6105 20306 1 PB
6105 20306 1 PB
6105 20306 1 PB
Received: September 30, 2021 Revised: October 20, 2021 Accepted: November 2, 2021
ABSTRACT
A mistake in translating a single word may cause thousands of deaths. An unimaginable fact that
mistranslation cost 80.000 lives in Japan in August 1945 proves that translating a text should be
taken into consideration and done carefully. Translating a source language (SL) into a target
language (TL) is problematic and not as simple as only transposing SL into TL because this
activity closely relates to different cultures. Therefore, this study is aimed at analyzing the
translation techniques in the English subtitle of the movie “Ketika Cinta Bertasbih 1”. This
qualitative study focuses on Molina and Albir’s translation techniques used in the English movie
subtitle. The primary data were collected from the dialogs and the English subtitle and selected
based on the translation problems. Furthermore, the data were analyzed and interpreted
descriptively to identify and explain why and how the translation techniques are used in the
English subtitle. This study found that five translation techniques were used to translate the
dialogs in bahasa Indonesia (SL) into English subtitle (TL). In the subtitle, this study found the use
of adaptation (10 times), transposition (9 times), borrowing (7 times), generalization (3 times) and
compensation (once). Those techniques were applied to solve problems in translation, such as
cultural differences, in equivalence, untranslatability, and grammatical differences. This study
concludes that the techniques proposed by Molina and Albir in 2002 have been a great
contribution in the field of translation. The cultural problems which lead to in equivalence and
untranslatability, as well as grammatical differences are no longer problematic to translators.
INTRODUCTION
THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK
Previous Study
Translation
Translation is an activity of transposing a source language (SL) into a
target language (TL) as in line with Newmark (1988) who defined the term as
rendering the meaning of a text into another language in the way that the author
intended the text. The main purpose of translation is therefore to transfer the ideas
of the author to the target readers by using the language they speak. To do this
job, a translator is responsible to produce a comprehensible and accurate
translation to transfer ideas in the source language by using target language as
precisely as possible.
Further, Catford (1978) defined translation as the replacement of textual
material in one language (SL) by equivalent textual material in another language
(TL). Translation refers to the activity of transforming a text written in a certain
language into a text written in another language as closely as possible. It means
that a translator must find words, phrases, and sentences from the target language
to substitute the source language accurately.
In this study, the object is the English subtitle of an Indonesian movie,
entitled “Ketika Cinta Bertasbih 1” adapted from a very popular novel written by
Habiburrahman El Shirazy in 2007. This movie is also targeted for a wider
consumption. Similarly, it is directed to English speakers throughout the world.
Hence, the translator should be able to transfer the messages and ideas through
dialogues spoken in bahasa Indonesia to the English speakers by accurately
translating those dialogues into English to reach equivalent meanings and effects.
However, translators often find problems when doing their jobs. Newmark
(1988) asserted “that the body of knowledge and of assumptions that exists about
translation is tentative, often controversial and fluctuating.” The various
translation methods, strategies, and techniques which overlap to one another
create problems in translation. However, the cultural differences followed by the
existence of thousands of languages with different dialects spoken in the world are
the major problems in translation.
Translation Problems
The close relationship between culture and language brings difficulties in
translation. Nida (2001) proposed the classification of culture by stating that
purpose of the SL text is to affect and the TL translation is to inform (or vice
versa); (b) if there is a pronounced cultural gap between the SL and the TL text.”
Moreover, untranslatability is closely related to inequivalence. In fact,
there are words which cannot be substituted by any words with equivalent
meanings in another language. Similarly, certain words in a source language do
not exist in a target language. For example, the Indonesian word “tempe” has no
equivalent word in English language. The following words are some Indonesian
slangs, “jayus”, “mager”, “gabut”, “jaim”, which also have no equivalent English
words. When finding those slang words, a translator often finds difficulties and
must think extra hard to translate them into English. Robinson (2020) defines
“untranslatability as a property of a text, or of any utterance, in one language, for
which no equivalent text or utterance can be found in another language.” This
linguistic phenomenon shows a lexical gap among languages.
To overcome the problem, the creation of a translator is the answer. He or
she must creatively think to find the closest words in the target language for the
untranslatable words. Robinson (2020) also supports the argument by stating that
“transcreation skills are required rather than standard translation in order to
overcome untranslatability.” It means that a translator should translate them
innovatively to find the best words for the untranslatable. Robinson’s
transcreation idea is in line with Newmark (1988) asserting that “there are no
absolutes in translation, everything is conditional, any principle (e.g. accuracy)
may be in opposition to another (e.g. economy) or at least there may be tension
between them.” It means that there is no real equivalent translation.
Another problem in translation is grammatical differences. Languages do
not share the same grammatical rules. Only languages with the same origins may
have the similar grammar, but not exactly the same. As English belongs to the
West Germanic language, the grammar in both languages is similar. Whilst,
bahasa Indonesia and English are quite different in grammar because they do not
come from the same origins, even though they share the same sentence structure.
