i
THE STUDY OF ONOMATOPOEIA TYPES AND
TRANSLATION STRATEGIES
IN DON ROSA’S
THE LIFE
AND TIMES OF SCROOGE MCDUCK
AN UNDERGRADUATE THESIS
Presented as Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Sarjana Sastra
in English Letters
By
SILVIA MEGA KUSUMA
Student Number: 094214056
ENGLISH LETTERS STUDY PROGRAMME DEPARTMENT OF ENGLISH LETTERS
FACULTY OF LETTERS SANATA DHARMA UNIVERSITY
ii
THE STUDY OF ONOMATOPOEIA TYPES AND
TRANSLATION STRATEGIES
IN DON ROSA’S
THE LIFE
AND TIMES OF SCROOGE MCDUCK
AN UNDERGRADUATE THESIS
Presented as Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Sarjana Sastra
in English Letters
By
SILVIA MEGA KUSUMA
Student Number: 094214056
ENGLISH LETTERS STUDY PROGRAMME DEPARTMENT OF ENGLISH LETTERS
FACULTY OF LETTERS SANATA DHARMA UNIVERSITY
vii
(Jeremiah 29:11)
For I know the plans I have for you,“ declares the LORD,
“plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you
viii
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
My deeply gratitude is for my Great Lord, Babe Jesus Christ for His
unconditional love for me. Without His grace, I would not be in Sanata Dharma
University Yogyakarta and reach what I could only dream before. You make me
learn that everything is possible with You. I would also thank my beloved family,
Papa Mama Bhe, Ko Indra and Diandul, and also Pino Bhe.
I am very grateful to my advisor, Dr. Fr. B. Alip, M.Pd., M.A. for helping
me doing this undergraduate thesis with his guidance, patience, caring,
suggestion, correction, and jokes. I also thank my co-advisor Harris Hermansyah
S., S.S., M.Hum. for helping me even though this study was not conducted yet.
My gratitude is also for Anna Fitriati S.Pd., M.Hum for helping and giving me
support to finish this study.
I would like to say thank my second family, Lion of Judah Cellgroup,
especially Eel and Efra. This gratitude is also for my first friends, Richard and
Wawan. My gratitude goes to my friends who always be with me since in first
semester Emy, Ogeg, Yeyen, Ivan, Bryan, and Sheila. Much love I give to Yenni
Zhou, PutriAnto, Mike, Ya Li-We Ya, Indra, and my solonity Adel Jupek Astari
and Aldo Dongsaeng and for all who are too many to mention. I cannot also forget
all of lecturers and staffs in English Letters Department, and for staffs who work
in parking area, thank you very much for giving me lessons of this beautiful life.
Above all, a prayer I send for a help from my Papi Han and Pe’ Welly.
ix
LEMBAR PERNYATAAN PUBLIKASI v
MOTTO PAGE vi
A. Review of Related Studies 6 B. Review of Related Theories 9 1. Theory of Onomatopoeia 9
a. Theory of Origin of Language
i. The Pooh-pooh Theory 9 ii. Associative Onomatopoeia 12 iii. Exemplary Onomatopoeia 12 2. Theory of Meaning
x
C. Method of the Study 26 i. Types of Data 27 ii. Data Collection 28 iii. Population 29 iv. Data Analysis 29
CHAPTER IV: ANALYSIS RESULTS AND DISCUSSION
A. Description of Research Data 31 B. Analysis Results
i. Onomatopoeic expression found in the comics 32 ii. The strategies applied to translate
onomatopoeia expressions 48
CHAPTER V: CONCLUSION 62
BIBLIOGRAPHY 64
APPENDICES
Appendix 1 66
Appendix 2 70
xi ABSTRACT
KUSUMA, SILVIA MEGA. The Study of Onomatopoeia Types and Translation Strategies in Don Rosa’s The Lifes and Times of Scrooge Mcduck.
Yogyakarta: Department of English Letters, Faculty of Letters, Sanata Dharma University, 2013.
Comic is a kind of reading that has so many connoisseurs in all of the world. The story of the comic is seen through the conversation inside the balloons. Comic contains pictures and many expressions such as onomatopoeia. This undergraduate thesis discusses the onomatopoeia in The Life and Times of Scrooge Mcduck by Don Rosa. The target language is comic Kisah Hidup Paman Gober.
