| Abstract [eng] |
One of the main features of tourism information websites is culture-specific lexis. As the goal of tourism information websites is to represent the culture of a country, the translation of such texts is mainly aggravated by the names of cultural realia. The aim of the present Master‘s Thesis is to analyze the meanings of the names of cultural realia using culturological approach, to reveal the dominant patterns used for rendering the names of realia, and to determine the equivalence between the Lithuanian names and their English equivalents by analysing their semantic content. Although the present research deals with the translation material, the rendering of the names of cultural realia is viewed more widely that it is in translation studies. Although the insights of the translation theorists were taken into consideration, this research is based on the theories of contrastive semantics and ethnolinguistics which focus on the world view of a nation reflected in its language; their differences are revealed through comparing the languages. In this thesis English is viewed as a means used by Lithuanian authors of tourism information texts or translators to introduce the elements of their own culture to the foreigners. The thesis tries to reveal the extent to which it is possible to reconstruct Lithuanian worldview reflected by the Lithuanian language and how the English equivalents to the names of Lithuanian cultural realia can be understood by the users of English to whom it is not necessarily a mother tongue. Due to increasing number of intercultural contacts and Lithuania becoming more and more open to visitors from all over the world, it is becoming more and more important to maintain not only the quantity of the release of information representing Lithuania but also their quality. The results of the research could be useful to translators-practitioners, as well as the specialists of communication, cultural heritage and tourism concerned with Lithuania’s image on international level. As far as the function of tourism websites is not only informing but also advertising our land to its potential visitors, it is very important to render specific lexis to prevent the readers from having a distorted image and help them get proper associations. |
