Communicative translation in news reporting: A case study of daily nation and Taifa Leo newspapers.

Abstract

This research investigated the level of retention of meaning and equivalence in translated international news items from English to Kiswahili languages in the Daily Nation and Taifa Leo Newspaper publications. Based on Nida and Newmark‟s structuralisation of news discourse, theories of translation, equivalence and framing theories were compiled together as a framework to map international news translation into a multi-level social context. The research confirmed Nida‟s assertations in his dynamic equivalence theory which concludes that all languages have the same capability of expressing by saying, anything that can be said in a particular language can certainly be said in another language, with reasonable accuracy by establishing equivalent points of reference in the receptor's culture and matching his cognitive framework by restructuring the constitutive elements of the message. The tenets of these theories served as a guideline and enabled the research to achieve its objectives. The study aimed to find out the gaps in news translation researches, the role of equivalence in meaning retention during translation as a factor of communication, how and why framing occurs during news translation. Through Comparative and qualitative Content Analysis, discourse on International news stories from Daily Nation, source text, and corresponding Taifa Leo, Target Text, translations were reviewed. Interviews with different Nation Media Group Staffs were also referred to as supportive evidences from media insiders, which expanded the research scope to professional and organizational levels. The result of the study revealed that among other entities, direct translations affected equivalence in the translations. The study also revealed that reframing which often occurred during the translations altered the intended meaning hence affecting the intended communication all together. From the reviews of the news items it was discovered that most of the previous studies on news translation focused on strategies at textual levels in order to suit target Kiswahili-speaking audiences‟ interest and knowledge. The study also proved that it is possible to explore the social context behind media organization‟s practice through studying international news translation, which could help us better understand developing countries in a globalised world that the discourse power is to be shared and varied. Data collection involved reviewing the Daily Nation and Taifa Leo Internatinal News Segments. Discourse from newspapers and other existing secondary data inform of books, masters exertations, theses, magazines, journals, seminar papers among other was reviewed in the library and the findings presented in prose after comparative and qualitative content analysis. The findings of the study will be useful to the editors and translators of English-Swahili news items as the adoption of the reccomendations herein will enable them reliable news translations.