For the purpose of the study, the following problems were formulated. The first problem was what types of onomatopoeia that could be found in the comic The Life and Times of Scrooge Mcduck and its translation. Second problem was about the strategies used in translating the onomatopoeia that had been found.
xii ABSTRAK
KUSUMA, SILVIA MEGA. The Study of Onomatopoeia Translation in Don
Rosa’s The Life and Times of Scrooge Mcduck. Yogyakarta: Jurusan Sastra Inggris, Fakultas Sastra, Universitas Sanata Dharma, 2013
Komik merupakan salah satu bacaan yang memiliki banyak penggemar di seluruh dunia. Kisah di dalam komik dapat dilihat melalui percakapan yang berada di dalam balon. Komik terdiri dari gambar-gambar dan banyak ekspresi seperti onomatopea. Studi sarjana ini membahas tentang onomatopea yang ada di dalam komik The Life and Times of Scrooge Mcduck karya Don Rosa. Bahasa targetnya adalah bahasa dari komik Kisah Hidup Paman Gober.
Demi tujuan studi ini, berikut adalah masalah yang disusun. Masalah yang pertama adalah apa saja onomatopea yang dapat ditemukan dalam komik the Life and Times of Scrooge Mcduck dan terjemahannya dalam Kisah Hidup Paman Gober. Permasalahan yang kedua adalah strategi apa yang dipakai dalam menerjemahkan onomatopea yang telah ditemukan.
Penulis menggunakan penelitian kualitatif dan kepustakaan. Penelitian ini menggunakan keseluruhan populasi dari data. Bacaan komik ini memiliki 7 seri. Peneliti menggunakan semua seri komik tersebut.
1
CHAPTER I INTRODUCTION A. Background of the Study
Many people know that poetry and novel are categorized as literary works.
Due to the reason that there are some people who cannot enjoy literary works by
reading novel or poetry, it will be more interesting if they can enjoy it in pictures,
comics for example. Since the comic fans are not only from the country that the
favorite comics were published, these works were translated into the readers‟
language.
What makes reading become interesting is that there are pictures telling
about the story made by the creator. There are also some expressions that ilustrate
the sounds which appear inside the story. These expressions are called
onomatopoeia. Onomatopoeia is often used in comics. Onomatopoeia itself is a
very interesting study of language due to the naming of the sounds in every
language in the world that are usually varied.
The fact about onomatopoeia is that it is different in every country. Japan
comic is famous in the world, especially in United States, Europe, and Southeast
Asia (http://web-japan.org/kidsweb/archives/cool/97-7-9/manga.html). They call it as manga. There must be also onomatopoeia in manga. Fr English people and
Japanese, for instance, what they hear may not be the same. This case could
happen in Indonesian too. Crow of rooster, for example, will show us how people
in English is cockadoodledoo, Japanase is kokekkoko while in Indonesia is
kukuruyuk. The sound of knocking the door in English goes to knock-knock, but in
Indonesian, it is tok-tok.
Transferring the idea and meaning from source language into target
language may not be easy. The idea is not only transferring the words into words,
but also the culture that is carried by the language itself. Onomatopoeia is
phenomenon that is wholly related to culture. In translating the words of
onomatopoeia, the way to translate is important. Meaning to say, translation
strategies are the key to deliver the meaning succesfully.
To deliver the message of the comic‟s author, the translator must translate
into the compact sentences, considering that the space given is limit due to the
screen of the comic is comic strips. In this study, it is hoped that researchers can
learn in translating the target language into the compact source translation so that
the message still can be delivered well, understandable, readable, and accurate for
the readers to enjoy the comic itself.
One of Don Rosa‟s works is Donald Duck and Scrooge Mcduck. These
comics were translated into so many different languages in the world, including
Indonesian. There is no doubt that onomatopoeia also appears in this comic, since
this comic tells about the life of animal, which is duck, living like a human being.
By reading of the comic of Don Rosa entitled The Life and Times of
Scrooge Mcduck, there are many interesting points, especially in onomatopoeia.
Source Text English Crack
Target Text Indonesian Ctar
In this context, the character whipped the horse so that it made a sound of Crack
in English and it is translated into Ctar Indonesian. Indonesian people are not
accustomed to hear the whipping of the whip as Crack, but Ctar.
Another example that was found is that there is no translation in the
onomatopoeia words from the Source Text into the Target Text. In one of the
pages from the Source Text, there is onomatopoeia foof which shows the effect of
the changing of the character into another using magic, but in the Target Text,
there is no translation on it. Beside those examples, there are still a lot of the
phenomena of onomatopoeia translation occur in this translation. Because of the
phenomenon, the writer was intended to find the translation strategy.
B. Problem Formulation
There are two questions formulated in this study. The first question relates
to the onomatopoeic expression found, while the second question concerns with
the translation strategy. Those two questions are:
1. What are the types of onomatopoea expressions in The Life and Times of
Scrooge Mcduck and their translation in Kisah Hidup Paman Gober?
2. What are the strategies used by the translator in translating onomatopoeic
C. Objectives of the Study
There are two objectives of the study. This is to answer problems that
formulated by the writer. An object may have its own types and kinds.
Onomatopoeia has its types as well. This study is conducted to find out the types
of the onomatopoeia which is found in the comic The Life and Times of Scrooge
Mcduck.
