Translating African-American Vernacular English into German
The problem of 'Jim' in Mark Twain's Huckleberry Finn
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 3606609 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Raphael Berthele (0000-0003-1403-4116, University of Fribourg, corresponding author) |
| Year | 2000 |
| Volume | 4 |
| Issue | 4 |
| Pages | 588-614 |
| Publication date | 2000-11-01 |
| Peer Reviewed | Yes |
| Open Access | Yes |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Journal of Sociolinguistics (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 1360-6441 • E-ISSN: 1467-9841 |
| Publisher | Wiley (PUBLISHER • GB) |
| DOI | 10.1111/1467-9481.00131 |
| OpenAlex | W2154645570 |
| Language | EN |
| Citations received | 15 |
| References cited | 5 |
This paper focuses on the most important problem translators are faced with when translating Mark Twain's Huckleberry Finn into German: how can the speech of the African-American character Jim be rendered? When translating Jim's passages substantial problems arise because there is no exact German equivalent of AAVE. This paper examines both orthographic and other linguistic strategies to differentiate Jim's voice over the last hundred years. This historical analysis shows that in most translations before the 1960s, these strategies downgrade Jim's linguistic and cognitive faculties, depicting his speech as a grammatically simplified pidgin. More contemporary translations, however, opt for devices that depict Jim in colloquial and spoken language that does not carry the same amount of sociolinguistic stigma. Thus, changing translation techniques shed light on prevailing attitudes toward non-standard varieties of both German and English
American English · Character (mathematics · German · Linguistics · Pidgin · Sociolinguistics · Sociology · Vernacular · History · Lexicography and Language Studies · Linguistic Variation and Morphology · Mathematics · Philosophy · Swearing, Euphemism, Multilingualism
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| Unique citing works | 15 |
|---|---|
| Citations per year | 0,63 |
| Citation span | 2002 - 2025 (24) |
| Citation velocity | recent |
| Highly cited | No |
| Citation types | Neutral: 14 |