Contents

Contents...........................................................................................................................................1 .........................................................................................................................................................1 Introduction......................................................................................................................................2 Chapter I..........................................................................................................................................4 The phenomenon of False friends................................................................................................4 1.1 Factors that influence the appearance of False friends ....................................................4 1.1.2. International False Friends...........................................................................................10 Evidently, same-language false friends and the confusion they can engender are phenomena common to all varieties of English. ..........................................................................................11 1.2 Classification of English False Friends..............................................................................11 1.3 Importance of paying attention to the usage and translation of False Friends...................14 Chapter II.......................................................................................................................................16 Handling Translators False Friends..............................................................................................16 2.2. Main types of difficulties of translation of false friends ....................................................16 2.2. Translating False Friends ...................................................................................................17 2.2.1 Translation difficulties of false friends into Spanish........................................................19 2.2.2.Translation difficulties of false friends into Italian..........................................................23 Conclusion.....................................................................................................................................25 Bibliography..................................................................................................................................27

Introduction False friends constitute a source of error for learners of a language and for translators. The lexical category of translator's "false friends" mislead not only those who begin studying language, but even those with good command of language. These people are liable to identify similar elements of systems of foreign and native languages. These identifications sometimes appear to be false and lead to numerous loan translations and to infringements of lexical combinability or stylistic agreement either in the process of using foreign speech or in the translation from the foreign language into the mother tongue. However, false friends are constantly created either as loan words or as words which share a common derivation. This course paper investigates the phenomena of false friends. Our immediate purpose is to show to what an extent false friends is a widespread phenomena when a word is borrowed from another language or two culturally and historically-related languages such as English, Italian and Spanish come into play. Therefore our main task is to make the most of the semantic and pragmatic information provided by false friends and analyse actual occurrences of false-friendship in these languages. During the analysis of this phenomena we point out the reasons which may motivate occurrence of false friends in English-Spanish-Italian translations. The overwhelming majority of people having a command of a foreign language make though to a very different degree, mistakes in word usage and translation. The main sources of such mistakes are relations of similarity and nearidentity in both languages. The formal similarities of three words English, Spanish and Italian - are often understood as their semantic proximity. Thus, the purpose of the present work is: to prove that the formal similarity does not mean the semantic proximity; to prove the necessity of paying special attention to the translation of false friends;
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 to prove the topicality of the topic with the help of some examples of irrelevant translation; to reveal in the present work factors which influence the appearance of false friends; to answer why words which came into Italian, Spanish and English from one common source have acquired different meanings in these languages; to discus main types of difference in the lexical systems of English, Italian and Spanish which produce the difficulties in translation with the help of their comparative study;

to reveal major differences in the semantic structure of formally similar interlingual partial synonyms.

Chapter I. The phenomenon of False friends

1.1 Factors that influence the appearance of False friends False friends1 are the words of different languages, which have similar form and some common meanings. Historically false friends are the result of interfluence of languages. Words having similar form in the majority of cases were derived from words of Greek and Latin origin. Such words exist in different languages and are called international words. In a very limited number of examples they are result of incidental coincidence. English, Spanish and Italian words of this kind in the majority of cases are direct or indirect borrowing from the common source. Frequently these are international and pseudointernational words. 2 Such words can cause difficulty for students learning a foreign language particularly one that is related to their native language because the students are likely to misidentify the words due to Language . Comedy sometimes includes puns on false friends which are considered particularly amusing if one of the two words obscene . From the etymological point of view false friends can be created in several ways:

Cognates :
o

If Language A borrowed a word from Language B then in Language B the word shifted in meaning a native speaker of language A will face a false friend when learning language B.

For instance, Important has cognates in Italian, French, Portuguese and Spanish. And in all of these languages, the same main meaning (i.e. significant, consequential) is shared. But this basically qualitative sense, shared with English, is also extended to a more quantitative sense describing size, extent, and degree.
1

Throughout the paper we will use the terms false friends, false cognates and false lexical equivalents interchangeably to refer to the lexemes in question. We will also use the term false lexical equivalence to speak of the phenomenon as such. 2 www.bbc.co.uk/languages

