A Semiotic Approach to the Theory of Translation: - Bruno Osimo ...

It is the acquisition of I TN S that is the most difficult problem
for human translation (T H ) and machine translation (T M ). How
does T H acquire it By (1) linguistic analysis of context, close or
wide-ranging, surface or deep; or (2) extralinguistic analysis. In
my example the sentence that constitutes the entire surface
context of masse does nothing to resolve its ambiguity, nor
would any deeper analysis help. Either we need a larger context
(Dans la rue il y avait beaucoup de gens…), or else some
extralinguistic information. If we do not envisage T M of literary
texts at present, it is not so much because of linguistic difficulties
as because of the amount of extralinguistic information needed.
The Reference System. We have seen that linguistic
understanding can be described as choice between significations.
But to make the choice we must be aware that it is there, e.g., be
able to recognize masse as having two or more significations and
to identify each of them. Logic and linguistics offer two
approaches to the identification of significations, viz., the
referential and the logical:
Referential identification: by the thing itself, e.g., by showing
the object.
Logical identification: explanation of a sign by another sign
or by a combination of sings. For this we may use signs of
another language, but also signs of the same language.
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