4. Critical Discourse Analysis: A Systematic Approach

As has been demonstrated in the literature review, research on the translation of political texts has so far dealt with national and international political contexts (Section 3.2.1)., the translator as a point of potentially conflicting political views (Section 3.2.2)., the translation strategies associated with the translation of political texts (Section 3.2.3.), the effects of translators’ own political commitment (Section 3.2.4.), the misuse of translated political texts for purposeful manipulation (Section 3.2.5.) and urged critical awareness (Section 3.2.6.).

Not underestimating the merits of any of the above approaches, it must be noted that these approaches are not strictly text and context based approaches, nor are they systematic enough to obtain valid research results in the field of translating political texts. Such a systematic approach, in my view, should extend to social, political, cultural, historical, hermeneutical and political contextual features as much as possible and/or relevant. Furthermore, none of the above-described approaches include all the relevant contextual features in a systematic manner, which is necessary if one wishes to understand how the interdependence and the interplay between these contextual features surface on a textual level. It may thus be concluded that systematic and theoretically well-grounded critical approaches incorporating all of the above contextual features of political texts have not yet been applied in Translation Studies.

All this points towards the realisation that the analytical tools Translation Studies currently offers in terms of the study of political discourse are rather ad hoc and the research findings available are thus incomparable.

In order to make future research results comparable and to systematise the approach to the translation of political texts, van Dijk’s (1993, 1997, 2001, 2003) Framework of Critical Discourse Analysis (henceforth: van Dijk’s CDA) may present a reliable tool. Van Dijk (1993) views discourse in its cultural, historical and political context in dynamic terms supposing that each contextual feature affects not only all other features but the resulting text as well. At the same time, CDA interprets and explains textual features and phenomena in the light of the actual social, cultural and historical context.

It is claimed that van Dijk’s CDA may be successfully used for the analysis of political discourse in Translation Studies for the following reasons. Van Dijk’s CDA assumes that power relations are discursive. Thus, CDA describes the “linguistic and discursive nature of social relations of power in contemporary societies. This is partly a matter of how power relations are exercised and negotiated in discourse.” (Fairclough and Wodak 1997: 272). This suggests that power relations can be observed in political discourse through van Dijk’s CDA.

Van Dijk’s CDA maintains that discourse constitutes society and culture. It is claimed that there is a dialectical relationship between discourse, society, culture and power. This practically means that “every instance of language use makes its own small contribution to reproducing and/or transforming society and culture, including power relations” (Fairclough and Wodak 1997: 273). This means that discourse concurrently represents reality, constructs social relations and social identities as well as creates a unified picture of such reality, relations and identities within one single text. Consequently, word order, style, coherence and other properties of discourse may be described as language users’ attempts to actively construct and display social and cultural roles and identities as well as realities (van Dijk 1997). Therefore, van Dijk’s CDA is may be used for the comparison of source and target language political discourse.

Van Dijk’s CDA claims that discourse does ideological work. This suggests that ideologies represent and construct society by reproducing unequal relations of power (Fairclough and Wodak 1997). In this sense, in order to uncover ‘ideological work’, besides text analysis one must consider how texts are interpreted and received and must, at the same time, account for their social effects (Fairclough and Wodak 1997). Consequently, discourse must be interpreted and explained in its social, cultural, historical context, which is a crucial factor to consider in Translation Studies.

Van Dijk’s CDA states that discourse is historical. In this sense, “[d]iscourse is not produced without context and cannot be understood without taking the context into consideration” (Duranti and Goodvin qtd. in Fairclough and Wodak 1997: 276). In line with pragmatics, the interpretation of a text is only meaningful if its use in a specific discoursal situation is considered, if the cultural and ideological context of a text is recognized, and if it is explored what past events the discourse relates to (Fairclough and Wodak 1997). Therefore, van Dijk’s CDA takes the communicative situation, its features and intertextuality into account as well as interprets intertextual references and allusions. All this can be used in the comparison of source and target language political discourse.

Van Dijk’s CDA asserts that discourse is a form of social action. In this sense, discourse will reproduce existing power and ideological relations. This also enables van Dijk’s CDA to be used for pinpointing, analysing and contextually interpreting ideology related translation shifts.

Van Dijk’s CDA asserts that discourse analysis is interpretative and explanatory. This is envisaged in a way that “[u]nderstanding takes place not through a tabula rasa, but against the background of emotions, attitudes and knowledge” (Fairclough and Wodak 1997: 278). That is, the audience’s emotional (emotions), formal (attitudes) and cognitive (knowledge-related) schemata (or mental representations) must be considered when analysing texts. Such an analysis may uncover different translation behaviours surfacing in target texts and may help explain target text production.