Teaching English Idioms through Translation

By Petra Grgičević Bakarić, Edita Šalov, Department of Professional

Studies, University of Split
The Everlasting Appeal of Idioms

Key words: translation, idioms, contrastive analysis, English and Croatian

Being an English lecturer at University of Split, Department of Professional Studies,

my colleagues and I persist in enriching our classes with innovative and creative approaches
to both ELT and ESP. Like us, many ELT teachers professing to use the “Communicative
approach” to ELT claim that translation can – and – should be used (judiciously) in class to
reinforce students’ self-directed learning and improve all four language skills.
From the turn of the twentieth century onwards, it has been generally assumed that
L2 should be taught without reference to the learners' L1.
Carreres (2006) put forward some arguments against using translation as a language
teaching tool:

• Translation is an artificial exercise that has no place in a communicative

methodology. Also, it is restrictive in that it confines language practice to two skills
only: reading and writing.
• Translation into L2 is counterproductive in that it forces learners always to view the
foreign language through their mother tongue; this causes interferences and a
dependence on L1 that inhibits free expression in L2.
• Translation into L2 is a purposeless exercise that has no application in the real world,
since translators normally operate into and not out of their mother tongue.
• Translation, particularly into L2, is a frustrating and de-motivating exercise in that the
student can never attain the level of accuracy or stylistic polish of the version
presented to them by their teacher. It seems to be an exercise designed to elicit
mistakes, rather than accurate use of language.
• Translation is a method that may well work with literary-oriented learners who enjoy
probing the intricacies of grammar and lexis, but it is unsuited to the average learner.

Despite the previous arguments against teaching translation, there are strong arguments for
teaching translation. From an opposite perspective, translation, misconceived and overused,
could be seen as a victim of the grammar-translation method, rather than the source of its
evils. The problem was not translation as such, but a teaching methodology that separated
language from its communicative function. Indeed, translation itself as it takes place in the
real world is essentially linked to a communicative purpose. As Duff (1989: 6) puts it,
"translation happens everywhere, all the time, so why not in the classroom?"
The consequence of the violent reaction against the grammar-translation method in teaching
languages was a complete discredit of translation itself as a teaching tool. What was wrong
with this method was not that translation was made use of, but that it was used badly.
Learners of a foreign language do refer to their mother tongue to aid the process of
acquisition of L2 or, in other words they "translate silently" (Titford 1985: 78). In light of this,
translation into L2 can help them systematize and rationalize a learning mechanism that is
taking place anyway. As for the contention that learners will never need to translate into L2 in
their practical life, in many cases this is the expression of an ideal situation rather than a
description of actual practice. It is arguably true that one needs native command of the target
language when translating a text. However, in reality EFL learners need to translate into L2
to prepare them for what they might find outside the classroom.
Many researchers support the idea that translation is a motivating activity. Lavault
(1985) pointed out that one of the reasons quoted by teachers to explain their use of
translation in the classroom was that students asked for this exercise and enjoyed it, too.
As for the point of limiting the use of translation to advanced levels only, Carreres
(2006) views translation activities as forming a continuum between the extremes of literal,
explicative translation and that of communicative translation as it takes place in the
professional world. In the former, translation into L1 is merely a tool--and a very effective
one--to help learners grasp a particular L2 structure. As such, stylistic considerations are set
aside. In the latter, the focus is on the communicative value of a given text. Learners are then
expected to produce a text that could function in the L2 culture.
The way translation is taught makes a difference. Malmkjaer (1998) argues that
translation, if taught in a way that resembles the real life activity of translating, can bring into
play the four basic language skills and yield benefits in L2 acquisition. Translation is a means
by which both languages can be assessed. Rather than being seen as an obstacle to real
language use, translation might more effectively be viewed as a way of fine-tuning the
language to be used in given situations and conditions (Owen, 2003). In summary, the
arguments for using translation in the language classroom outweigh the arguments against it.
However, over the years of teaching English as a second language, I became aware
of several problems associated with the widely practiced translation teaching in the
classroom, if there was any at all. Translation activities advocated by different English course
books’ authors suggested using irrelevant, unauthentic and boring texts, implying that
translation was actually a product-based activity striving to achieve merely linguistic
equivalence between L1(Croatian) and L2 (English). As a result, students were not interested
and actively engaged in translation, some weaker students even shied away from translating
turning the whole activity into rather ineffectual and stress inducing experience. By the end of
the lessons educational goals had not been fulfilled and the students’ translational skills had
not improved. Finally, the extent of student-centered learning had remained indistinct.
Among a great number of strategies to adopt when using translation as a technique I
was particularly drawn to the necessity of using interesting, relevant and, as far as possible,
authentic texts. In addition, I was determined to make students more aware of the pragmatic
and communicative equivalent effect, to make translation a process-based activity and to
provide students with learner-centred, cognitive translation activities in order to help them
notice the differences and similarities between Croatian and English meaning-patterns and
the features of the language system as a whole. Given the assigned lesson hours and the
detailed syllabus to follow, I chose English idioms as the basis of translation teaching. Due to
the frequency of their use and prevalence in everyday English idiomatic expressions provide
a fertile ground for refreshing English language classes. They are not something that can
and should be left until students acquire an advanced level of English language use since
every newspaper is full of metaphorical language and all native speaker English is idiomatic.
Additionally, the metaphorical use of a word is very often more common today than its literal
use and proficiency in a language can be measured by the appropriate use of expressions
and phrases. By highlighting their colourfulness and expressiveness English idioms may
become very appealing to various English language learners in Croatia.
In accordance with this, Croatian students are first introduced to the cognitive and
linguistic concept of conceptual metaphors and subsequently English idioms as
representatives of peculiar and metaphorical speech forms. After a thorough analysis of
many linguistic, particularly pragmatic and sociocultural features pertaining to English
idiomatic expressions, which are shown in a funny and exciting way, students are asked to
identify and to try to translate nine sentences with English idioms into Croatian. All the idioms
are accompanied by appropriate pictures and images used to provide students with help in
translation.
Next, they are provided with an outline of contrastive analysis of the nine pairs of
idioms in question resulting in two completely identical, three partially and four completely
different phrases. The two-language idioms are contrasted on the morphological, syntactical
communicative and stylistic level and the possible errors that could be made in the process
of translation are assumed. The conclusion that could be drawn on the basis of this analysis
is in accordance with the results of a more detailed and general contrastive analysis of a
large corpus of Croatian and English idioms (Martinović, 2005) stating that cultural
differences make for most lexical differences in both languages, while lexical
correspondences and similarities arise due to their common linguistic background.
Afterwards three different kinds of translation errors are discussed and thoroughly analysed:
a) failure to associate the imagery with meaning, b) not understanding the communicative
and sociolinguistic meaning and c) making linguistic mistakes (grammatical and stylistic).
Special emphasis is placed on the effect and necessity of applying the functionalist
approach or the ‘top-down approach’ to translation where pragmalinguistic or communicative
features are first considered, only later to be followed by cultural and lastly linguistic features.
Bearing in mind the main concept underlying this approach, students are asked to translate a
set of general English idioms into the Croatian idioms. Finally, the different translation
solutions are analysed, the encountered translation errors are discussed and the appropriate
translation equivalents are agreed on.
The translation results obtained during the course of the translation task indicate that
the majority of translation errors (almost 39 %) are to be assigned to students’ inability to find
appropriate translation equivalents or their failure to grasp the communicative meanings of
the given idiomatic phrases. In other words, they were able to associate the English linguistic
expressions in question with both their imagery and meanings but still missed the right
Croatian lexis, such as izlazila mu je para iz ušiju for he went through the roof.
Second-ranked mistakes (36%) are entirely due to students’ failure to guess the
meanings on the basis of the linguistic expression and its imagery. As assumed, this type of
errors is more likely to be made when translating completely different lexical phrases from
English into Croatian, e.g. to bring one’s eggs to a bad market into donijeti svoj proizvod na
loše tržište, since the accompanying imagery and metaphorical meaning are not easily
deductible from the literal comprehension of the linguistic expression itself. It is only after
taking into consideration its metaphorical meaning and searching for the adequate Croatian
equivalent that better translations are provided, for example namjeriti se nakrivu osobu.
Finally, linguistic mistakes account for 27% of the overall translation errors, e.g. biti na
zadnjim izdisajima instead of biti na izdisaju. Although grammar and syntactical mistakes are
supposed to be the least present in the text translated from English into Croatian, this,
unfortunately, indicates considerable percentage of Croatian grammar ignorance among its
native speakers.
To sum up, despite a variety of arguments against translation, translation activities
should definitely be incorporated into the English language teaching material. The
advantages of their use are numerous, but they are to be employed through process–based,
learner-centred, cognitive translation strategies using relevant and authentic texts and
emphasizing the significance of translation equivalence. Hopefully, Teaching English Idioms
through Translation could be considered as one of them.
References