This study is about translation where the source language of onomatopoeic
expression was translated into target language. Therefore the second objective is
to identify the translation strategy that was used by the translator in transferring
the idea and meaning of the English onomatopoeia into Indonesian.
D. Definition of Terms
It is important to make one understanding about the study. This is built to
avoid misunderstanding on certain terms as key words of the study. Therefore, the
definition about the title of this study must be explained.
Onomatopoeia. The Merriam-Webster Dictionary reports the onomatopoeia is derived from the Greek onoma which means „name‟ and poiein
which means „to make‟. Based on Khweler Literary Terms, it is the use of sounds
that are similar to the noise they represent for a rhetorical or artistic effect.
Translation Strategy. It is not easy in translating the onomatopoeic expression. It is because of the different cultural background underlying the
translator. There may be some onomatopoeic expressions which are not translated
is needed. Moreover, Loescher (1991:8) defines translation strategy as “a
potentially conscious procedure for solving a problem faced in translating a text,
or any segment of it.” This translation of onomatopoeia will face a problem if
there is no lexically meaning in the Indonesian dictionary.
Balloon. According to Comicraft Glossary of Lettering Terms (http://www.balloontales.com/articles/glossary/), balloon is circular shape used to
6 CHAPTER II
REVIEW OF LITERATURE
This chapter contains three parts. The review of related studies talks about the
review from other researchers that help the writer in conducting the research.
After the review of related studies is review of related theories. In this subchapter,
the review will contain the theories that have relation with this research. The last
part is theoretical framework. Each review of studies and theories are the key in
analyzing the problems which have been formulated and to find out how the
progress of this study different from other studies.
A. Review of Related Studies
As stated previously, comics are different from other works, such as
novels or short stories. There is only a limited space for the author in delivering
the conversation. Therefore, the authors should write the dialogue concisely and
efficient. To study on the onomatopoeia translation, the writer must understand
not only in the linguistic field, but also in the extra linguistics field, which is about
the comic.
The study the writer found is from Bara Diska Putra Krisnanto entitled The
Intended Meaning of Smurf Words in Smurf Comic Strips (2010). Krisnanto stated
that the readers must have cultural background knowledge and social background
knowledge in order to prevent the misunderstanding of reading the comic
(Krisnanto, 2010, X). Kristanto found that the word smurfs contain different
convey the author‟s idea in delivering the story to be imaginative and fascinating.
It is also important for Krisnanto in interpreting the intended meaning of the word
smurfs in the comic. The readers know that they must understand the words in the
comic strips in relation to what the pictures is shown about. There must be
relation between the meaning of the vocabulary given in the comic strips and the
pictures, and these all must be suitable. The difference from this study is that the
writer analyses onomatopoeia, while Krisnanto analysed the meaning of the word
smurfs in the comic.
Another research about translation of onomatopoeia has been also
conducted by Hiroko Inose, entitled Translating Japanese Onomatopoeia and
Mimetic Words (2010). Inose who collected the source of the onomatopoeic and
mimetic expression in his research used novel Sputnik No Koibito by Haruki
Murakami. He identified the method used in translating Japanese onomatopoeic
and mimetic expression into Spanish and English. He found 300 cases which are
extracted and nine methods by using adverbs, adjectives, verbs, noun, idioms,
onomatopoeia in the target language, explicative phrases, combination of words
and omission. The method which is analyzed uses some of examples, considering
its effectiveness in transmitting the meaning of the original expressions. Inose‟s
research is almost similar with the writer‟s research which conducted about the
onomatopoeia and translation strategies in comic. The writer in this study tries to
find the types of onomatopoeia, which is different from Inose who identifies
The study which helps the writer is about the translation strategy. It is used
in order to find out the other researcher in analyzing the study of translation
strategy. The study was conducted by Nella Fitri Maya Juwita, entitled The
Translation Strategies Employed by the Translators in Translating English
Business Management Terms into Indonesian (2009). In this research, Juwita
intends to know what English terms in business management that are translated
into Indonesian and what strategies used by the translator. She found 600 terms
taken from various glossaries of English business management terms. She found
that the translator used more than one strategy. The strategies include direct
translation, combination of direct translation and naturalization, naturalization,
and descriptive translation. This research has relation with this study of
onomatopoeia due to the fact that the writer is going to find out the strategy in
translating the onomatopoeic expression found in the text.
The above studies have the same topic about comic and translation. The
study of onomatopoeia translation is different from the studies above in the
language which is analyzed; it is Indonesian and English, while the study above is
in Japanese and English. The translation strategy will also be different, because
this onomatopoeic expression is not always stated in the dictionary. Therefore, the
translation strategies must be different from the study above conducted by Juwita.
