EGP and ESP syllabuses

            EGP means English for General Purposes and ESP means English for Specific/ Special Purposes. In the first, English is studied for general purposes as we see in English learnt / taught in high schools and colleges. Here, the main purpose is to learn the language and literature in that language. However, in ESP, English is learnt / taught for specific vocational purposes. For example, English for medical courses, engineers, law, journalists science students etc. ESP is mainly related to 'Needs Analysis,' So, it is natural that syllabuses for EGP and ESP are / should be different.

          The primary aim of an ESP course would be to provide students with the language they require to pursue their scientific studies. For example, as Widdowson has suggested, English for Science and Technology must be concerned with developing the ability for scientific and technological communication. However, an EGP course has much wider and general objectives. Here English is considered as a 'good thing' to learn as a part of education as a whole.

          In EGP, there is no immediate and specific requirement to use the language in any communicative situation. On the other hand, an ESP course would restrict its objectives to immediate and utilitarian needs of the students. So, the syllabus should provide the students with language they can put to immediate practical uses. In ESP, students have to utilize English in real life communication. Therefore, they need to be taught language use (communicative form) and not language usage (grammar). In other words, in ESP, communicative compentence is more important than linguistic competence. The syllabus for ESP, consequently, is of communicative type.

           ESP has specific purposes and so the nature of the situation which the students will have to face is predicted. For example, scientific language, report-writing, note-making and such other presentation skills would be included in an ESP syllabus. On the contrary, an EGP syllabus has wider and general objectives. So it would not be relevant to the learners with specific purposes.

          The EGP and ESP syllabuses are different regarding the four skills of language too.

In EGP, reading and writing skills are given more importance. On the contrary, in ESP syllabus, all the four skills - listening, Speaking, Reading and writing are emphasised though with varying degrees. The emphasis is given on the basis of the communicative needs of the students needed for their profession. In the ESP course, skills will be taught at the level of communication. On the other hand, in the EGP course, the segmental or sentence syntactic (grammar) level will be given more importance. ESP course will be concerned with teaching micro-skills only. For example, a journalist may not need to write a composition. He/she would rather want only to be taught how to write good summaries in English. Similarly, a policeman would need training in writing traffic accident reports.

          EGP and ESP syllabuses differ in their emphasis on grammar and vocabullary as well. For example, ESP syllabus will emphasise scientific English uses of certain constructions of language such as the passive voice, imperatives and tenses. This does not mean that other structures of language are neglected. ESP syllabus entails all the main structures. However, those items of language which are widely used in the professions receive more attention and concentration. Such variation is not found in EGP Sylla-buses. As for as Vocabulary is related, ESP syllabus emphasises Vocabullary of scientific concepts. For example, the students of Zoology will refer to the concepts like respi-ration, reproduction, water-relations etc. In ESP syllabus, attention is paid to Latin stems too.

          An ESP syllabus differs in approach from an EGP syllabus too.  An ESP syllabus should have an essential aim i.e. fulfilment of the students' requirements. Such require. ments are immediate, concrete and practical. So, an ESP sylabus necessarily includes communicative approach.

          An EGP syllabus does not focus on specific uses of the language. So, it will be more structural. It will be more concerned with usage rather than use. On the contrary, an ESP syllabus aims to equip the students to function in specific situations. So, it will need to focus on use. It will show how scientists and technologists use the language to commu-nicate. They are not taught only what linguistic elements are commonly used. Widdowson rightly comments :

"Communicative competence does not automatically follow mastery of usage and system of language." Thus, an EGP syllabus would be of little benefit to the students of science and technology.

           An ESP syllabus needs to be functional in approach as science students often fulfill the functions like description, classification, giving instructions etc. Here, grammar will be taught but only as a tool to work. This approach enhances students' interest and motiva-tion. It also shows them how they can use their knowledge of language to serve their scientific communicative needs. For example, the conditional tense ('lf Patterns') may be taught as the means of expressing scientific hypothesising e.g. If the temperature rises more than two degrees the ice will melt.

