English to Thai Translation Strategies on Unreal Nouns and Noun Phrases in “Harry Potter” Book Series

Abstract

The objective of this research was to study English to Thai translation strategies on unreal nouns and noun phrases in “Harry Potter” book series. The research methodology was qualitative research. The research tools consisted of the English-Thai unreal noun and noun phrase record and the translation strategy record. Data consisted of English-Thai unreal nouns and noun phrases taken from the first three books of the “Harry Potter” book series. Data was analyzed by comparing the meaning of unreal nouns and noun phrases between English and Thai versions. Then those unreal nouns and noun phrases were analyzed to match with one of 18 translation strategies in the translation strategy record. 

The research shows that 10 of 18 strategies were used in the translation. The strategies were used in two patterns: single strategy and mixed strategy. The 5 most frequently used translation strategies in the order of mean from high to low were as follows: 1) Translation by forming a new word in the target language by literally translating each lexical item of the source language 2) Translation by using loan blends (loan and target-language words) 3) Translation by using transliteration 4) Translation by forming a new word with lexical items of the target language and 5) Translation by forming a new word of the target language by literally translating each lexical item of the source language and using other related words.