Thus, in Italian, French, Portuguese, and Spanish, the variety of things which can be described as important is extended to include, for example, sums of money, buildings, periods of time, organizations, and even traffic. It is terribly easy for Italian, French, Portuguese and Spanish learners of English to assume that important can be used to describe the same things in English that it is used to describe in their mother tongue. The problem is that it can, but its meaning may be subtly different. It all depends on the nouns the adjective is being used to describe. Sometimes it is clear that a language interference mistake has been made. For instance, if a learner says ' There was important traffic in the city ' or 'The train arrived after an important delay'. The learner has used important where a native speaker would use heavy and long, respectively. In other cases, important sits more comfortably with the noun it is used to describe, but still a question lingers, as with 'important financial benefits' or 'important cutbacks' - the native speaker might expect some further clarification as to the nature of their importance, but the learner is only saying that the benefits or cutbacks were great in extent. In other contexts, the learner's use of important starts to sound like hubris. When a learner claims that they work for the most important company in their region, or that their school is the most important school in their town, they probably just mean that their company/school is the biggest. On the other hand, it is impossible to be sure without asking for clarification. Sometimes cognates may share the same basic meaning but have a more specific meaning in one language than the other. The Spanish word critiquizar looks like it might mean the same as English criticise, but actually means to be over-critical or indulge in petty nitpicking (the correct Spanish equivalent of criticise is criticar). False cognates :
o

In certain cases false friends were created separately in the two languages

some false friends are simply homonyms with no relation between them whatsoever. They happened due to sheer coincidence.

Pseudo-anglicisms :
o

Pseudo-anglicisms are artificially-created constructions of words with elements borrowed from English but the morphemes of which do not actually exist in English.

The words Preservativo (Italian) prezervativ (Romanian) and are derived from the French prservatif (which means both "preservative" and "condom" though "conservateur" is more used for "preservative") and all false friends of the word name. This is an example of how in one language a word can acquire an additional meaning which is not shared by other languages. Since false friends are a common problem for language learners teachers sometimes compile lists of false friends as an aid for their students. Even compilers of bilingual dictionaries are sometimes fooled by false friends particularly when they are cognates. For example the Spanish desgracia can on rare occasions mean "disgrace" but it usually means "misfortune". The best defense for the language student is to use a monolingual dictionary in the target language as a final authority. Essential divergences are frequent in this group. These divergences make difficult understanding by an Englishman of word of English origin assimilated by Spanish or Italian languages and vice versa. In the course of the last fifty years a great number of international words in different languages have changed their meanings, very often in different ways. In a number of languages some parallels were entirely dropped. This process is intensively continuing nowadays. When a word is taken over into another language, its semantic structure as a rule undergoes great changes. Polysemantic words are usually adopted only in one or two of their meanings. 3
3

Stewart Clark & Graham Pointon (2003) Word for Word Oxford: Oxford University Press. p. 56

In some cases we can observe generalisation of meaning, in others specialisation of meaning. Sometimes a borrowing acquires new meanings, which were uncharacteristic for its former semantic structure. The great number of borrowing in English left some imprint upon the language. The first effect of foreign influence is observed in the volume of its vocabulary. Due to its history the English language more than any other modern language, has absorbed foreign elements in its vocabulary.4 The adoption of the foreign words must not be understood as more quantitative change. Any importation into the lexical system brings about semantic and stylistic changes in the words of this language. Another instance of foreign influence upon the semantic structure of some English words is semantic borrowing, i.e. the borrowing of meaning from a word in a foreign language. This often takes place in English words having common roots with some words in another language (international words today reflect this process best), e.g. the words pioneer and cadres, which are international words that have acquired new meaning under the influence of some languages. Sometimes English words acquire additional meanings under the influence of related words having quite different roots; Because of the changes in the semantics of borrowings and international words they should be rendered in translation not by the words which formally correspond to them. Semantic differences are too frequent to be ignored. The main task of the translator is to preserve and not to pervert the genuine meaning of an utterance. Suceso is not a "success", but an "incident" in Spanish, while Exito is a "success", not an "exit" (which is "salida") That is why, the priority in translation should be given to words which render the authentic meaning of the words and the translator should avoid misleading pseudoinlernational counterparts of formally known words. e.g. library - n - librera in Italian (biblioteca) - a place where we borrow books, but in English is a place where we buy books;
4

Bantas, A., Radulescu, M., Capcanele limbei engleze:False Friends. Editura Teora. Bucuresti. 1992. p. 6