          An ESP syllabus is concerned with teaching communicative uses of the language.

So, it should adopt a rather tolerant approach to student's mistakes than an EGP sylla-

bus.

          An ESP syllabus has to adopt a positive approach to the use of the first language and translation as useful tools. This is because the process and procedures of science are the same in all languages. Students of various branches of science are already familiar with the process and procedures of their fields, the task of an ESP course is to take advantages of the knowledge found in the first language. It becomes easy to show how these procedures can be expressed through English. An EGP course would not do this as it does not focus on specific area of knowledge.

          Finally, students of an ESP course want the target language to express their needs.

English is now established as the principled international language of science. So, without it their success and development in their profession would be restricted. These students also need English to communicate with English-speaking scientists and experts whom they would meet during their study or profession.

Factors affecting Language Learning

Factors affecting Language Learning

          Language is a means of expression our emotions and thoughts. Some children acquire language more quickly than others. Some factors that affect learning language are as follows.

1. Maturation and Symbolization :

            These biological factors are proposed by the structuralists while explaining language ac-quisition. Language is a system of symbols. So, the child should have the mental capacity to hold in mind a symbol realization of something else. It is through such capacity that a child masters language features like displacement.

2. Age Level :

            There are various age levels when children learn a language. According to Chomsky the ability to learn a native language develops within a fixed period from birth to middle childhood. A child generally achieves language fluency at the age of 3 years.

3. Language acquisition Schedule:

            It is related to the age factor. As children grow their vocabulary also grows. There are miles stones in the development of a child's language learning.

4. Exposure to Language :

           The learner's normal brain development depends on early and regular exposure to language. Children are exposed to adult language and it influences their language development. A child will acquire the language if he/she is sufficiently exposed to children who don't get this exposure will not achieve proper grammatical competence.

5. Child's Health and Language Disability :

             Several studies have shown that the child's health and language disability have much influence on language learning. Language disorders like dyslexia affect language learning.

6. Family Factors :

            The language of the parents and other family members determines the language of a child. The interactions within the family play a vital role in offering a child verbal contacts and the opportunity to use language in meaningful ways.

7. Personal Factors :

             Some personal factors like gender, birth order and nature of birth also affect the child's learning of a language. It is found that girls have an advantage over boys in language acquisi-tion. Some children learn a language more quickly and easily than others. This is also found in learning the second language.

            There are a few other factors which are beyond the control of the learner. These factors are broadly categorized as Internal and External factors.

Internal Factors :

1. Age:

             Second language learning is affected by the age of the learner. As the children know their mother-tongue, they acquire a new language effectively.

2. Personality: 

             Anxious learners usually make slower progress as they are less willing to take advantage of opportunities. However, more but going students will not worry about the inevitability of making mistakes. They will take risks and thus will have more practice.

3. Motivation: 

             Intrinsic motivation has been found to correlate strongly with educational achievement. Students who enjoy language learning will do better than those who do not. Extrinsic motivation is also a significant factor. For example, ESL students who need to learn English in order to take a place at an American university are likely to make greater efforts and thus greater progress.

4. Experience: 

             Learners who have acquired general knowledge and experience are in a stronger position to develop a new language than those who have not. For example, the student who has already lived in three different countries and has been exposed to various languages has a stronger base for learning a further language than the student who hasn't had such experience.

5. Cognition: 

              Generally, it seems that students with greater cognitive abilities (intelligence) will make faster progress.

6. Native Language: 

              Students who are learning a second language from the same family as their mother-tongue have a much easier task than those are not. For example, a Dutch child will learn English more quickly than a Japanese child.

External Factors :

1. Curriculum (Syllabus) :

           For ESL students, it important that the totality of their educational experience is appropriate for their needs.

