The Crisis of Translation in the Western Media: A Critical Discourse Analysis of al-Q?cida Communiqués

This work takes into account the forces globalization exerts on international news broadcasts primarily focusing on the invisible, but vital role translation plays in enabling the global news process to take place. Particular attention is given to elucidating possible reasons behind translation distortion that occurs when language is transferred from source text to target text. Research for this book revealed three primary causes of translation infidelity and are, therefore, explored, investigated, and analyzed in detail. First, significant evidence incriminates two of the three major international news agencies for not offering any type of translator training for anyone on their staff. Second, the Western Materialism-Eastern Spiritualism ontological dichotomy seems to be causing a natural distortion of fidelity to take place; especially regarding religiously-charged Arabic terrorist communiques. Third, a journalist's personal biases- a product of engrained ideologies learned through one's society, educational system, and language- consciously and unconsciously influence their writing choices."