Some classic false friends in Spanish-to-English translation: - Actual doesn't mean actual, but current. - Compromiso doesn't mean compromise, but commitment. - Elaborar doesn't mean elaborate, but produce, manufacture. - Adecuado doesn't mean adequate, but suitable, fitting, ideal. - Pretender doesn't mean pretend," but try. Spanish does not have a commonly-used word for nuts. This means that when we say Contiene nueces? Soy alrgico a las nueces, and you think you're asking about nuts, we are really only asking about walnuts (or pecans if you're in Mexico). Nuts (meaning all kinds of nuts) is actually frutos secos in Spanish, but it's not a common, everyday term like nuts in English. Examples of falsi amici that continue to puzzle learners of Italian include casino, which is a brothel or mess, not a gambling place, and intossicazione, which is food poisoning, not intoxication. From the point of view of the theory of language contacts loan translations which appear under the influence of translators false friends represent a particular case of interference. Interference is an erroneous speech product, which was created either by extending the rules of ones mother tongue onto the foreign language or mixing up some similar things within the same language. In the first case we deal with interlingual interference (interference with one language). Interference is inevitable to appear because of great number of differences existing in the systems of mother tongue and of the language studied (and in particular, in the lexical systems). If the two lexical systems were identical the student could simply transfer his knowledge of mother tongue onto the language studied without any mistakes. But due to various reasons these systems are different. When two languages contact, the student is liable to identify the phenomena of the language studied with the phenomena of the mother tongue. In such a way these phenomena form a system which is identical to the system of the mother tongue and does not coincide with the actual systems of the foreign language.
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In spite of all the potential pitfalls outlined above, similarities in the lexicon can, in fact, be a great help to the language learner. It has long been the practice of language teachers, textbooks for language learners and, in particular, teach-yourself language books of the 'learn-it-quick' variety, to start out with a very heartening introduction to the lexical similarities between the learner's mother tongue and the language being learnt. The next step is to point out that there are easy shortcuts to learning vocabulary which involve making automatic transformations to the morphology of the words in the foreign language to make them more easily recognisable in the mother tongue. So, the Spanish learner of English, for example, is told to read the English adjective suffixes -ed/-ated, -ive, -ous, -ic, -ary etc. as -ado/a, -oso, -ico and -ario, respectively. And similar easy transformations apply for the other parts of speech. For anybody about to dive into a new language this is an encouraging springboard. Pointing out similarities of this kind is certainly both valid and constructive, but should always be accompanied by a warning. These 'short cuts' can lead to some very disappointing (or even embarrassing) dead ends. Having grasped very quickly that -ado/a is an equivalent adjectival ending to English -ed/-ated, the temptation to assume that adjective pairs in the two languages mean the same thing is enormous, and dangerous. Constipado means suffering from a cold and embarazada means pregnant. It is easy to imagine the confusion these false friends could cause the unguarded learner. The subtlety of these three false friends underlines the importance of sensitive collaboration between the native speaker and the learner in the task of clarifying meaning. Awareness of the potential pitfalls inherent in cognates is just the beginning. There is a great temptation, once aware of the possible problems, to adopt a policy of avoiding these words, but it is far more constructive to practise using them, at the same time always verifying that they are being correctly used and correctly understood.

1.1.2. International False Friends

The varieties of English currently spoken across the world were imported from Britain via different routes, by different sectors of society and at different points in history and also reflect in their vocabularies other (internal) influences such as the languages of the indigenous peoples. The vocabularies of these varieties of English are surprisingly varied; it is claimed, for example, that Australian English has 10,000 words which do not feature in British English and that there are 5,000 words unique to South African English. The same forces are at work both in foreign languages and in regional varieties of the same languages, creating an evermore slippery stock of false friends. As with regional false friends like bully and urchin, some of these international false friends are survivals; words whose meanings have been frozen in time, like flies in amber, while their meanings elsewhere in the world have diverged and evolved. For example, vest is the word used in US English to describe the garment which in UK English is generally called a waistcoat. A look at the etymology of vest reveals that it was, in fact, originally a sleeveless, jacket worn over a shirt and under an outer jacket, and that US English therefore retains the original (17th century) sense while the UK English underwear sense dates from much later, in the 19th century. Sometimes the nouns for objects which belong to the same area of the lexicon or which perform a similar purpose may appear to have become muddled during importation to another country or region. What are known in UK English as suspenders are called garters in US English, where the word suspenders is used for what are known in UK English as braces. Context is unlikely to be of much assistance in translating between the two varieties of English in the vocabulary of clothing, too, where a US jumper is a UK pinafore dress, overalls are dungarees, shorts are underpants, pants are trousers, cuffs are both cuffs and turn-ups, and thongs are flip-flops, respectively.5
5

Rudzka, B., Channell, J. Putseys, Y. & Ostyn, P. 1981. The Words you Need. London:Macmillan Publishers Ltd.

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In the UK are all very familiar these days with the vocabulary of the English used in the US, and most of us are aware that what we call a nappy, they call a diaper, for example. We make adjustments in our communication with people from the US either by using the word used in their variety of English or by making sure our own UK term has been understood correctly (linguists call this process 'accommodation'). In this context, words like diaper and nappy which do not occur in both English varieties present relatively few difficulties. Real problems arise when the word pair are homonyms or false friends. In a conversation between a US-English speaker and a UK-English speaker, if the UK-English speaker describes somebody as 'mad', for example, do they mean the UK English main sense of 'insane' or are they 'accommodating' the US speaker and do they actually mean the US English sense of 'angry'? Evidently, same-language false friends and the confusion they can engender are phenomena common to all varieties of English. 1.2 Classification of English False Friends Continuing previous contrastive studies and practical investigations into the pitfalls of the English vocabulary for speakers of Romance languages, we are going to sketch lines of research into the way semantic dissimilarities have emerged along the centuries in the utilization of the Greek-Latin vocabulary in Romance languages versus that in English. However, investigations made by scholars have proved that the Romance languages themselves are far from unitary or solidary in the utilization of the Greek-Latin lexis; they too display divergences and inconsistencies - not always shared by the English vocabulary. But first of all, the present study will attempt a dearer identification of the deceptive cognates (= false friends) within the context of the Romance vocabulary, by a more rigorous delimitation of the object of our investigations as part of the various types of possible false friends.6
6

