Constrained language: a multidimensional analysis of translated English and a non-native indigenised variety of English

Abstract

Translation and non-native indigenised varieties of English are produced in contexts where heightened constraints operate on them. Recurrent features of translated language include explicitation, normalisation or conventionalisation, simplification, and homogenisation. Similar features in non-native indigenised varieties of English include hyperclarity, anti-deletion, regularisation, simplification and register shifts. This article adopts a multidimensional approach to analyse a translation corpus and a parallel set of texts from ICE East Africa, with ICE Great Britain as control corpus. The aim is to determine whether translated and non-native indigenised varieties of English resemble each other due to shared constraints related to bilingual language production. The results demonstrate three shared sets of features between translated and non-native indigenised varieties of English: increased formality, explicitation of information through elaboration and specification, and features resulting from processing strain. The most important difference is that translated English uses more complex, compressed syntactic structures for elaboration while the non-native indigenised variety relies more on clausal structures.