This research on onomatopoeia translation in Don Rosa‟s The Life and Times of
Scrooge Mcduck (1996) is a new research; therefore it will be very helpful if any
B. Review of Related Theories 1. Theory of Onomatopoeia
Due to the purpose of understanding the translation of onomatopoeia
expression, the writer searched some theories in conducting this study. For
beginning, it is important to understand the meaning of onomatopoeia. The
Merriam Webster Dictionary reports the onomatopoeia is derived from the Greek
onoma which means „name‟ and poeiein which means „to make‟. This term is also
called as sound symbolism.
a. Theory of Origin of Language
To help the classification of onomatopoeic expression found in the comic,
we must first know the theory of onomatopoeia. To understand when the
onomatopoeic expressions built, the theories of the origin of the language are
needed. Here are some theories of origin of the language according to David
Crystal in the book The Cambridge Encyclopedia of Language (289, 1987):
i. The Pooh-Pooh Theory
This theory is also determined as „Interjectional Theory‟ which suggests
that the language come from expression of human emotion, such as pain, anger,
happy, or other (Yule:2006).
According to Darwin in, human feelings such as pain, disgust, or contempt
create a tendency to contract all the muscles of the body, including face and lips to
produce a sound, such as the interaction „ouch‟ indicating of pain.
This may be not too hard to be analyzed, because it is shown mainly on the
”yipes” which is translated into “huaaaaa”. In this context, the character in the
comic was yelling.
ii. The Ding-Dong Theory
This theory tries to determine the relationship between the sounds and the
senses of word. Speech arises because people react to the stimuli in the world
around them and spontaneously produce sounds which in same way reflected to
the environment (Crystal: 1987). For example the utterance „byebye’ followed by
waving hands that indicates „good bye‟.
iii.The Yo-He-Ho Theory
This theory underlines the development of language in social context.
Language is produced because of human physical effort, such as people work
together (Crystal: 1987). However, when people get a command-sound they will
do strong body movement and automatically produce rhythmical yells. The
example found in Rosa‟s comic is when the character in this comic wants to
engrave; the onomatopoeic expression shown is “chip-chip” translating into “krik
-krik”.
iv. Bow-wow Theory
This theory was proposed by Max Muller from German. He states that the
simplest word is imitative of natural sounds, such as „cuckoo‟, which is then
originated as the name of bird and „bow-wow’ which is originated as the dog‟s
bark becomes the name of dog. This theory is also supported by Jespersen on his
book entitled „Language, Its Nature, Development and Origin‟ by giving the
and then man comes and makes a language for himself by imitating his inferiors.
Sounds which are produced without any meaning can be used to designate the
creature itself to have communication. This is also found in this comic. The
onomatopoeic expression of “aroooooo” is translated into “auuuuuu”. This sound
imitates the voice of wolf.
v. The La-la Theory
This theory was proposed by Otto Jespersen, The Danish Linguist, in
Chrystal‟s The Cambridge of Encyclopedia of Language (1987). He felt that if
any single factor was going to initiate human language, it would arise of the
romantic side of life-sounds associated with love, play, poetic feeling, perhaps
even song. The gap between the emotional and the rational aspects of speech
expression would still have to be accounted for.
b. Types of Onomatopoeia
As what Kate Burridge said in her book, Blooming English (2002), words are
symbolic. It means there is a meaning in each of words. Since onomatopoeia is
denoting sound, there is also meaning inside it. Different from the theory of the
origin of onomatopoeia, Hugh Bredin in Elin Dofs‟ Onomatopoeia and Iconicity,
A Comparative Study of English and Swedish Animal Sounds suggests three types
of onomatopoeia.
According to Hugh Bredin, there are three types f onomatopoeia.
i. Direct onomatopoeia.
As he says, this type of onomatopoeia can occur if the words fulfill two
sounds. The second is the sound of the word resembles a member of the
class. Simply to say that if the sound of the onomatopoeia words resemble
to the sound that it names. For example, hiss and moan.
ii. Associative onomatopoeia
This type of onomatopoeia occurs whenever the sound of a word
resembles a sound associated with whatever it is that the word denotes.
For other information, none of these words has a sound that resembles the
objects or actions that they denote. For example, cuckoo.
iii. Exemplary onomatopoeia
Exemplary onomatopoeia relies on the amount and character of the
physical work used by a speaker in uttering a word. Bredin said that words
such as nimble and dart require less muscular and pulmonary effort than
do sluggish and slothful, so that they become one of the examples of
exemplary onomatopoeia.
When it comes to talk about the pulmonary and muscular, it means that in
pronouncing the word, energy is needed. Pulmonary is related to lungs.
