earticle

영어

English punctuation has a long-standing tradition and is extensively used in writing: it serves as an effective tool to write down pauses and stresses of spoken language as well as to distinguish grammatical and logical structures of sentences and their subdivisions. As such, punctuation is accepted as a solid linguistic entity in English. Meanwhile, punctuation is relatively new and not fully incorporated into the Korean language system as the language has well-developed clause-ending devices and thus sentential boundaries are clarified due to its unique morphological features. This paper seeks to understand English punctuation to discuss the translation of English punctuation into Korean. More specifically, the translationese of punctuation in English-Korean translation is examined. To this end, this paper touches upon the functions of English punctuation and elaborates on its evolution from the 7th century when punctuation was first adopted by Anglo-Saxons. Based on a clear understanding of the concept and history of English punctuation, this paper deals with the translation of the dash, semicolon, and colon to clarify how these markers take on their functional roles, how they can be translated into Korean, and what should be noted to avoid unnatural source language traces or translationese during the process of translation.