2. Instruction (Teaching) :

          Some language teachers are better than others at providing effective learning experiences for the students. These students will make faster progress.

3. Culture and Status:

          It is found that the students who are from the culture status in which they are learning the language make faster progress.

4. Access to Native Speakers:

          Those students who have extensive access to native speakers of the language are likely to progress faster.

5. Gender : 

          It is found that girls learn language faster than boys.

6. Residence:

          Residence is one more factor that affects language learning. If children are happy in their country of residence, they can learn language better. However, some children have to go from one place to another because of the transfers of their parents. Such students generally make slow progress.

7. Multilingualism: 

          The use of two or more languages at home can affect language devel-opment. According to same linguists, multilingualism can lead to a slight delay in early language development.

                 Thus, there are various factors which influence both first language acquisition and second language learning.

Relation between Language and Culture

            Language and culture are deeply intertwined. One cannot understand one's culture without accessing its language directly. When one learns a new language, it does not include only the grammar and vocabulary of that language. It also means to learn about the specific society's customs and behaviour. When one wants to learn someone's language, he/ she must know the culture to which that language belongs. This is because language is very much ingrained in culture. That is why, it is said that "language is culture and culture is language". Not only this but Fatiah Guessabi argues that "culture is a language in itself".

          In fact, one of the salient features of language is that it is culturally transmitted. Language does not go from one generation to another genetically. It cannot be acquired by inheritance. Therefore, a child will learn the language of the people among whom and whose culture he is grown up. Language is learnt. It is taught to a lesser extent. Similarly, culture as a whole is transmitted very largely through language. However, language is a part of culture as culture includes much more than language.

          Language and Culture have homologous relationship. Language and culture developed together and influenced each other as they evolved. 

In this sense, great anthropologist, Alfred L. Krober has said :

"Culture started when speech was available, and from that beginning, the enrichment of either one led to the other to develop further."

          If culture is a consequence of the interactions of humans, the acts of communication are their cultural manifestations within a specific community. 

In this context, Ferruccio Rossi-Landi Says :

"A speech community is made up of all the messages that were exchanged with one another using a given language, which is understand by the entire society".

          Paralanguage also is used like language. It is also specific to culture. Therefore, communication with other ethnic (social) groups can lead to misunderstandings. When one grows up in a specific society, it is essential to learn the glances, gestures, tone and other communication tools to emphasise what one wants to do or say. Such specific communication techniques of one culture are learned mostly by imitating other people. Like Paralanguage, body-language or 'Kinesics' is concerned with language as well as culture. For example, in communication, one must know the culture of others to understand the postures and expressions of the people.

          Nowadays, intercultural interactions are very common. Communication is necessary for any person who wants to understand and get along with people whose background and belief are greatly dissimilar from their own. Similarly, cultural identity can be marked by language. A specific language refers to a particular cultural group. The set of attributes of a culture is expressed through language. Language is also used to point to objects that are unique to a particular culture. All this means that learning another language is essential for international communication and cooperation. The knowledge of other languages facilitates know-edge of other countries and the specific cultures of each one.

          Further, one of the common things between culture and language is that both continue changing. Both language and culture experience drastic changes over time. For example, a young boy and an old man do not share an identical culture and exact the same language even if they live in the same locality. 

Ravi Zancharias rightly says:

 "Changes in language often reflect the changing values of a culture".

          Next, both language and culture play a significant role in shaping our personality. Culture tells us how to interact with others and helps to shape our values and ethics. Similarly, language is like a tool using which we express our culture. In fact, cultural ideas and beliefs are transmitted ahead via language. Moreover, both culture and language allow us to peek into the past and shape our ideas.

           Thus, the relation between language and culture is quite complex and important. All people have culture and language. They point us toward our people and dectate how we view the world. If we are learning a new language, culture must be an integral part of our journey. We can only effectively communicate if we understand the culture of the people whom we are talk-ing. 