Lungs are one of motors for vocal vibration (Wise in Introduction
toPhonetics, 1957: 37). The other motors for vocal vibration are larynx,
pharynx, and mouth. They all become one unit of vocal vibrators and
functioned for pronouncing the sound, and then so-called as musical
instruments. Therefore, when an onomatopoeia word needs to be
pronounced and it uses one or more vocal vibrators, it could be an
2. Theory of Meaning
It is important to consider in the extra linguistic field, which is comic. To
understand the meanings onomatopoeic expressions‟ meaning in the comic strips,
the readers have to understand the context in the comic strips. Looking comics as
an integral language on the one hand, and as a partnership of words and pictures
on the other.
This is very interesting that interpretation of the readers are also needed,
that is why in translating the onomatopoeic expression must be careful in order to
deliver the imagination and the content between the pictures and the story.
In categorizing the onomatopoeia, the writer provides some theory of type
of the Onomatopoeia or Symbolic Meaning. According David Crystal (1987),
there are several attempts have been made to find specific correspondences
between sounds and meaning. For example, in several languages an association
has been suggested between close vowels (especially [i]) and smallness, and an
open vowels (especially [a]) and largeness, as in English teeny, little, bit, slim. On
the other hand, there are several counter-examples to this tendency, example big
vs small.
In translating the onomatopoeic expression in the comic, the writer must
be able in understanding the meaning of the onomatopoeic expression in the
Source Text. There are certain types of meaning. Contextual Meaning and Lexical
a. Lexical Meaning
Lexical meaning refers to the dictionary definition. It is the meaning of the
term in common usage. The first step in translating each vocabulary is by looking
at the dictionaries. If the vocabularies are found, it can be called as lexical.
Onomatopoeic words have many synonyms, such as ba-dooomm and baaa-dooow
which have meaning the sound of explosion. They are often multi meaning as well
such as poink which has some meanings as the bouncing sound or the sound of
small metallic hit.
There are several ways in lexical meaning. The first is Homonyms. As what Fromkin said in her book, An Introduction to Language (2000), “knowing a
word means knowing both its sounds and its meaning” means that sound and
meaning have relation. Homonyms or homophones in this context focus in the
pronunciation. When two or more words have the same pronunciations but
different in meanings, they will be called as homonyms. Word tale and tail are the
examples of it. They are pronounced as [teɪ l], but in meaning, they are different.
According to Oxford dictionary, tale means a story created using the imagination,
especially one that is full of action and adventure. Meanwhile, tail means the part
that sticks out and can be moved at the back of the body of a bird, an animal or a
fish.
Homonyms are different from homographs. Homographs are words that spelt the same but different meaning. Word tear in tear in the eye and a tear in
her blouse is spelt the same, but has different meaning. There is also polysemy,
or historically. Bear is polysemus, because it has several meanings „to tolerate‟,
„to carry‟, and „to support‟.
There are also synonyms meaning words have the same meaning but
different spelling or sound different. One of the examples is the words annoy and
bother which mean to make somebody angry. Different from synonyms,
antonyms are the opposite in meaning. Big vs small is the example. Red, blue,
black, white are hyponyms. It is a set of words whose relationship is general to
more specific.
Three more lexical meanings are metonyms, retronyms, and proper names.
A metonym is a word used in place of another word or expression to convey the
same meaning. Retronyms are expression that would once have been redundant.
Proper names mean a language‟s shortcuts. Crown which refers to monarchy is
the example of metonyms. Silent movie is a retronym because in the past all
movies were silent, whereas nowadays all of movies are now not silent, even
though there are some movies which are silent. The last example is White House
which is to name official residence of US President. White house is example of
proper names.
b. Contextual Meaning
If lexical meaning focuses on the lexical features of the word, in this
contextual meaning focuses on the text. Contextual meaning is the meaning of
word in particular situations and certainly in different kind of context. It might be
a reason, justification, assumption, explanation, or other function of the context.
Onomatopoeic words are considered as symbolic language; therefore, the meaning
depends on the context in which it is used. More than one level of their meaning is
expressed (Crystal: 1987). Therefore, different interpretation appears when
someone tries to find out the meaning of onomatopoeic words.
Due to the fact that this thesis is about translation, theory of translation is
needed. First is about the definition. According to Nida and Taber, translating
consists in reproducing in the receptor language the closest natural equivalent of
the source-language message, first in terms of meaning and secondy in terms of
styles (Nida and Taber, 1982). The definition is changing from one state or form
to another, to turn into one‟s own or another‟s language (The Merriam-Webster
Dictionary).
Contextual context is included in contextual meaning. In pragmatics,
context is very essential. This study needs co-text theory in order to know the
references pointed and due to the reason that the study uses comic as the text.
