Translating Culture-Bound Lexical Units: ‘a Tough Row to Hoe’
Translating Culture-Bound Lexical Units: ‘a Tough Row to Hoe’

Summary/Abstract: Our experiences of the world are assumed to be filtered by language and culture to a great extent. Consequently, it is difficult to grasp and convey experiences that take place within a different system of filters, outside our own frames of reference. The present paper sets out to analyse the cultural dimension of translation, as illustrated in the translation of phraseological units, which are ‘culture-bound’ lexical units. The study examines actual practices of this type of translation that mediates cultural differences, while trying to reconcile respect for the cultural specificity with the desire to render the foreign familiar.

• Details
• Contents