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Humor in Political Speeches and Interpreting Strategies

  • The Journal of Translation Studies
  • Abbr : JTS
  • 2019, 20(4), pp.141-163
  • DOI : 10.15749/jts.2019.20.4.006
  • Publisher : The Korean Association for Translation Studies
  • Research Area : Humanities > Interpretation and Translation Studies
  • Received : August 31, 2019
  • Accepted : October 8, 2019
  • Published : October 31, 2019

Lee Migyong 1

1경희대학교

Accredited

ABSTRACT

Humor can be an effective tool in political speeches. Humor, though, is a challenge for interpreters who need to mediate communication between the disparate Source Language and Target Language evoking same playful response among the target audience. With the aim to propose strategies for interpreting humor, this study first looks into how humor is created and what triggers the humorous effect. Second, the study conducts an analysis of 2011 and 2016 White House Correspondents' Dinner speeches delivered by President Obama and their Target Language interpretations to explore strategies employed by ten student interpreters studying at GSIT in Seoul. The analysis shows humorous effect is created by unexpectedness that stem from incongruity in context, meta-text and situation. In order to be received as funny, humorous discourse needs to be unexpected within the predictability of the hearer. The analysis also shows that interpreters will resort to interpreting strategies that will maximize humorous effect - thus, amplification, overstatement and emphasis. Unlike the initial assumption that interpreters will find strategies to fill the knowledge gap between SL speaker and TL audience, interpreters opted to amplify humorous effect by means such as using paralinguistic elements, adding adjectives and adverbs, and choosing more effective word choice.

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