Both languages uses SVO pattern which begins most of the sentences with
subject, verb, and object.
The major difference between bahasa Indonesia and English is in the noun
phrase. It often brings a problem to students when translating noun phrases. In
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bahasa Indonesia, the key word (the modified word) of a noun phrase should be
come first and the modifier is put behind it, for example: gadis imut, wanita
cantik, and janda muda. In contrast, the construction of English noun phrases is
different in which the key word comes before the modifier, as exemplified in the
following phrases: cute girl, pretty woman, and young widow.
The focus of this study was to identify and explain how the translation
techniques are used in the movie English subtitle. The writer found out that
qualitative study is the most appropriate design to conduct this study. It is in line
with the claim made by Creswell (2012) that in qualitative research, “the inquirer
seeks to gather information on a single concept—a central phenomenon”, then
explores the translation techniques as the central phenomenon of this study.
Moreover, Creswell (2012) asserted that “the researcher seeks a deep
understanding of the views of one group or single individuals.” Aimed at
providing an understanding, this qualitative study enables the writer to conduct
data analysis and provide detailed explanations about how the translation
techniques are used in the movie subtitle.
Creswell (2012) stated that “the qualitative researcher seeks to explore and
understand one single phenomenon, and to do so requires considering all of the
multiple external forces that shape this phenomenon. To give a deep
understanding of the use of the translation techniques in the movie subtitle, this
study reveals why and how those techniques are used to provide accurate
translation of the movie subtitle. By wrapping this study using qualitative design,
this study can effectively and efficiently expose the contributing factors in
translation, such as the contexts and the socio-cultural aspects which deal with the
use of the translation techniques.
Since this is a qualitative study, the data appeared in the form of words,
phrases, and sentences which were transcribed from the spoken dialogues in
bahasa Indonesia and the English subtitle. The data were obtained from the movie
“Ketika Cinta Bertasbih 1” accessible on a Youtube channel in the following link:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nzdPpUO92U0.
While watching the movie, the writer focused not only on the dialogs
spoken in bahasa Indonesia but also on the English subtitle provided in the movie.
The spoken dialogs were transcribed and the English subtitle was taken into notes
to facilitate the data analysis. Those data were then presented in a table.
The collected data were selected by using criteria which deal with the
predefined translation problems. This study only selected the data which matched
RESULT
In the English subtitle of the movie “Ketika Cinta Bertasbih 1”, this study
found that the translator used various techniques to render bahasa Indonesia as the
source language (SL) into English as the target language (TL). The following
table describes the use of various translation techniques in the English subtitle of
the movie, namely adaptation, transposition, borrowing, generalization and
compensation.
(05.56)
12 Ana yakin antum I’m really sure you will Adaptation Datum 12
bisa menjadi be a great guy. (12.05)
entrepreneur yang
hebat.
13 Ana yakin antum I’m really sure you will Generalization Datum 13
bisa menjadi be a great guy. (12.05)
entrepreneur yang
hebat
DISCUSSION
Adaptation Technique
In this study, adaptation is the most frequent technique used in the English
subtitle because this technique provides solutions to translation problems dealing
with cultural differences between the source language (SL) and the target
language (TL). Molina and Albir (2002: 500) claimed that adaptation refers to
replacing a cultural element in a SL text with the one originating from TL culture
to make the translation of the original more familiar in the TL. The technique that
refers to cultural substitution or cultural equivalent is a cultural element which
replaces the original text with one that is better suited to the culture of the target
language. Adaptation technique appears in the following data.
Datum1:
SL: Mas Azzam
TL: Bro Azzam
Datum 2:
SL: Mbak El
TL: Sis El
Datum 12:
SL: Ana yakin antum bisa menjadi entrepreneur yang hebat.
TL: I’m really sure you will be a great guy.
Datum 25:
SL: Makasih ya Bang
TL: Thanks Bro
Datum 5:
SL: Aku sampai ngebel 27 kali ke kamarnya mas Azam, tapi nggak
diangkat-angkat.
TL: I’ve called you 27 times to your room, but no answer.
In Datum 9, 10, 14, and 22, the translator has to create a new situation that
can be considered as being equivalent when translating the Indonesian word
mantap into delicious because English users do not commonly use the word
steady to describe the taste of food. The translator transformed the word mantap
into “delicious” to maintain the context, and thus provides a good understanding.
Whilst in Datum 10, the Indonesian word pulukan is best translated into the
phrase “by hand” to maintain the equivalence between SL and TL.
Datum 9:
SL: Dikit pak Ali … biar lebih mantap.
TL: Just a few will make more delicious.
Datum 10:
SL: Enaknya makan pakai “pulukan”
TL: More delicious if we eat by hand
Datum 14:
SL: Syukurlah
TL: Lucky you
Datum 22:
SL: Surat-surat penting
TL: Important papers
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Hatim & Munday (2004: 151), adaptation is used in those cases where
the type of situation being referred to by the SL message is unknown in the TL
culture. Since untranslatability problem occurs in Datum 30 in which the
Indonesian term dimadu in the context of polyginy does not exist in English, the
use of “co-wife” is appropriate and provides an equivalent meaning. The term
dimadu refers to the husband’s practice of marrying two or more wives.