Bantas, A., Radulescu, M., Capcanele limbei engleze:False Friends. Editura Teora. Bucuresti. 1992. p. 76

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Bantas A. has advanced the following classification: 1. Greek-Latin words whose meaning(s) differ(s) in some languages, though they derive from a common source - and could therefore be called external false friend. We prefer to call them genuine deceptive cognates, that is, those words which can actually be described as such, on a scientific ground. Criteria of subclassification or subdivisions could be their currency, their degree of jeopardy and especially the discrimination of: a) monosemants with differences between English, Italian and Spanish, for instance; b) polysemants with one different meaning; c) polysemants with several different meanings, and d) (much rarer) polysemants with all meanings different in the two languages. On the whole we may say that their meaning(s) may have followed parallel though partially or totally different roads (for various reasons, such as partial selection, extension, narrowing of meaning, etc. in one of the two languages or in an intermediate language). An example is provided by the word genial which has gradually lost in English the meaning which French, Italian and Romanian employ, on the contrary preserving several meanings ( nice, agreeable, pleasant, jovial, etc.) entirely absent in French, Italian, Spanish, Romanian. Similarly, sympathy with its well- known meanings (comprehension, pity, compassion and even condolence) has another sense in French, Italian, (liking). Incidentally, certain crossings or wrong superpositions of the various parts of speech may increase the difficulties and errors: contrary to the impression which endings usually create. The same is also due to the fact that either English or Romanian took over from Latin (or from French) fewer parts of speech represented by one and the same polyfunctional word, than the other language: the Spanish filial is translated into English by filial when an adjective, but the Italian filiale is a noun which has to be translated by branch. Some English words display similarities - accidental or not because

12

of polysemy, paronymy, polyfunctionalism, Composition, differences between dialects or between British and American English, etc. We could therefore accept for them the term of internal false friends as the deception is based on treacherous similarities with the lexis of the same language that is, on the independent evolution of that language, without an parallel abroad. (They are potential risks for English people too). Their subdivision is proposed as follows7: o Polysemants, paronyms or polyfunctional word (non-compound), usually forming separate entries in dictionaries, especially in the large ones. (In fact they ought to be separated for both etymological and other reasons). For instance, homonyms: lay may be 1. a noun (song, ballad); 2. an adjective (secular); 3. a verbal form, further differentiated as the infinitive and indicative of so lay - laid - laid or the past tense of to lie - lay- lain. Moreover, the addition of the substantival sufix - er yields the homonyms layer1 (stratum) and layer2 (a hen, etc. which lays eggs), therefore generating new possibilities for confusion. o Compound words whose meaning is not (and cannot be inferred from) the sum total or the scare of their components. o Potysemants with one or several meanings refusing/precluding their utilization in certain contexts. E. g. the adjective buxom with two different meanings - plump and attractive - the latter not fitting (or rather precluding) a negative or derogatory context, such as Mary is short, buxom and plain where it has to be replaced by another adjective with negative connotations. Obviously, certain mistakes in interpretation may be due to a pseudotranslator who cannot make any selection according to the context. Semantic differences between English dialects, regional vocabularies and especially between American and British English also give rise to (potential) false friends.

Idem

13

Illustrative examples are elevator (B.E. hoisting machine, A.E. platform for taking up or down); downtown (B.E. distinctive area, A.E. the center of a city, especially its business center);

1.3 Importance of paying attention to the usage and translation of False Friends A keen awareness of all of the varieties of false friends listed above is vital not just for language learners but for anybody who teaches languages or is involved in producing teaching materials or reference books for learners. Lexicographers, and particularly those compiling bilingual dictionaries and dictionaries for learners of foreign languages, should ask themselves how many common false friends they have included in their defining vocabulary, for example, and whether those words get sufficiently clear coverage at their individual definitions within the dictionary itself.8 But it is not just people involved with languages professionally who need to be aware of the influence of false friends. Anybody who comes into contact with people who speak languages other than their mother tongue, at whatever level of proficiency, will encounter false friends in action, doing what they do best confusing and obscuring what people are trying to communicate. We could try to avoid using potentially confusing words, but really it is sufficient and far more constructive to simply be aware of them and make certain when we use them that they have been correctly understood. And as with the example of terrible mentioned above, when a learner of our own language says something that surprises us, we should think 'false friend?' before we react. In English, Italian and Spanish translators false friends can be met within the limits of four parts of speech: nouns, adjectives, adverbs and verbs. False identifications take place within the limits of one and the same part of speech.
8

Partington, A. 1995. True Friends are hard to find: A Machine-Assited Investigation of False, True and Just Plain Unreliable 'Friends'. Perspectives: Studies in Translatology, 3:1. Oxford.

