Translation as an intertextual practice – Farzaneh Farahzad

Romina Ghorbanlou
This article talks about the relationship between prototext (source text) and metatext (target text) from an intertextual
point of view, and it argues that the metatext repeats and replicates the form and content of the prototext without being
limited to it because they have an intertextual relationship. Interlingual and intralingual levels of intertextuality are
distinguished. On the first, the metatext is related to the prototext and its other metatexts in different languages; on the
second, the prototext is related to all texts that have appeared before it, both in content and form. The reason for the
existence of so many target texts is the relationship they have among themselves with what is also called the
"corresponding source text". This relationship was known as equivalence, but now a new definition of it is needed, one
that considers the target text as a "target language reality". To do this, it is important to examine the nature of text and its
definition as product, process and intertext.
Text as product
Due to the influence of structural linguistics, a text was considered self-contained as it carried all the elements such as
meaning, message, author's intention, coherence, cohesion, etc., and the readers, who were considered passive and non-
interactive, only had to decipher and extract the meaning. A text was a set of elements that controlled the reader's
understanding, focused on the linguistic structure and textual meaning rather than the meaning-making process, and
assumed only a single, stable and fixed meaning for each text. In this view of translation, it was assumed that each source
text element has a single meaning and there is only one correct translation of it.
Text as a process
In this case, the text is viewed from the perspective of poststructuralism, which suggests that the text is not self-contained
but is a process in which the reader interacts with the text producer, the reader is no longer passive, and there are multiple
meanings because each person understands one meaning differently from others and differently from time to time. This
expands the scope of translation far beyond the formal and linguistic features of a physically recorded material.
Text as intertext
This approach is about the relationship between a text and other texts. Bakhtin and Volosinov refer to this as "dialog,"
"contextuality," "intersubjectivity," and "contact between texts." Although Bakhtin is known as the creator of the idea,
Kristeva is the originator of the term 'intertextuality'. For her, a text is not an isolated piece but 'a permutation of texts' in
which 'several utterances from other texts overlap and neutralize each other'. She (De Nooy, 1998: 270) believes that 'each
text is constructed as a mosaic of quotations; each text is the absorption and transformation of another'. Thus, the text
becomes an intertext and stands in diachronic relation to earlier texts and in synchronic relation to any text produced in
the present. However, intertextuality calls into question the origin and source. From this perspective, no text is original or
source.
Types of intertext
There are two types of intertextuality: overt and covert. One is overt, in which the intertext contains direct quotations and
citations from other intertexts. The other is the covert, where the intertext refers to and depends on other intertexts, not
only in terms of genre and discourse, but also and especially in terms of concepts. These two are by no means
dichotomous, for intertexts relate to each other directly and indirectly.
Translation as intertextual practice
Every translation deals with two languages, two cultures and two socio-historical contexts, all of which are different from
each other. When an intertext is translated into another language, it is de-contextualized and removed from its own
context to enter the new context of the other language. Two physically recorded intertexts are important and related to
translation, namely source text and target text, but in the context of intertextuality we have metatext and prototext. The
prototext is the intertext that is translated and the metatext is the result of the act of translation. The two intertexts are
related to each other once they are placed in a translation context, and their relationship is discussed in the case of
intertextuality.
First, the prototext:
(1) overtly and covertly repeats and transforms other texts that precede it, in its own language, content and form;
(2) is not the source of anything, including metatext;
(3) has no original or fixed meaning.
Second, the metatext:
(1) repeats and covertly transforms the prototext in content and form;
(2) is not a reproduction of any other text, including the prototext;
(3) reflects only one of the possible meanings (interpretations) of the prototext; and
(4) can never be equivalent to the prototext because it unfolds in a different socio-historical and intertextual context.
Levels of intertextuality
- Local (intralingual) level:
At this level, the prototext is related to other texts of its genre and language, repeating their form and content, but they all
differ from each other in the case of a new conceptualization. Even though this causes the act of translation, this prototext
is neither the source nor the original, but it is made for the overt and covert intertextual references in the language.
- Global (interlingual) level:
At this level, the prototext is translated and related by metatext to other texts of the same genre and content in different
languages. It appears before the translation and after the metatext(s), while its content, terms and formal properties are
repeated in the translation. This creates a relationship between the prototext and every other metatext in both languages.