There are some aspects that should be considered in co-text or contextual contexts
analysis. The context of the text itself covers grammatical cohesion and lexical
cohesion.
i. Grammatical cohesion
Cohesion is relations of meaning that exist within the text, and that define
it as a text. Grammatical cohesion is the cohesion which is affected by the logical
a. Reference
This is an act which a speaker uses linguistic forms to enable the hearer to
identify something. In referring something, we may use time deixis,
person deixis, and other deixis. When there is no previous mention of the
referent in the text, exophoric reference is used. If there is a referring
expression links with another item within the same text, it is called
endophoric reference. In endophora, there are two kinds, Anaphora and
Cataphora. While anaphora is used for something referring backward,
cataphora is used for referring forward.
b. Substitution
Substitution in this co-text is the replacement of one item by another. Joan
Cutting in his book, Pragmatic and Discourse said that “As with
endophoric reference, substitution holds the text together and avoid
repetition”. If we may take a look at the example below:
Little baby oh so small One day you will be big and tall I watch you while you laugh and play
My love for you grows everyday I tell you this with my whole heart
I love you just the way you are
(Lisa,
http://www.familyfriendpoems.com/poem/mothers-short-poem-to-her-little-baby, 3 May 2013)
From the poem, the substitution used is in the second line. The word “you”
substitution is for reducing repetition which somehow will be impacted for
the readers to feel bored because of the use of the words repetition.
c. Ellipsis
Ellipsis is a little bit different from the substitution. Even the purpose is
the same with the previous kind of co-text, which is to avoid repetition;
ellipsis‟s way is to omit the repetitious and unnecessary words.
“He is afraid of you,” Yossarian said. “He‟s afraid you‟re going to die of pneumonia.” “He‟d better be afraid,” Chief White Halfoat said. A deep low laugh rumbled through his massive chest. “I will, too, the first
chance I get. You just wait and see.” (Heller‟s Catch 22,
<www.goodreads.com/author/quotes/3167.Joseph-Heller>)
The omission used in the text above is place in the last direct speech “I
will, too.” The proper sentence will be “I will die of pneumonia too.”
Therefore, the words omitted are “die of pneumonia”.
ii. Lexical Cohesion
Lexical cohesion is the cohesive effect achieved by the selection of
vocabulary (Halliday, 1976). There are four kinds of lexical cohesion. Repetition,
superordinates, synonyms, and general words belong to it.
a. Repetition
This is the most common form from the lexical cohesion. We can put
The child put the pale chrysanthemums to her lips, murmuring:
„Don‟t they smell beautiful!‟
Her mother gave her a short laugh.
„No.‟ She said, „not to me. It was chrysanthemums when I
married him, and chrysanthemums when you were born,
and he first time hey ever brought him home drunk, he‟d
got brown chrysanthemums in his button-hole.‟
The aim of using repetition in the text above is to emphasize the
meaning of chrysanthemums for the character, and this has no
disadvantage of make the text boring, because the main purpose
is to make a focus point of what the author or the writer wants to
tell about.
b. Synonyms
Synonyms are the use of another word that means the same or
almost the same. For example, some use phrase watching over
instead of keep an eye.
c. Superordinates
It is an „umbrella‟ or general terms of certain things. For
example, blackbird for bird.
d. General Words
General word is the umbrella term that can cover almost
everything. This can be general nouns such as „thing‟, „stuff‟,
„place‟, „person‟, „woman‟, „man‟, and so on.
The important of using co-text is intended in the form of the text, which is in
this study used form of comic. The co-text helps the references of the
c. Cultural Meaning of Words
As what Mildred L Larson said in his book, Meaning Based Translation
(1984:431), culture is a complex of believe, attitudes, values, and rules which a
group of people share. It can be concluded that people have their own culture.
Language is also one of the cultures had by a group of people. A word in one
group of people may have same or different meaning.
It is not only the language that is different. It is not also different in every
country, but even in every region, language and culture could be different.
Indonesia has many cultures. We can see one of the differences from the using of
color of the flag for a sign of the death. Color red will be used in Solo, white in
Yogyakarta, yellow in Lampung, and so on. This is a proof that language can be
seen from anything including color.
It is no need argument about the differences of culture. Due to the fact that
translation is transferring the idea of one language to another language, every
translator cannot easily forget about the culture brought by its language. If we take
a look at the word “pig”, the use of this word in Papua Guinea and in Jewish is
different, even though the object is the same. For people in Jewish, they
understand “pig” has a connotation meaning of unclean, however people in Papua
Guinea signify “pig” as a wealth. The people of a given culture look at things
from their own perspectives (Larson, 1984:137). The perspective in translating the
onomatopoeia lies in the hearing of the speaker. For people in Indonesia, they
3. Characteristics of Language Theory
In translating the language, knowing the characteristic of language which
affect translation is needed. According to Mildred L. Larson, in his book entitled
Meaning-Based Translation: A Guide to Cross-Language Equivalence (1984),
there are three characteristics which have a very direct bearing on principles of
translation:
a. Meaning Components
Meaning components are “packaged” into lexical items, but they are
“packaged‟ differently in one language than in another. Meaning components is
sometimes called as plurality, for example the English –s.
b. Same Meaning Components
The same meaning component will occur in several surface structure
lexical items (forms). In English, the word „sheep‟ occurs. However, the words
„lamb‟, „ram‟, and „ewe‟ also include the meaning „sheep‟.
c. Alternative Meaning
One form will be used to represent several alternative meanings. Most
words have more than one meaning. There will be a primary meaning-the one
which usually comes to mind when the word is said in isolation-and secondary
meanings-the additional meanings which a word has in context with other words.