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From the point of view of semantics, misleading are the words belonging to analogous or closely related semantic spheres, or at least occurring in similar contexts. Divergences in pairs of false friends may appear in content, realia, stylistic characteristics and lexical combinability: in reality all these types of deviations are very often interwoven. These divergences turn to be different with different parts speech: adjectives and moreover adverbs have the most specific meanings. 9 Certainly, the translator should pay special attention to translation of such words, because cases of irrelevant translation sometimes can cause serious misunderstandings.

Bell, R.T 1991. Translation and Translating. Theory and Practice. London:. Longman Group UK

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Chapter II. Handling Translators False Friends

2.2. Main types of difficulties of translation of false friends The words of any synchronically compared languages relate to each other either in terms of equivalence (more often of relative equivalence; in special terminology also of absolute equivalence); or in terms of entire lack of equivalence. Taking into account the relation of the sound (or graphical) form of equivalence and relationship of their syntagmatic and speech characteristics we can further distinguish synchronic interlingual categories of absolute and relative synonymy, homonymy and paronymy. o The words of two languages are interlingual synonyms when they entirely or partially coincide in meaning and usage (and are, respectively, equivalents in translation). o o The words of two languages similar to the degree of their identification At last the words of two languages which are not quite formally, but in the sound (or graphical) form can be called international homonyms. which can cause false associations and be mixed with each other can be called interlingual paronyms. We can infer from the first paragraph of this chapter that the formal similarity of English, and words does not always mean the semantic proximity. There are some words, which have no semantic proximity. As we have mentioned above these are pseudointernational words, which are similar in form but completely different in meaning. Thus, the translator should pay special attention to such words which often mislead the translators and cause serious mistakes to appear.

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2.2. Translating False Friends Translating is difficult due to the barriers between languages that are greater than is commonly believed. Various dictionaries (pocket-sized, computerized, multilingual etc.) may be useful for basic needs but they constitute a dangerous illusion. There is almost never any true equivalence between an expression in the SL and its corresponding one in the TL. The respective meanings may overlap in part, but it is rare for them to match, even between languages that are actually close and historically related. There are words in the source and target languages which are more or less similar in form. Such words are of great interest to the translator since s/he is naturally inclined to take this formal similarity for the semantic proximity and to regard the words that look alike as permanent equivalents. The formal similarity is usually the result of the two words having common origin, mainly derived from either Greek or Latin. Since such words can be found in a number of languages, they are referred to as international. As a matter of fact, very few international words have the same meanings in different languages. In respect to English and Spanish we can cite the words like the English parliament, theory, diameter and their Spanish counterparts parlamento , teoria, dimetro. In most cases, however, the semantics of such words in English and in Spanish does not coincide and they should rather be named pseudointernational. Their formal similarity suggesting that they are interchangeable, is, therefore, deceptive and may lead to translation errors. For that reason they are often referred to as the translators false friends. As we have mentioned before false friends are pairs of words in two languages that look or sound similar but different in meaning. In linguistic literature this issue has also been designated as deceptive cognates that can be subdivided (taking into account the monoligual aspect) into those used syncronically (treating various phenomena independently from their historical development, considering their development at any stage of their historical

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evolution ) and diachronically (treating various linguistic phenomena from the historical point of view). The pseudointernational words can be classified in two main groups: first, there are words that are similar in form but completely different in meaning. Here the risk of making a bad mistake is very great whenever the translator fails to consult the dictionary. Lots of mistakes have been made translating such English words as complexion, lunatic, etc.: Second, there are many pseudointernationl words which are not fully interchangeable though there are some common elements in their semantics. They may become false friends if the translator substitutes one of them for the other without taking into account the difference in their meaning or the way the English word is used in the particular context. The translator should bear in mind that a number of factors can prevent the possibility of using the formally similar word as an equivalent. Among these factors the following are the most important: 1. The semantic factor resulting from the different subsequent development of the words borrowed by the two languages from the same source. For instance, the English idiom can be well rendered by its Italian counterpart to meaning regional speech or dialect, whereas the English unit has also the meaning of an expresison having a meaning that cannot be understood from the individual meanings of its elements; the specific grammatical, syntactic, and structural character of a given language. 2. 3. The stylistic factor resulting from the difference in the emotive or The pragmatic factor reflecting the difference in the background stylistic connotation of the correlated words. knowledge of the members of the two language communities which makes the translator reject the formal equivalent in favour of the more explicit or familiar variant. The reader of the English original will usually need no explanation concerning the meaning of such terms as the American Revolution, the