Transposition Technique
Molina & Albir (2002: 511) argued that transposition as changing the
grammatical category. Concerning with the grammatical differences between SL
and TL, transposition technique can be applied to translate bahasa Indonesia into
English by changing the structure of sentences in TL without changing the
meaning. In “Ketika Cinta Bertasbih 1”, transposition technique appears 9 times
in Datum 6, 15, 17, 20, 21, 23, 24, 26, and 28 as exemplified below:
Datum 6:
SL: Ada yang perlu kita bicarain… hal penting.
TL: I’ve important thing to talk to Bro Azzam.
Datum 15:
SL: Hampir semua mahasiswa Kairo asli Indonesia …saya kenal.
TL: I almost knew all Indonesian students in Kairo.
Borrowing Technique
Molina & Albir (2002: 499) stated that borrowing as a word taken directly
from another language. This technique is divided into two types: pure borrowing
and naturalized borrowing. To use pure borrowing technique, a translator only
borrows the term used in SL and re-uses it in TL without using any modifications
at all. In contrast, a translator can apply naturalized borrowing technique by
modifying the spelling or the pronunciation.
The use of pure borrowing technique appears in Datum 7, 8, 11, 18, 27,
and 29. In Datum 7, the term sholat which is derived from Arabic language was
not translated into the word “prayer”. Instead, the translator used pure borrowing
to avoid confusion between the worshiping activities of Muslim prayer, namely
salat and du’a. Salat and du’a are two different terms. Salat is an activity of
worshipping Allah that must be compulsorily performed five times a day by a
Muslim, whereas du’a is an activity of invocation, or requesting/asking help from
Allah. Therefore, the translator does not transpose the term sholat.
Datum 11 contains the word alhamdulillah that literally means “praise be
to Allah”. In English, it is commonly translated into “thank God”. In this case, the
translator once again used pure borrowing technique by keeping the same word in
the English subtitle. Since the movie is intended to wrap the story in Islam
teachings, using the same word “alhamdulillah” is one of the ways to share the
Islamic term.
In Datum 8, the Indonesian food called sambal is the typical Indonesian
chili-based sauce that does not exist in English culture. However, it is not actually
like sauce western people used to eat. It is a cultural term that has no equivalent
term in TL. Hence, it is best translated by using pure borrowing technique without
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Datum 8:
SL: Sambal khas Yogya
TL: Yogya’ special sambal
Datum 11:
SL: Alhamdulilah
TL: Alhamdulillah
Datum 16:
SL: Solehah
TL: Soleehah
Generalization Technique
When TL has no equivalent term to translate specific terms in SL, a
translator can use generalization technique. The cultural differences lead to
translation problems, such as inequivalence and untranslatability. In
generalization technique, the use of hypernyms or superordinate terms to
generalize the meaning and make the meaning more acceptable and
comprehensible is possible. It is in line with the claim made by Molina & Albir
(2002: 510) who defined generalization as using a more general or neutral term in
the target language. This study found the use of generalization in Datum 3, 13,
and 19 as presented below.
Datum 3:
SL: Aku masih harus mengawal acara.
TL: I still have to work.
Datum 13:
SL: Ana yakin antum bisa menjadi entrepreneur yang hebat.
TL: I’m really sure you will be a great guy.
Datum 19:
SL: Kita cari ta’meyya abilbeit (a typical Cairo food).
TL: Let’s buy food.
Compensation Technique
The translation technique lastly discussed in this study is compensation
technique which appear only once in the English subtitle, especially in Datum 4.
Molina & Albir (2002: 500) stated that compensation takes place when an item of
information or a stylistic effect from the ST (source text) that cannot be
reproduced in the same place in the TT (target text) is introduced elsewhere in the
TT (target text). In relation with untranslatability problem, compensation
technique is applied to translate terms that cannot be translated, yet their nuances
are expressed somewhere else within the text.
Datum 4:
SL: Aku sampai ngebel 27 kali ke kamarnya mas Azam, tapi nggak
diangkat-angkat.
TL: I’ve called you 27 times to your room, but no answer.
CONCLUSION
This study has been set to the limitation of using Molina and Albir’s
translation techniques used to analyze the English subtitle of the movie "Ketika
Cinta Bertasbih 1". Therefore, it is recommended for future researchers to
conduct further studies using other techniques proposed by other experts in the
field of translation. Moreover, the movie as the object of this study also provides
limited techniques involved in translating spoken language into the English
subtitle. Thus, more studies should be conducted to analyze the translation
Volume 10 (2) November 2021, page 358-380
Copyright ©2021, ISSN: 2252-7818 E-ISSN: 2502-3543
Available online:
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Exposure: Jurnal Pendidikan Bahasa Inggris
techniques in other movies which are full of cultural elements and more
challenging problems in translation.
REFERENCES