Above is the dialogue of an elderly woman to Alif. When Alif comes to
Ustad
Khalid’s house, she opens the door and tells him that
Ustad
Khalid is not at home.
Description technique is employed by the translator in translating this datum. The word
den
in the source text is used by an elderly woman to address
Alif. Meanwhile, the translator translates it into
young man
in the target text which refers to
den. Den
is the abbreviation of
raden.
In Javanese language it is a title used by people who have lower social status to address a young boy who has
higher social status than the addresser.
f. Generalization
It is a translation technique which uses more general or neutral term in order to avoid the ambiguity or unnaturalness in the target language. There are 19 data
of generalization technique employed by the translator to translate address terms in
Negeri 5 Menara
into
The Land of Five Towers.
Below are the examples.
Datum 2442nd2ndPPGenFully ST
:
masya Allah, ini ente, atang bandung? sutradara Batutah?
TT
: masya Allah, is it you, atang from bandung? Director of Batutah?
The dialogue of Alif to Atang is when he cannot believe that the person is really Atang, his close friend when studying in Madani Pesantren. They both have
not met for a long time since graduating from there.
The example above employs generalization technique since to avoid the ambiguity, the translator translates the word
ente
in the source text into
you
.
Ente
used by Alif to address Atang is an Arabic which could also be
antum
. In Bahasa Indonesia,
ente
and
antum
mean
saya
or
aku.
While in English it means
you
.
Datum 11661st1stPPGenFully ST
:
Iya, Mak, besok ambo mendaftar tes ke SMA.
TT
: Yes, Amak, tomorrow I will sign up for the public high school entrance exam.
The dialogue of Alif to
Amak
is when she starts to talk about where he would continue his schooling. He wants to register to public high school;
otherwise
Amak
wants him to continue in madrasah. Generalization technique is employed by the translator in translating this
datum. The word
ambo
in the source text is used by Alif to address him. It is translated into
I
in the target text.
Ambo
is a Minang language. It has the same meaning as
aku
and
saya
in Bahasa Indonesia. While in English, it could be translated into
I
to avoid ambiguity and unnaturalness in the target text.
Datum 14872nd2ndKKGenFully ST
:
Buyuang , sejak waang masih dikandungan, Amak selalu punya cita -
cita,
TT
: Son
, since you were still in your Amak’s womb, I have always had dreams,
Amak
tries to implore Alif that choosing madrasah as high school is better than choosing public shool. While talking slowly, her eyes return to staring at
Alif. There is a hope in
Amak
’s eyes.
