The Pragmatic Evaluation of Translations: Speech Acts in Focus

Pragmatic problem is one of crucial and challenging facets of translation. It is due to the fact that speech acts do not have universal cross-cultural application. Hence, in a good translation the intentions or speech acts in the source language are rendered to appropriate speech acts in the target language. For this aim, translators should use their knowledge of cross-cultural pragmatics to convey the message appropriately in the translated version without causing any offence. Considering a translation approach and Searle’s Speech Act Theory (1969) into account, this study aimed to evaluate the efficiency of translation and eliminating knotty problems in translation. To do so, the English and Persian versions of one episode of SpongeBob Square Pants were scrutinized in terms of Searle s five-fold paradigm to find out to what extent they overlap each other pragmatically. The results showed significant differences in the numbers and types of speech acts found in the two translations. That is, Persian version was more assertive than English version. Another significant difference was due to some inserted sentences used in Persian translation. In addition, the analysis revealed that metaphorical expression in the source version episode were shifted to their equivalence in Persian or substituted by culture specific ones to make the utterances authentic.