What are some concepts that do not translate well from language to language?
Humor, and serious answers welcome. Doesn’t have to be English.
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The one that comes to mind was mentioned in an undergrad Bible class. The word is Faith. It has caused much discussion in the world of translation.
Some of the most difficult concepts to translate are idiomatic phrases. These are phrase that mean something different than the words used.
an “idiom” is defined by Oxford Languages as “a group of words established by usage as having a meaning not deducible from those of the individual words.”
An example of this would be the Homeric Greek phrase”
’Ομοιοι εςςιι ‘oμοιοι φιλοι. (or)
Homoion estin homoion philon
It was pointed out by the professor that the literal meaning could be translated as:
Like (things) are similar to like (things). or Like is like to like.
But then he pointed ot that the idiomatic translation would be closer to:
Birds of a feather flock together!
“Darmok and Jalad at Tanagra.” Need context from the culture to understand.
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