Media Language: Equivalence in the Translation of Headlines

Abstract

Equivalence is the leading subject in translation studies; accordingly, many different theories on equivalence have been discussed in detail within this field over the past few decades. Equivalence in translation is affected by many different aspects, i.e., aspects of meaning between words and expressions, grammar and participants in various communicative situations, semantics, pragamtics, etc. The concept of equivalence with the focus on equivalence degrees is provided; the overview and characterization of the main features as well as specifics of translation of media language (headlines in particular) are presented in the article as well. The paper focuses on the equivalence in translation of media language, headlines of on-line news articles in particular, since headlines are considered as crucial and the most important part of news articles. One hundred English headlines and their Lithuanian translations have been selected for the analysis which is performed according to the degrees of equivalence: optimum translation, partial equivalence, zero equivalence. Partial equivalence is divided into two narrower subtypes which are: near-optimum and weak translation.

DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5755/j01.sal.0.21.2839