Translating urban tourist icons across cultures: an English-Malay perspective

Urban tourist icons such as Paris, Istanbul or Sydney are major pull factors of a destination and are often represented in tourist promotional texts (TPTs) to persuade potential tourists to visit a destination. The use of the ‗iconic advertising approach‘(Litvin & Mouri, 2009), which capitalises...

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Main Author:	Mohamed Zain Sulaiman
Format:	Article
Language:	English
Published:	Penerbit UKM 2014
Online Access:	http://journalarticle.ukm.my/7771/ http://journalarticle.ukm.my/7771/ http://journalarticle.ukm.my/7771/1/5467-18828-1-PB.pdf

id	ukm-7771
recordtype	eprints
spelling	ukm-77712016-12-14T06:45:08Z http://journalarticle.ukm.my/7771/ Translating urban tourist icons across cultures: an English-Malay perspective Mohamed Zain Sulaiman, Urban tourist icons such as Paris, Istanbul or Sydney are major pull factors of a destination and are often represented in tourist promotional texts (TPTs) to persuade potential tourists to visit a destination. The use of the ‗iconic advertising approach‘(Litvin & Mouri, 2009), which capitalises on the iconicity of tourist icons, is one of the most effective advertising approaches in affecting a destination image. The strength of this approach lies in its key function of representing easily recognisable and positive images that reinforce or simply recall the audience‘s previously held perceptions about the destination. However, the ways in which urban tourist icons are represented and perceived differ from one audience to another, for it is based on the cultural background of the audience. The differences in how these icons are represented and perceived pose a key challenge for translators of TPTs, whose role is to produce an effective translation in the target language and culture in order to persuade potential tourists in that language and culture. This paper discusses some of the cultural issues involved in translating tourist icons and analyses how a particular ‗tourist icon‘ is represented in a published English TPT (source text) for an Anglo audience and how it has been translated into the Malay language for a Malay audience. The translation (target text) is analysed in terms of its functionality and effectiveness within the cultural context of the target audience. The discourse analysis of the source and target texts is complemented by findings derived from focus group discussions and an analysis of authentic TPTs in Malay (parallel texts). Based on the analysis, a functionally adequate translation which takes into consideration the cultural differences, hence preserving the iconicity of the destination, is proposed. Penerbit UKM 2014 Article PeerReviewed application/pdf en http://journalarticle.ukm.my/7771/1/5467-18828-1-PB.pdf Mohamed Zain Sulaiman, (2014) Translating urban tourist icons across cultures: an English-Malay perspective. GEMA: Online Journal of Language Studies, 14 (3). pp. 159-173. ISSN 1675-8021 http://ejournal.ukm.my/gema/index
repository_type	Digital Repository
institution_category	Local University
institution	Universiti Kebangasaan Malaysia
building	UKM Institutional Repository
collection	Online Access
language	English
description	Urban tourist icons such as Paris, Istanbul or Sydney are major pull factors of a destination and are often represented in tourist promotional texts (TPTs) to persuade potential tourists to visit a destination. The use of the ‗iconic advertising approach‘(Litvin & Mouri, 2009), which capitalises on the iconicity of tourist icons, is one of the most effective advertising approaches in affecting a destination image. The strength of this approach lies in its key function of representing easily recognisable and positive images that reinforce or simply recall the audience‘s previously held perceptions about the destination. However, the ways in which urban tourist icons are represented and perceived differ from one audience to another, for it is based on the cultural background of the audience. The differences in how these icons are represented and perceived pose a key challenge for translators of TPTs, whose role is to produce an effective translation in the target language and culture in order to persuade potential tourists in that language and culture. This paper discusses some of the cultural issues involved in translating tourist icons and analyses how a particular ‗tourist icon‘ is represented in a published English TPT (source text) for an Anglo audience and how it has been translated into the Malay language for a Malay audience. The translation (target text) is analysed in terms of its functionality and effectiveness within the cultural context of the target audience. The discourse analysis of the source and target texts is complemented by findings derived from focus group discussions and an analysis of authentic TPTs in Malay (parallel texts). Based on the analysis, a functionally adequate translation which takes into consideration the cultural differences, hence preserving the iconicity of the destination, is proposed.
format	Article
author	Mohamed Zain Sulaiman,
spellingShingle	Mohamed Zain Sulaiman, Translating urban tourist icons across cultures: an English-Malay perspective
author_facet	Mohamed Zain Sulaiman,
author_sort	Mohamed Zain Sulaiman,
title	Translating urban tourist icons across cultures: an English-Malay perspective
title_short	Translating urban tourist icons across cultures: an English-Malay perspective
title_full	Translating urban tourist icons across cultures: an English-Malay perspective
title_fullStr	Translating urban tourist icons across cultures: an English-Malay perspective
title_full_unstemmed	Translating urban tourist icons across cultures: an English-Malay perspective
title_sort	translating urban tourist icons across cultures: an english-malay perspective
publisher	Penerbit UKM
publishDate	2014
url	http://journalarticle.ukm.my/7771/ http://journalarticle.ukm.my/7771/ http://journalarticle.ukm.my/7771/1/5467-18828-1-PB.pdf
first_indexed	2023-09-18T19:50:35Z
last_indexed	2023-09-18T19:50:35Z
_version_	1777406192149069824

Translating urban tourist icons across cultures: an English-Malay perspective

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