4. Theory of Translation Strategy
It is not easy in translating the onomatopoeic expression. It is because of
the different cultural background underlying the translator. There may be some
becomes one of the reasons why translation strategy is needed. Moreover,
Loescher (1991:8) defines translation strategy as "a potentially conscious
procedure for solving a problem faced in translating a text, or any segment of it."
This translation of onomatopoeia will face a problem if there is no lexically
meaning in the Indonesian dictionary.
Newmark (1988b) mentions the difference between translation methods
and translation procedures. He writes that, "While translation methods relate to
whole texts, translation procedures are used for sentences and the smaller units of
language" (p.81). He goes on to refer to the following methods of translation:
Word-for-word translation: in which the SL word order is preserved and the
words translated singly by their most common meanings, out of context. Literal
translation: in which the SL grammatical constructions are converted to their
nearest TL equivalents, but the lexical words are again translated singly, out of
context.
Other methods are Faithful translation: it attempts to produce the precise
contextual meaning of the original within the constraints of the TL grammatical
structures. Semantic translation: which differs from 'faithful translation' only in as
far as it must take more account of the aesthetic value of the SL text. Adaptation:
which is the freest form of translation, and is used mainly for plays (comedies)
and poetry; the themes, characters, plots are usually preserved, the SL culture is
converted to the TL culture and the text is rewritten. Free translation: it produces
translation: it reproduces the 'message' of the original but tends to distort nuances
of meaning by preferring colloquialisms and idioms where these do not exist in
the original. Communicative translation: it attempts to render the exact contextual
meaning of the original in such a way that both content and language are readily
acceptable and comprehensible to the readership (1988b: 45-47).
The study of its onomatopoeia translation will need the translation
strategy, because the translator will not easily translate the onomatopoeic
expression without knowing how to translate. From this translation strategy, the
writer knows that this has relation with the contextual meaning and lexical
meaning in the text, which is story line.
There is also a procedural knowledge or options for translation. They are
Direct or Literal Translation and Oblique translation. While Direct or Literal
Translation focuses on structural parallelism for grammatical structures and
meta-linguistic parallelism for parallel concepts, Oblique Translation is used when there
comes a time that direct translation technique would not work because of the
source text which is structurally impossible and the target language does not have
corresponding expression.
Here are some ways of Oblique Translation:
1. Transposition
Transposition can be divided into two. First is Free Transposition,
Compulsory Transposition, which is used when only a transposition is
acceptable.
2. Modulation
Modulation is used when other techniques would generate a text which
is grammatically correct, but unsuitable, not idiomatic, or awkward.
These techniques require excellent knowledge of both languages in
both of the languages involved in the translation. It is commonly used
for translating metonymy.
3. Equivalence
This type of techniques is used to render expression using different
stylistic and structural methods. This method is usually used for
translating idiom, onomatopoeia, proverbs, nominal or adjectival
phrases, idioms, clichés, etc.
4. Adaptation
It is used when there the limit to translation is been reached, for
example when a simple translation would not work or it would
produce a result that is shocking in the target language and culture.
These all theories from the origin of the language assist the writer to find
out the onomatopoeic expressions‟ origin. After find out the origin, the writer then
points out about the meaning and the relation of each the onomatopoeic
expression, according to its lexical meaning or contextual meaning. From the
theories that have been applied, the last is to know the translation strategy of its
C. Theoretical Framework
Three reviews of related studies are needed to compare the idea of the
study. They give new knowledge to the writer in comparing the theories that
should be used in analyzing or doing the study. They also required finding some
information either in the similar or differences idea underlying in the writer‟s
study or the reviews. The theory of origin of language in the onomatopoeia‟s
theory is needed in analyzing the data. The theory of types of onomatopoeia helps
the writer to answer the first problem formulation.
Not only both of theory above that help in answering the first problem
formulation, but also the theory of meaning, even those theories can also be used
in analyzing the second problem formulation. Theory of characteristic language is
needed in answering the first problem formulation in identifying the
onomatopoeic expression and the meaning from the dictionaries. The last is the
translation strategies and the translation procedures is to answer the second
problem formulation and to find the way the translator transferring the idea from
26 CHAPTER III
METHODOLOGY
In this chapter, the writer describes the methodology that will be helpful in
analyzing the onomatopoeic expression in translation as the main topic of this
study. This chapter contains of four subchapters. First, it will tell about the areas
of the research. The second is about the object of the study. The third will be the
approach that will be used in conducting the study. The last is the research
procedure which contains of types of data, data collection, population, and data
analysis.
