Explain what is meant by the terms 'domestication' and 'foreignisation' in translation theory.

The first 200 words of this essay...

(a) Explain what is meant by the terms 'foreignisation' and 'domestication' in translation theory.

The notions of foreignisation and domestication in translation theory were first proposed by Friederich Schleiermacher, a German theologian and philosopher who also dabbled in a range of other subjects, including linguistics. His terms for these concepts, alienation and naturalisation, were later taken up in the twentieth century by Lawrence Venuti, who renamed them foreignisation and domestication. These approaches to translation were based on the idea that in translating a text, the culture of the original text has to be accounted for in the translation, either by 'adapting' it to the culture of the target language, and thus bringing the text to the reader (domestication), or by making the target language adapt to the culture of the source text, and thus taking the reader to the text (foreignisation).

Both approaches have attracted negativity: domestication is often seen as a betrayal of the culture expressed by the original text, while foreignisation is seen as inherently elitist and not always something that necessarily adds to the diversity of the situation (Robinson 1997, 109-112), although Robinson points out earlier in his criticism that foreignisation can be seen very