Postscript: I think one of the words I was looking for earlier (which of course only occurs to me now) is that in reference to honorifics and other specific terms, what we call "translation" is actually shorthand – more specifically "target language shorthand for the concept this represents in the source culture, or at least the reader's understanding thereof". Obviously this also describes how meaning works in general, plus word choice and nuance can already be tricky within one language to start with… but when filtered through the lens of another language the question of what shorthand works best* becomes no longer trivial in many cases. If it was ever trivial to start with!
(*again oversimplifying on multiple levels, including the assumption that the reader is sufficiently fluent in the target language for there to be a good shorthand at all, but that's a whole 'nother can of squiggly things)
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Date: 2022-02-08 05:39 am (UTC)Postscript: I think one of the words I was looking for earlier (which of course only occurs to me now) is that in reference to honorifics and other specific terms, what we call "translation" is actually shorthand – more specifically "target language shorthand for the concept this represents in the source culture, or at least the reader's understanding thereof". Obviously this also describes how meaning works in general, plus word choice and nuance can already be tricky within one language to start with… but when filtered through the lens of another language the question of what shorthand works best* becomes no longer trivial in many cases. If it was ever trivial to start with!
(*again oversimplifying on multiple levels, including the assumption that the reader is sufficiently fluent in the target language for there to be a good shorthand at all, but that's a whole 'nother can of squiggly things)