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Reconstruction or the Emancipation Proclamation which refer to the familiar facts of the US history. With the knowledge of these factors the translator has a good chance of making the pseudointernational words as good friends and allies. 2.2.1 Translation difficulties of false friends into Spanish o English semantic components into Spanish words Examples of this type were difficult to find. The reason is that such Spanish and English words share some but not all semantic components. The words in this section need to be shown contextually and explained thoroughly in order to appreciate the errors.10 In order to make our examples easier to understand, we used the pattern shown below for introducing all semantic components. English Word - Spanish Word: 'context' [English back-translation of the context]. English semantic components: other English English semantic semantic component components (Spanish translation/meaning), (Spanish translation/meaning),... The suggested Spanish translations are shown in brackets. The examples may be subdivided into the following sections:11 o Words obsolete in modern English Consistent-Consistente: 'Estructura de menus consistente' [Consistent menu structure]. English semantic components: a) idea or argument organized or presented so that each part of it agrees with all the other parts (coherente); b) (no meaning) (consistente) (meaning when the particles of a mass are joined together; used in cookery). Comment: In the past, the English word 'consistent' did include the Spanish semantic component of 'stuck together' but it has evolved and this extra semantic component has become obsolete in contemporary English.
10

Chesnevar, C. I. 1994. Some Problems about English-Spanish translations in computer science literature. SIGCSE Bulletin of the Association for Computer Machinery, Vol. 26, Nr. 3., September 1994.
11

Idem

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Eventual-Eventual: 'Eventualmente se termina de recorrer el archivo' ['eventually, the end of file is reached']. English semantic components: a) at last (finalmente); b) from time to time (ocasionalmente). Comment: In the past, the English word 'eventual' did include the Spanish semantic component of 'possible, contingent' but it has evolved and this extra semantic component is considered an archaism in contemporary English. o Spanish words used in a sense which is rare in Spanish Attractive-Atractiva: 'es una atractiva version de su impresora termica'. [this is an attractive version of your thermal printer]. Comment: In English, the word 'attractive' has the following semantic components: a) pretty or handsome and b) likely to bring in advantages (e.g. attractive pay). The Spanish word 'atractivo/a' only contains the former semantic component and not the latter. Conventional-Convencional: 'impresoras convencionales' [conventional printers]. English semantic components: a) established by virtue of precedent or custom (idem); b) (no meaning) (applies to people, attitudes or ideas which are unoriginal and accommodating); c) method, product, accepted as normal because it has been used or produced for a long time (neutral tone) (in Spanish it has negative undertones). Flexible/Flexibility=Flexible/Flexibilidad: esta serie ofrece selecciones flexibles de procesadores de ejecucion alta' [this series offers flexible selections of high-execution processors], 'Potencia y flexibilidad de election' [power and flexibility of choice]. English semantic components: able to change and adapt to different conditions and circumstances as they occur. In Spanish, flexible means "easy to accommodate to somebody's will", with negative undertones.12

12

Stevens L. C., Textbook Vocabularies and Deceptive Cognates in Spanish. Modern Language Journal, Vol. 27, No. 2 (Feb., 1943), pp. 116-118

