Cross-cultural Problems of Translation of Compliments

Abstract

In this paper, various strategies employed for the speech act of compliments in Persian and English are studied and some examples of cultural misunderstandings that may happen to be troublesome in translation of compliments exchanges in English and Persian contexts will be presented. The present study of compliments in Persian and English shows that the use of polite expressions is mostly less positive in Persian in comparison with those of English. Moreover, Persian speakers seem to be more modest, indirect, ambiguous, lengthy and obscure than the English ones. Besides, Persian speakers, unlike the English ones, as a socio-cultural norm, mostly have the tendency to leave the compliments somewhat vague and avoid assertive statements and all these differences may bring about negative transfer in the process of translation of from L1 to L2 and vice versa. To bridge between socio-pragmatics and interpretation/translation fields, the present study will try to open perspectives on a better understanding of underlying universal social and linguistic conventions in both Persian and English cultures. Furthermore, such a study can provide us with valuable information on cross-cultural problems concerning the translation of speech act of compliments in English and Persian and therefore prove of extremely value to both fields of Translation and TESOL.