in any of languages, so the only way to give appropriate translation is the word-for word translation.

Some of the calks can be translated both with the help of the idiomatic and literal methods. Let’s take the English idiom with a colour element  the grass is always greener on the other side of the hill. It’s literal translation into Russian трава всегда зеленее с другой стороны холма is quite clear in Russian, but it’s much better to use its Russian equivalent хорошо там, где нас нет.

Descriptive method of translation isn’t actually the translation of an idiom itself, but its interpretation or description. Descriptive method can be effective while translating comparisons, explanations, descriptions, etc. Here are some of the examples of the idioms with a colour element:

A black eye- «синяк под глазом»

Be in the black- «быть в прибыли»

Be in the red- «быть в убытке»

Be in the pink-«выглядеть здоровым»

Have a yellow streak-«быть трусливым, робким человеком»

Blue  chips-  акции   компании,   выплачивающей   высокие дивиденды.

        While making use of the descriptive method it is necessary to practice a short historical commence. Such method of translation is called a double or parallel method. For example, when the English want to say that some of the property is very ruinous and wasteful, the use the idiom white elephant. According to the legend the king of Siam used to give a white elephant to his enemies or ill-wishers as a present, if he wanted to flatten them. A white elephant has always been a sacred animal in India and in Ceylon, so it can’t be used in any work and besides needs a very expensive care. So sooner or later a white elephant becomes a burden to his owner.

Conclusion

To sum up it should be observed that there are a lot of various sources of the idiom adoptions in English. All the idioms, including those ones that have got colour elements in their semantics, can be divided into two big groups: the primordial and the adopted ones.

The source of the origin of the idioms in the modern English language is quite various. Symbolically all the idioms can be divided into two groups: the primordial and the adopted ones.   The adopted idioms, by-turn, are divided into: the interlingual and the intralingual ones. Thereby, three groups of idioms can be singled out: the primordial English idioms; the interlingual English idioms that were adopted from many foreign languages through the different ways of translation; the intralingual English idioms that were adopted from the American and other variants of the English language.

English idioms are mostly original idiomatical phrases and the source of their origin is not identified. Such idioms are connected with traditions and customs of the English folk, its realities and historical facts.

We began studying English not long ago; nevertheless some scientists say the language situation is close to bilingual. It is a typical situation for the XXI century because more and more new ways of the adoption both into English and Russian have appeared. A negotiation in practically all spheres of life - in science, art, literature, politics, economy and new ways of the adoption made English the international language. Bilingual influence brought some negative factors, like fusion or the mix of styles. The adoption of foreign phrases has a complex character and can be studied at different levels, but this research work gives analyses of the wide variety of  adoptions from lots of sources and tries to explain the reasons of the this process.

The research work makes a contribution into the study of the adequate translation of English idioms with a colour element in their semantics. It touches upon the issue of the equivalents in English and Russian languages, the problems of full-fledged translation, the problem of idioms that are total equivalent and the idioms that have analogues, besides the work studies the  idioms that don’t have either equivalents or analogues in Russian.

The list of literature

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2. Беляевская Е.Г. Семантика слова. – М., 1987.

3. Гальперин И.Р. Информативность единиц языка.- М., 1984.

4. Жуков В.П. Семантика фразеологических оборотов. – М., 1978.

5.   Казакова   Т.А.   Практические   основы   перевода.     СПб.:

«Издательство Союз», - 2000.

6. Кунин А.В. Курс  фразеологии  современного  английского  языка

–  М.:Изд. Центр «Феникс», 1996.

7. Никитин М.В.. Лексическое значение слова. М., 1983.

8. Никитин М.В. Курс лингвистической семантики. СПб., 1996.

9. Шанский Н.М. Лексикология современного русского  языка.  –  М.,

1984.

Словари.

1. Кунин А. В. Англо-русский фразеологический словарь.- 4-е  изд.,

переработанное и дополненное. – М., 1984.

2. Новый большой англо- русский словарь  М.:Рус.яз.., 2000.

3. Русско- английский словарь/ Под. Ред. Р. С. Даглиша.- 8-е  изд.

Стереотип..- М.: Рус. яз., 1991.

4. Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English. London, 1997

5. Longman dictionary of English Idioms, Longman. 1980.

6. The Oxford Dictionary  of  English  Etymology/  Ed.  by  C.  T.

Onions. Oxford, 1996

7. The Oxford English Dictionary (OED). A corrected reissue of the

New English  Dictionary  on  Historical  Principles  (NED):  In

thirteen vols/ Ed. By J.  F.  H.  Murray,  H.  Bradley,  W.  A.

Craigie, C. T. Onions.  3rd  ed.,  revised,  with  corrections.

Oxford, 1997.