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Massive Masivo: 'el masivo poder adquisitivo'. English semantic components: a) extremely large in size or quantity (idem); b) general usage (no equivalent meaning in Spanish). Comment: In Spanish 'masivo' also means 'related to human population' (e.g. emigration masiva, ataque masivo, manifestation masiva); there is no equivalent meaning in English for massive. Versatile Versatil: 'La nueva y versatil impresora de red', [the new and versatile network printer]. English semantic components: having many skills and able to adapt to each skill easily. Comment: This adjective in English denotes a positive idea. In Spanish, versatil may sometimes be applied to somebody who changes affection or opinions too easily, and therefore has negative undertones. o Words whose mistranslation into Spanish has become institutionalized Concurrent Concurrente: Transferencia concurrente hasta 120 Mb/min.' [concurrent transfer up to 120 Mb/min]. English semantic components: happening at the same time (simultaneo), get together in the same place or time (idem). Comment: Even though the semantic component of the Spanish 'concurrente' does not coincide with the English 'concurrent', the adjective 'concurrente' is already established in computer-related Spanish as an accepted term. It may be found in specialised dictionaries both as 'transferencia concurrente' or 'transferencia de ejecucion simultanea'. From the two choices given to the translator, he has chosen the one that is formally closer to the English word instead of taking the more risky but clearer second option. Line=Linea: 'los ordenadores personales IBM Value Point nan sido la linea de PC mas vendida' [Personal computers IBM Value Point have been the line of PC most sold]. English semantic components: particular type of product that a company makes or sells (gama). Even in English this word seems to have some detractors. In Eric Partridge's Usage and Abusage, 'line' is described as a word which 'has been so over done that one would be wise to avoid it -in good writing, at least.' (Partridge 1947:172)
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o Spanish words which do not have a 100% match with English usage Additional/Adicional: 'no precisa de ningun almacenamiento adicional de memoria' [no additional memory is needed]. English semantic components:a) adjective (rarely used as an adjective); b) wider range of meanings (e.g. this is an additional reason for not leaving, this problem is additional to their major financial anxieties) [esta es otra razon para no marcharnos, esta problema se afiade a sus otros problemas economicos]. Competitors- Copetidores: 'Sea el pimero en atender a sus clientes con Lotus Notes. Sus competidores seran siempre segundos'. [Be the first to serve your clients with Lotus Notes. Your competitors will be always the second ones]. English semantic components : a) sbd. who is trying to sell goods or service to the same people as you are (competencia); b) person who takes part in a competition or contest such as a sport (idem). o Words with completely different semantic components Removable/Removible: 'discos duros removibles' [removable hard-disks]. English semantic components: you can move it easily from where it is (idem). In Spanish, the verb 'remover' means 'to dig about', 'to turn over', 'to stir', whereas 'to remove' does not have such a meaning in English. As applied to computer terminology, 'extraible' would be an acceptable translation of removable. o Spanish words with English morphological adaptation Consumables-Consumibles: 'estos son los consumibles de HP'. English semantic components: any material which can be used up, esp. in offices (material fungible). Important-Importante: 'pequenas diferencias importantes', 'importantes paquetes de software'. English semantic components: significant, valuable, necessary when dealing with a particular topic. In Spanish the main meaning is convenient or interesting, which may have wide-ranging consequences.

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So, we can sum up that Spanish words whose primary semantic components do not coincide with the English primary semantic components but rather with English secondary semantic components, such as 'efficient', 'global' and 'sophisticated', the Spanish counterparts have upgraded their semantic components and acquired new values in translated texts. These examples show that some words which are similarly spelled in two languages involve a network of semantic relations, which may be enriching for the receptor language. Within the field of translation of computer texts, which are probably going to increase prodigiously in the future and will often only be found in an electronic form, our study may serve for more studies on pragmatic equivalence with special reference to 'false friends'. As such it explores a field which is particularly sensitive to English and American influence in today's world, but the findings and the procedures we have used may be equally applied to other disciplines and other language pairs, in order to show the impact a major language has on the languages of receptor cultures.

2.2.2.Translation difficulties of false friends into Italian In this subchapter we would like to present some instances where friends in Italian language.

the

semantic (figurative) structures underlie false friends, especially semantic false As we have mentioned before chance false friends share the same form but have different etymologies and different meanings in different languages. They can be compared to homonyms in a single natural language. Semantic false friends, by contrast, have the same etymological origin, their meanings differ in different language, but one can still detect semantic relations between them. They can be considered to be cross-linguistic equivalents to polysemous words in a single natural language. The links between their meanings in different languages can be based on metaphor, metonymy and euphemism, but also on specialisation and generalisation. Semantic false friends are the semantic relics of pragmatic language use over time and space.
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Italian words that resemble words in English but have different meanings are the cause of student bafflement and some hilariously mistaken usage. Examples of falsi amici that continue to amuse teachers of Italian include casino, which is a brothel or mess, not a gambling place, and intossicazione, which is food poisoning, not intoxication. We have confronted the much-neglected problem of `false friends,' or deceptive cognates, with a dictionary which makes it possible for the student of Italian to alert her- or himself to the pitfalls.13 In order to achieve an accurate translation, essay work, and comprehension hinge on the confident handling of key words prone to incorrect interpretation the followings examples of Italian False Friends will be a useful tool to assist students to improve their proficiency in these areas.
false friend in English Actual attitude canteen consistent Eventually preoccupied correct translation in Italian Effettivo atteggiamento mensa aziendale; borraccia coerente alla fine pensieroso, distratto false friend in Italian attuale attitudine cantina consistente Eventualmen te preoccupato correct translation in English present / current aptitude /propensity cellar / wine shop substantial / large if necessary worried

Studying false friends is, however, more than an exercise in diachronic pragmatics. It has important implications for translation and cross-linguistic communication, where an awareness of false friends is important together with knowledge of certain pragmatic strategies, which help to avoid misunderstandings or mistranslations. The study of the underlying figurative links between false friends also adds a new dimension to cognitive semantics.
13

Altrocci 1935: Rudolf Altrocci. Deceptive cognates: Italian-English and English-Italian. Chicago 1935.

