LA PROBLEMATIQUE DE L’ETHNOGRAPHIE DANS L’ACTIVITE TRADUISANTE (LE CAS DU NIGERIA)

Abstract

In fact, translation is an operation or activity that aims to render the meaning of a message expressed in the source language into the target language in order to achievelinguistic equivalence. However, this presentation tries to prove that despite the consideration of the linguistic elements in a translation activity, translation has much affinity with culture because the meaning of a word is derived from the culture of the community or society that speaks that language. This paper observes that there are a lot of cultural elementsin literary works which normally create problems for the translator if he or she does not possess the cultural baptism in the languages in question. The paper aims at alerting the translator of these problems and to proffer solutions to avoid realizing a translation which is far from the intended message of the writer of the source language.Consequently the paper insists that a good translator should become what he calls a cultural mid-wife.