Let us conclude with the words of Buttjest :

"Culture learning is actually a key factor in being able to use and master a foreign linguistic system."

Cultural Barriers to Translation

Cultural Barriers to Translation

J.C. Catford talks about two kinds of untranslatability. 

1. First the linguistic untranslatability when you have no linguistic equivalent in Target Language  for a word in Source Language (e.g. कल दो होते है एक बीता हुआ कल और दूसरा आनेवाला कल) and 

2. Cultural untranslatability when a cultural concept or element in Source Language culture is absent in Target Language culture. (e.g. मंगलसूत्र, बलूतं, वटसावित्री पौर्णिमा etc) 

          There are some things which are universal and common to all cultures. But certain things are culture-specific. These are related to the unique beliefs or world view of a particular society. Such culturally specific expressions are difficult to translate. For example the institution of joint family is deeply rooted in Indian culture and we have strong family ties and relationships of different kind. So we have specific words for each kind of relationship ( मामा/ मामी/काका/ काकु मावशी/आत्या चुलत/मावस/आते/मामे/भाऊ बहिण इ.) English lacks precise kinship terms and so the English word 'aunt, uncle and cousin' are poor substitutes for Indian kinship terms because they are incapable of indicating the exact relationship. Similarly 'बलुतेदारी' and caste system were a social reality in the past in India. So the words related to it can not be satisfactorily translated in English. This is also trueabout the many religious rituals in Hindu culture. Words related to them can not be translated in English. This is why A K Ramanujan retained the title Sanskara in his translation of U R Anantmuthy's Kannada novel. He did not translate it as 'funeral rites' because the two rituals are not the same. 'Funeral rites" refer to a Christian burial while 'antysanskaras' refer to the burning of a dead body on a funeral pyre as per Hindu religious customs.

Khushwant Singh's translation of a Hindi or Punjabi dialogue in his novel Train to Pakistan also reveals this culture-specificity.

For example a railway porter asks a woman.

'Are you travelling alone sister?' 'No, I am travelling with my master, brother.

          Address terms used here are very significant. Addressing an unknown woman as sister and addressing the man as brother and referring to the husband as master all this is unique to Indian culture where you establish a relationship with even an unknown person.

          Eugene Nida rightly points out that a translator "ought to be constantly aware of the contrast in the entire range of culture represented by the two languages'. He feels that words are symbols representing different facets of culture. So words can not be understood in proper perspective without reference to culture. In fact language itself is a product of culture. For example Eskimos living in polar region have 12 words for different kinds of snow. English has only two snow and ice. Marathi has only one word barf.

            Sometimes some concepts may seem universal or common but they are interpreted differently in different cultures according to the people's beliefs and ways of thinking. For example the two words for marriage 'vivah' and 'nikah' may seem equivalent. But they are not, Vivah' is a sacrament for many lives. While 'nikah' is a contract as long as the bride and groom abide by the terms of it.

          Many words related to religious beliefs, social customs, and even food items can not be translated. Thus 'bhakari' is certainly not bread. Thus translating a text is not just translating language; but also the culture behind it. Sapir and Whorf declare that "No language can exist unless it is steeped in the context of culture and no culture can exist without .....a natural language."

           According to Susan Bassnet language is heart and culture is like the body around it. The surgeon operating the heart can not neglect the body that surrounds it. Similarly the translator can not ignore the culture that surrounds the language of the text to be translated.

 SEMIOTICS OF TRANSLATION

What Is Semiotics ?

          Semiotics is the study of how words and other signs systems of communication make meaning. 

The term originates from the Greek word for sign, semeion, which means anything that is used to represent or stand for something. 

For example, the word "chair" is the sign that English speakers use to describe a piece of furniture.

          Semiotics is useful in many fields. 

For example, an art critic might use semiotics to analyse how a painter uses symbols associated with femininity to convey something about womanhood. A psychologist might use semiotics to interpret patients' dreams and their past. Anthropologists use semiotics to study the significance of folktales (e.g. the story of Noah's ark) and rituals in specific cultures (e.g. swastika, moon and stars etc).

