Shifting

The translational practice witnesses the lower frequency of shifting operations comparatively to those of concretisation and generalisation. They are resorted to under the influence of the traditional word usage established in the TL as well as the combinatority of words that build up free combinations. Notably, in shifting operations translational items both in the SL and the TL belong to the same hierarchy’s level since the passage occurs in the horizontal plane: the sea-dog – морський вовк. The title of the Russian-made movie «Летят журавли» was rechristened in France: “Quand passent les cigognes”.

In some cases shifting could be accounted for the divergence in the category of gender. For instance, the English word oak may be rendered as сосна or ялина.

Regarded as a cogitative operation the technique of interhyponymic shifting is based upon the formal logical category of outward location. This is the case when areas pertained respectively to the two notions exclude each other but both belong to the same order of the higher rank.

The figure below presents the idea of the formal logical category of the outward location.

SL TL Outward location