Taboos as Cultural Constraints in Translation:A comparative Analysis on Stephen King’s Salem Lot

OpenAlex · Türkçe

The translation has always been influenced by cultural events, religious beliefs and political ideologies. Therefore, almost in all historical conditions, translators tend to rewrite what is acceptable from both social and personal angles. The translator conducts a thorough study when deciding which cultural elements are important and how necessary it is to translate them into the target language. In other words, considering the possible cultural implications of a translated text requires being aware of all these issues and implementing the most appropriate translation strategy specific for each situation. When the cooperation between the culture and society in which the translator lives in is considered, the rationale behind the censorship applied in the source text can be understood. For translators, linguistic taboos impose major struggles and censorship of taboo language plays an important role in the translation of taboo expressions. Accordingly, the primary purpose of this work is to discuss taboo, censorship and taboo translation strategies through Stephen King's famous novel Salem Lot (1975). In this context, two Turkish translations published by different publishing houses at different times are analyzed in terms of strategies used by the translators, taking into account the social, cultural and political conditions of the period. In the categorization of translation strategies, the classification carried out by Keith Allan and Kate Burridge (