Abstract If a joke is not translated as a joke, the translation is bad. This article asserts that almost all verbally expressed humour is translatable, given appropriate strategies and reasonable criteria for success. It focuses on two problem areas, language-specific jokes (in particular puns) and culture-specific jokes, distinguishing these from more manageable kinds of humour. A brief survey of research on puns is given, followed by practical advice to increase the translator's responses to wordplay, and a systematic way to proceed instead of just waiting for inspiration. Translators of humour (like writers of humour) have a licence to use language creatively, and this enlarges the options for handling outrageous jokes. There follows a shorter discussion of culture-specific jokes and how they differ from ‘universal humour’. Some light must be shed on obscurity, yet obviousness is a killer of humour.
%0 Journal Article
%1 Low2011
%A Low, Peter Alan
%D 2011
%I Taylor & Francis Group
%J Perspectives
%K humor juego_de_palabras traducción
%N 1
%P 59-70
%R 10.1080/0907676X.2010.493219
%T Translating jokes and puns
%U http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/0907676X.2010.493219
%V 19
%X Abstract If a joke is not translated as a joke, the translation is bad. This article asserts that almost all verbally expressed humour is translatable, given appropriate strategies and reasonable criteria for success. It focuses on two problem areas, language-specific jokes (in particular puns) and culture-specific jokes, distinguishing these from more manageable kinds of humour. A brief survey of research on puns is given, followed by practical advice to increase the translator's responses to wordplay, and a systematic way to proceed instead of just waiting for inspiration. Translators of humour (like writers of humour) have a licence to use language creatively, and this enlarges the options for handling outrageous jokes. There follows a shorter discussion of culture-specific jokes and how they differ from ‘universal humour’. Some light must be shed on obscurity, yet obviousness is a killer of humour.
@article{Low2011,
abstract = {Abstract If a joke is not translated as a joke, the translation is bad. This article asserts that almost all verbally expressed humour is translatable, given appropriate strategies and reasonable criteria for success. It focuses on two problem areas, language-specific jokes (in particular puns) and culture-specific jokes, distinguishing these from more manageable kinds of humour. A brief survey of research on puns is given, followed by practical advice to increase the translator's responses to wordplay, and a systematic way to proceed instead of just waiting for inspiration. Translators of humour (like writers of humour) have a licence to use language creatively, and this enlarges the options for handling outrageous jokes. There follows a shorter discussion of culture-specific jokes and how they differ from ‘universal humour’. Some light must be shed on obscurity, yet obviousness is a killer of humour. },
added-at = {2015-12-11T19:01:29.000+0100},
author = {Low, Peter Alan},
biburl = {https://www.bibsonomy.org/bibtex/22628a068e2c48eb035459460ce46f936/albalf},
doi = {10.1080/0907676X.2010.493219},
interhash = {29d69bd6601237db5cf85791441ea1ca},
intrahash = {2628a068e2c48eb035459460ce46f936},
journal = {Perspectives},
keywords = {humor juego_de_palabras traducción},
language = {EN},
mendeley-tags = {Jokes,Puns,Translation,Wordplay},
month = mar,
number = 1,
pages = {59-70},
publisher = {Taylor & Francis Group},
timestamp = {2015-12-12T12:12:31.000+0100},
title = {Translating jokes and puns},
url = {http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/0907676X.2010.493219},
volume = 19,
year = 2011
}