Lexico-Semantic Translation: Yorubaphone, Francophone and Anglophone Perspectives

The ability to translate is not always derived from the understanding of the meaning of the word but the ability to find a corresponding equivalence in the target language. Most researches in translation studies have focused on the linguistic meaning and the problems arising from such translations. It is against this background that this paper seeks to investigate some difficulties encountered in the process of translating lexical and semantic phenomena within Yorubaphone, Francophone and Anglophone space. Drawing on the linguistic approach to translation, which foregrounds the centrality of lexical and semantic relationship in translation, this study discusses some difficulties in finding lexical and semantic correspondence while translating from Source Text to Target Text. Data were randomly sampled and the paper adopts a qualitative method for data analysis. Data were critically analysed using the dynamic equivalence translation theory which proposes the closest natural equivalence of a source text in the target text. The study concludes that a translator mostly recourses to direct translation such as literal translation, borrowing or calque or he may resort to oblique (indirect) translation which consists of modulation, adaptation, transposition and equivalence in order to convey appropriate message in translation.