News translation and its impact on stereotypical discourses and on reshaping the world: MEMRI as a case study.

Abstract

Translation is considered as rewriting information about an event in a language other than the original, which cannot always be arbitrary. Thus, news translation can sometimes be ideologically motivated and reshaped for consumption by new readers (Bassnett, 2013; Bassnett, 1990; Lefevere, 2002; Bielsa and Bassnett, 2008). Therefore, this dissertation explores the ideologies implied in news translation language by analysing 4 videoclips& a written report about ‘The Deal of the Century’ (TDOC) found on the Middle East Media Research Institute (MEMRI) website. The researcher used both critical discourse analysis (CDA) and narrative theory taking (MEMRI) as a case study – to measure the impact these translations have on stereotypical discourses and on reshaping the world. This was accomplished by analysing people’s responses to MEMRI’s tweets about TDOC. The researcher developed a systematic, justifiable/unjustifiable filtering method to approach bias in news translation. This method separates the intentional and unintentional mistakes identified in the translations to examine their arbitrariness – determining whether they are ideologically/politically motivated. Although translated news is often evaluated and considered in its ‘verbal dimension’, with little attention given to its multimodal dimensions (Gambier, 2006), this research has investigated both arenas. The study concluded that media platforms have created a new way of delivering their ideologies without filtering the linguistics choices to a great extent. MEMRI’s strategic filtering, for instance, has leaned toward emphasizing the meaning of the text, whether that be through careful punctuation use or through making the implicit explicit in a way that intensifies the meaning. The impact of this is evident in people’s negative responses to these translations on twitter.