Eponimical linguistic parts of the language as the object of Russian translation.

Translators into Russian are often heard say that proper names are to be transliterated and there is no need to bother translating them from English. It may even be seen in real life. Still, there are quite a few proper names where this rule of thumb does not work.

You may come across some word combination which are partly a kind of proper names and partially a sort of common phrases. The eponymous lexical items are implied here. Though prior to defining those limits as well as other complex issues connected with eponymic expressions functioning in Russian translated texts, it is vital to give a little attention to the concept of the eponym and the way it works in the language of linguistics. The array of all words in both English and Russian is divided into 2 big categories: appellatives and proper names. If you understand ancient Greek, you might know that the lexical unit “eponym” means “naming” or “giving the name”. For ancient people eponyms originally meant people, gods or heroes, whose legendary names were employed to name villages, families and various objects, as well as officers (e.g. archonts, consuls). At the same time the actual meaning of "eponym" expanded, though it was used to refer not only to the a name of somebody, but it extended itself to refer to animals or an objects.

Currently, students of linguistics use the term “eponym” to speak of a word that has ceased working as a proper name and now functions as a simple regular noun. Thus, we work with three elements of an eponym:

1. an entity or an object

2. proper name

3. regular word.

When a translator works with an English text, they have to guess the background competence of the audience for which the English text was intended and the level of competence of the Russian reader. The meaning of eponymism is created on stereotypical associations concerning a concrete, particular eponym and having the nature of encyclopedic connotation. Variations among these implications in the English and Russian tongues lead to a number of possibilities of appellativization of proper names. The primary issue related to eponymisms is the matter of their etymological transparency which is a hidden peculiarity that depends on the linguistic competence and encyclopedic awareness of Russian native speakers. There is a question here: how should a translator handle eponyms? A number of eponyms share a common cultural background which makes translators job easy, for example “superman” or “Lolita”.

If there is no transparency of the context among the speakers from the 2 cultures, then all the same the task of an interpreter is a no brainer. (e.g.: Adonis who was named after a handsome young man adored by both Aphrodite and Persephone and killed by a boar, or the game of badminton that got its name from Badminton in SW England, country seat of the Duke of Beaufort, where it was played). Nevertheless, the situation is more complicated if a some eponymism is transparent in English, and hence it features a bit of symbolic connotation, and the case of Russian languge it does not excite any mental reactions of native speakers who fail to connect the common word and its lexical meaning with a suitable eponym. However, not every eponym causes difficulties. There are some eponyms which are pretty straightforward to understand.

Russian language translation agency Transneed offers high quality translation services in translation of documents, business correspondence, literary, technical translations to Russian and free translation online. All Russian translations are edited and proofread.

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