《圖書和藝術》版塊
Johnson: Lost without translation
約翰遜：因沒有翻譯而錯失
Language problems bedevil the international response to crises
語言問題困擾著國際社會對危機的反應
Sitting on a muddy floor beneath a tarpaulin roof, Nabila, a 19-year-old Bangladeshi, fiddles with her shoelaces as she listens to Tosmida, a Rohingya woman in her mid-30s. Both are crying. Nabila, a student-turned-interpreter, says awkwardly: “She had it from all of them in her secret place.”
娜比拉，19歲，孟加拉人。托米達，約莫35歲，羅興亞人（羅興亞族是緬甸的一個穆斯林族群）。娜比拉正坐在防水帆布屋頂下的泥濘地板上，一邊不停擺弄鞋帶，一邊傾聽托米達。兩人都在流淚。娜比拉是一名學生譯員，她笨拙地組織語言：“在她私密的地方遭遇了他們所有人。”
The struggle to tell the story of Tosmida’s gang-rape is not just an emotional but a linguistic one. Since some 700,000 Rohingyas escaped persecution in Myanmar and fled to Bangladesh over a year ago, many Bangladeshis like Nabila have suddenly found themselves with new jobs, as interpreters. Tosmida’s Rohingya and Nabila’s Chittagonian are related but not identical. Interpreters, quickly trained, must try their best to understand another language, and fill in the gaps left by cultural differences—including taboos about what victims can say.
講述托米達被輪奸故事的艱難之處不僅是感情方面的，還有語言方面的。自從約一年前約70萬羅興亞人為逃離在緬甸所受迫害逃往孟加拉國，很多像娜比拉這樣的孟加拉人，突然就有了新工作——翻譯。托米達所在的羅興亞族和娜比拉所屬的吉大港孟加拉人有些聯系，但并非完全相同。口譯員經過快速訓練，必須盡力去理解另一種語言，填補文化差異留下的空白——包括受害者可能說出的忌諱的話題。
The biggest practical issues concern health, says A.K. Rahim, a linguistics researcher working with Translators Without Borders (TWB), a group that helps humanitarian agencies. In Chittagonian, health terms come from Bengali and English; scientific knowledge and vocabulary have trickled down from educated elites. But among the relatively few educated Rohingyas, health terms come from Burmese. Most—especially women, who tend to be cut off from the outside world and denied education—have not been touched by that learning. Instead they have developed their own lexicon. They avoid haiz (menstruation) and say gusol (shower). Diarrhoea, a common camp ailment, was routinely misdiagnosed in the first few months. Many Rohingyas reported, “My body is falling apart” (“Gaa-lamani biaram”), baffling health-care workers.
服務于人道主義機構的“無國界譯員組織”（TWB）的語言學研究員A.K.拉希姆表示，最大的實際問題是健康。在吉大港語中，健康術語來自孟加拉語和英語；科學知識和詞匯已經從受過良好教育的精英階層中逐漸流傳下來。但在相對受到教育較少的羅興亞人當中，健康術語來自緬甸語。大多數人——尤其是與外界隔絕無法接受教育的女性——還沒有接觸到這種健康術語。而他們開發了自己的詞匯。他們避免說haiz（穆斯林用語，意為“月經”）而是說gusol（穆斯林用語，意為“淋浴”）。腹瀉是一種常見的營地疾病，在患病初期幾個月經常被誤診。很多羅興亞人這樣陳述，“我的身體正分崩離析”（“Gaa-lamani biaram”）,這讓很多醫護人員很迷惑。
Sex is the trickiest minefield. In the Rohingyas’ conservative Muslim culture, women are not supposed to talk about sex or their bodies at all. They employ euphemisms, using different words to describe sex permissible by religion, or illegal sex and sex out of wedlock. Most of these terms are deliberately vague; they refer to “shameful spaces” and “secret places”. For rape, they might use a word that means forceful torture. This has legal consequences. “I cannot imagine a Rohingya woman standing up in court and saying, ‘I was raped’,” says Mr Rahim. Interpreters must be cautioned not to fill in gaps or encourage their subjects to say particular things; that could weaken a prosecution.
性是最棘手的雷區。在羅興亞人保守的穆斯林文化中，女性根本不應該談論性或身體。他們使用委婉語，用不同的詞來描述宗教允許的性、非法性行為和婚外性行為。這些術語大多故意含糊不清；他們表達為“可恥的地方”和“私密的地方”。他們可能會用一個意為強烈折磨的詞來表達強奸。這會產生法律后果。“我無法想象一名羅興亞女性站在法庭上說，‘我被強奸了’，” 拉希姆說。口譯員一定會被提醒不要填補語義空缺或鼓勵他們的當事人說一些特別的事情；而這可能會削弱起訴。
譯文由可可原創，僅供學習交流使用，未經許可請勿轉載。
評論
打印
