TRANSLATING MEDICAL FLYERS FROM MODERN LANGUAGES INTO NIGERIAN PIDGIN ENGLISH FOR GRASS ROOT SENSITIZATION: STRIKING THE BALANCE BETWEEN ACCURACY AND SIMPLICITY

Abstract

The choice of an appropriate language for communication is a cardinal stage in social mobilization and particularly sensitization campaigns staged in rural Nigeria. In line with this, most health sensitization campaigns organized in rural Nigeria have been based on the utilization of vernacular and vehicular languages which theoretically have greater expansion in rural zones. Furthermore, translation/interpretation into vernaculars has often represented a strategy to ensure the success of these sensitization efforts. However, translating/interpreting from modern languages to vernaculars is often complex, demanding the translator to achieve both simplicity and accuracy; meanwhile, efforts to achieve the first (simplicity) often affect the latter (accuracy). Simplicity in translation often leads to a loss as part of the notional content of the source text is often left un-translated or “deleted”. This paper seeks to illustrate this phenomenon using the translation of some medical flyers from English to Nigerian Pidgin English (NPE). The paper explores the limitations of the theory of translation by simplification showing how difficult it may be for technical and relatively scientific lexicons to be transposed in vernacular or vehicular languages.