• Carreres, A. (2006, December). Strange bedfellows: Translation and language

teaching. The teaching of translation into L2 in modern languages degrees: Uses and
limitations. In Sixth Symposium on Translation, Terminology and Interpretation in
Cuba and Canada. Canadian Translators, Terminologists and Interpreters Council.
Retrieved from http://www.cttic.org/publications_06Symposium.asp.

• Duff, A. (1994). Translation. Oxford University Press.

• Lavault, T. E. (1985). Les fonctions de la traduction dans l'enseignement des

langues. Paris: Didier Erudition.

• Malmkjaer, K. (1998). Translation and language teaching. Manchester, UK: St

Jerome.

• Owen, D. (2003). Where's the treason in translation? Humanizing Language

Teaching 5 (1).

• Titford, C. (1985). Translation: A post-communicative activity. C. Titford and A. E.

Hieke (eds.) Translation in foreign language teaching and testing. Tübingen: Narr. 73-
86.
• Translation Journal, http://www.bokorlang.com/journal/58education.htm, last updated
on: 09/18/2011
• Teaching translation-British Council, http://www.britishcouncil.org/pt/portugal-ensinar-
ingles-revista-archive.htm
• Martinović, A.(2005) »A contrastive analysis of English and Croatian phrases» in
Granić, Jagoda, ur. (2005). Semantika prirodnog jezika i metajezik semantike,
Zagreb - Split: Hrvatsko društvo za primijenjenu lingvistiku, Zagreb – Split, 457-470

*****

Petra Grgičević Bakarić was born in Split in 1978. She studied English and German at the
Faculty of Philosophy, University of Zagreb, where she also received her Master's degree in
English Translation Studies in 2012. She works at the University Department of Professional
Studies in Split as a senior English lecturer. pgrgicev@oss.unist.hr
Edita Šalov graduated from the English and French Department at the Faculty of Philosophy
in Zagreb. She obtained CPE certificate in London and worked at the Centre for Foreign
Languages in Split prior to her current position of senior English Lecturer at the Split
University Department of Professional Studies. esalov@oss.unist.hr