Saussure's Model of Semiotics

            Saussure's semiotics theory expands on what Peirce called symbolic signs and the arbitrary relationship that they have to what they represent. As a linguist, Saussure was especially interested in words, or linguistic signs. He explained that language does not just convey meaning, it makes meaning.

          Saussure explained the symbolic nature of signs by dividing them into two components : the signifier and the signified. The signifier is the form of the sign. In the case of language, it is the word that is spoken or written. So, "chair" is a signifier. Non-language signifiers are not spoken/written words. The signifier for chair can be a drawing or photograph of a chair.

• The signified is the concept/meaning suggesed by the word. The concept may not necessarily indicate the real, physical thing. It can be an abstract idea like patriotism or courage.

• A signifier may have more than one signified. For example, the word "chair" can also refer to the leader of a committee. It is impossible to tell what "chair" signifies without any context.

Semiotics of translation:

          The contact between the two disciplines dates back to the late 1950s, when the linguist and semiologist Roman Jakobson presented his idea of the three modes of translation: intralingual,

interlingual and intersemiotic. The first two types of translation were well known the history of translation studies has much to offer. But the introduction of the concept of intersemiotic translation - caused both surprise and skepticism to those involved in translation studies.

          Jakobson's seminal paper was published in an era in which translation studies was not a fully recognized field in the humanities.

Translation studies focused on the linguistic dimension of the translation process only. Translation studies was not seen as an autonomous discipline and was considered part of the linguistic approach to communication. Jakobson's work was the result of the interaction of three humanistic disciplines: linguistics, semiotics, and translation.

          Structural linguistics tried to change the belief that Ferdinand de Saussure's parole or Roman Jakobson's message were not subjects worthy of scientific study. The main assumption of structuralism and semiotics was that for every process (an utterance, for instance) there is a system of underlying rules that govern it.

          And if parole is not worth studying, is the image worth studying? Can the image have rules? Roland Barthes' (1964) first semiological studies of advertising, influenced decisively the way the scientific community approached the image.

Barthes did not connect the image with translation, he contributed in establishing it as an object of study, next to that of linguistics, by uncovering the structural

composition of the visual message. That led the way to the study of the transformation of semiotic systems. The boundaries of the translation process, therefore, were expanded quite early by the semioticians, something which was not acknowledged by translation scholars.

          Umberto Eco observes that: culture continuously translates signs into signs, words into icons and so on. Susan Petrilli and Augusto Ponzio also argue that: the translator must move beyond the conventions and obligations of the dictionary to enter the live dialogue between verbal signs and nonverbal signs.

          Many distinguished semioticians point to the transition of a text from one culture to the other. It is almost a cultural translation. Othello (an English play) transmuted in to Onkara (a Hindi film) is an example. In an era of multisemiotic and multimodal communication, meaning is continuously transformed among different semiotic systems. So the instrument of semiotic research is translation.

          Gradually, however, the scepticism of translation scholars abated and there were calls for drawing on semiotics to enrich translation theory. As early as the 1980s, translation scholars started to turn to semiotics. Thus, for Bassnett the first step towards an examination of the processes of translation must be to accept that although translation has a central core of linguistic activity, it belongs most properly to semiotics Mona Baker also considers that translation by illustration (intersemiotic translation) is a useful option if the word which lacks an equivalent in the target language refers to a physical entity which can be illustrated.

          Jeremy Munday argues that translation studies must move beyond the written word and that the visual, and multimodal in general, must be incorporated into a fuller study of the translation of advertising'

         The expansion of the translation process to include non-verbal texts caused debate about the nature of translation, although there seems to be an agreement that contemporary communication is based on multimodal texts. There is an ' incessant process of "translation", or "transcoding" - between a range of semiotic modes.