Pragmatic Failure In Translating Conversational Implicature Into Arabic: A Case Study Of Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby
Auteurs : Albakeri Ahmed .
Résumé
This study investigates pragmatic failure in the Arabic translation of conversational implicature in The Great Gatsby. It aims to identify the types of implicatures most vulnerable to loss in English–Arabic literary translation and to examine the linguistic and cultural factors underlying such failure. The study adopts a qualitative descriptive-analytical approach based on Grice’s theory of conversational implicature and Thomas’s (1983) model of pragmatic failure. A purposive sample of four excerpts from the novel and its Arabic translation by Muhammed Mustagir Mustafa (1971) is analyzed. The findings indicate that irony-based implicatures, class-related meanings, and instances of understatement are particularly prone to pragmatic failure. These failures are primarily attributed to literal translation, explicitation, and cultural mismatch, which weaken or eliminate implicit meaning. The study emphasizes the importance of pragmatic awareness and functional equivalence in preserving implicature in literary translation.
Mots clés
Pragmatics Failure ; Implicature ; literary translation ; Arabic translation ; The Great Gatsby