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Conclusion In this course paper we have investigated the phenomena of false friends and the semantic (figurative) structures that underlie false friends, especially semantic false friends, in some European languages (Spanish, Italian and English). Chance false friends share the same form but have different etymologies and different meanings in different languages. They can be compared to homonyms in a single natural language. Semantic false friends, by contrast, have the same etymological origin, their meanings differ in different language, but one can still detect semantic relations between them. They can be considered to be cross-linguistic equivalents to polysemous words in a single natural language. The links between their meanings in different languages can be based on metaphor, metonymy and euphemism, but also on specialisation and generalisation. Semantic false friends are the semantic relics of pragmatic language use over time and space. Studying false friends is, however, more than an exercise in diachronic pragmatics. It has important implications for translation and crosslinguistic communication, where an awareness of false friends is important together with knowledge of certain pragmatic strategies, which help to avoid misunderstandings or mistranslations. The study of the underlying figurative links between false friends also adds a new dimension to cognitive semantics. The main task of the translator is to render the authentic meaning of the utterance. The translators false friends are an obstacle on the way to correct translation. In some cases these deviations which are produced as a result of interfering influence of translators false friends are insignificant. In others they can seriously affect the meaning of the utterance. In the present work we have used the contrastive method and contextual analysis. We compared sentence (or sentences), which contained false friends with their translation into Spanish and Italian. In this linguistic research we have also made use of contextual analysis, which was especially helpful when we dealt with words which are formally similar, but in English have different volumes of
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meanings. As a rule, there are English words, which have more meanings that their Italian or Spanish counterparts. This can be explained by the fact that English is a highly polysemantic language. The analysis proves that polysemantic words are borrowed only in one-two meanings. It should be mentioned that for students of foreign language it is difficult to remember and therefore to use in speech and translation secondary meanings of polysemantic words. This greatly affects the quality of translation. Very often translators do not take into account the frequency of word usage in both languages and this also is a weak point of translation. In the end we would like to mention Giacomo Devoto, an Italian linguist who wrote fundamental works on language and writing and who introduced the concept of prosa funzionale (clear, concise, highly effective writing), likens words to human beings in his book Civilt di parole (1965 Vallecchi),. Words can be robust and flexible (in terms of meaning), but through misuse they can become deformed, stiff and temporarily "sick." Knowing how to cure their patients is one of the skills translators need to have in their quest for quality.

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Bibliography
1. Altrocci 1935: Rudolf Altrocci. Deceptive cognates: Italian-English and English-Italian. Chicago 1935. 2. Alvarez, R & Vidal, M (eds.). 1996. Translation, Power, Subversion. Clevedon, UK: Multilingual Matters Ltd. 3. Baker, M. 1992. In Other Words. A Coursebook on Translation. London: Routledge. 4. Bauer, L 1983. English Word-Formation. Cambridge: Cambridge Textbooks in Linguistics. 5. Bell, R.T 1991. Translation and Translating. Theory and Practice. London:. Longman Group UK 6. Chesnevar, C. I. 1994. Some Problems about English-Spanish translations in computer science literature. SIGCSE Bulletin of the Association for Computer Machinery, Vol. 26, Nr. 3., September 1994. 7. Chomsky, N. 1957. Syntactic Structures. The Hague:Mouton 8. Gutt, E-A. 1991. Translation and Relevance. Condition and Context. Oxford, UK: Blackwell Publishers 9. Hatim, B & Mason, I. 1990. Discourse and the Translator. London: Longman Group Limited 10. Holmes, J.S. 1988. Translated! Papers on Literary Translation and Translation 11. Studies. Amsterdam:Rodopi 12. Newmark, P. 1988. A Textbook of Translation. London, New York, Amsterdam:Prentice Hall UK 13. Nord, C. 1991. Text Analysis in Translation. Theory, Methodology and Didactic Application of a Model for Translation-Oriented Text Analysis, Amsterdam:Rodopi, B.V. 14. Partington, A. 1995. True Friends are hard to find: A MachineAssited Investigation of False, True and Just Plain Unreliable 'Friends'. Perspectives: Studies in Translatology, 3:1. 15. Pratt, T 1986. Lenguajes de Programacion: Diseho e Implementation (2da. Edition). London, New York, Amsterdam:Prentice Hall. 16. Rudzka, B., Channell, J. Putseys, Y. & Ostyn, P. 1981. The Words you Need. London:Macmillan Publishers Ltd. 17. Stevens L. C., Textbook Vocabularies and Deceptive Cognates in Spanish. Modern Language Journal, Vol. 27, No. 2 (Feb., 1943), pp. 116-118 Toury, G. 1995. Descriptive Translation Studies and Beyond.Amsterdam:Benjamin Translation Library. 18. Zgusta, L. 1971. Manual of lexicography. The Hague: Mouton. 19. . 1969 " " . //

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