A. Areas of Research
The areas of research conducted by the writer was text analysis and
translation. The text to be analyzed was onomatopoeia words written in comic The
Life and Times of Scrooge Mcduck. The highlight of the translation was the
strategy used in transferring the idea of onomatopoeia words into Indonesian in
Kisah Hidup Paman Gober.
B. Object of the Study
The objects of this research were the language features, especially
onomatopoeic expression in the comic The Life and Times of Scrooge Mcduck and
its translation into Indonesian, Kisah Hidup Paman Gober. The translatable unit
C. Method of the study
This study was a qualitative research and library research. It was
conducted to figure out a theory which is underlying the project. The writer
studied not only about the conversation but also the words written outside the
dialogue balloons, considering that the onomatopoeic expression was not only in
utterances but also in the description of what the characters doing.
This study was a qualitative research in which the writer observed the
dialogue and the description outside the dialogue balloon in order to understand
the meaning. The writer used the theories as mentioned before in chapter II to
analyze the onomatopoeic expressions translation to figure out the translation
strategy.
D. Research Procedure 1. Types of Data
The collected data of this research was an objective data. This research
involved two main literary works, which were comics. The first was one of the
works of Don Rosa entitled The Life and Times of Scrooge Mcduck. It was first
published by Gemstone Publishing Book in New York 1994. This is the most
famous comic at that time until now. Hence, it is translated into so many
languages in the world because of the need of readers from other countries. For
this work, Don Rosa won Will Eisner Award in 1995.
Due to the popularity of the comic, Indonesian readers also like to read
this comic. In fact, not all of the Indonesian people know English. Therefore, this
Indonesia is Kisah Hidup Paman Gober. It was published by PT Penerbitan
Sarana Bobo, Gramedia Pustaka Utama Ltd, in Jakarta.
The Life and Times of Scrooge Mcduck is a comic in which the characters
are all animals. This comic contains of 12 chapters with additional chapters. The
story happens between 1877 and1947. The main character of this comic is a duck,
named Scrooge Mcduck. In this comic, Mcduck is characterized as a rich and
lucky. His attention is for money. The comic tells about his experiences with other
characters where the story is also related to money. The whole story tells the
experience from his child till he becomes rich.
2. Data Collection
The data that the writer has taken in conducting this study was twelve
chapters of the comic The Life and Times of Scrooge Mcduck and its tranlation in
Indonesian Kisah Hidup Paman Gober. The twelve chapters are: The Duke,
Dimes, and Detinies; The Last of the Clan Mcduck; The Master of the Mississippi;
The Buckaroo of the Badlands; The Cowboy Captain of Cutty Sark; Raider of the
Copper Hill; the New Laird of the Castle Mcduck; the Terror of the Transvaal;the
Vigilante of Pizen Bluff; Dreamtime Duck of the Never-Never; King of the
Klondike; The Prisoner of the White Agony Creek; Hearts of the Yukon; The
Billionaire of Dismal Downs; The Invader of Fort Duckburg; The Sharpie of the
Culebra Cut; The Empire-Builder from Calisota; and The Richest Duck in the
The numbering of the data is written this way. When the datum was
obtained inside the balloon, it would be IBxx, otherwise it would be OBxx. The
last two digits are numbers which is shown orderly.
The procedure done by the writer was that she collected the comic of The
Life and Times of Scrooge Mcduck from the internet. The followimg step was to
search its Indonesian-translation comic, entitled Kisah Hidup Paman Gober.
Second, the writer read whole of the comic, both of English version and Indonesia
version. Third, the writer made a list of the onomatopoeic expression found in the
comic.
3. Population
Population was the data of the research that was being analyzed and
discussed.The onomatopoeia expressions that have been collected was 63
expressions. Since the number of data that have been found was not many, the
writer used all of the data to be discussed in this research.
In naming the data, there are four digits to use. The two first digits are
letters and two rest digits are numbers. The first two digits represent a place where
the data was taken, whether it is inside the balloon or outside the balloon.
4. Data Analysis
To answer the problems, the writer has done some steps to solve. In
analyzing the data, the writer cannot apply the theories in every onomatopoeic
expression found. This was because some onomatopoeic expressions are not
First step done by the writer was to make the onomatopoeic expressions
into the table, by adding the information such as the words of onomatopoeia in
English and Indonesian, phonetic transcription, pages, and context of the picture’s
description. The second is to analyze every expression with its meaning in the
picture, by looking and checking it at the dictionary. When the onomatopoeic
expressions can be found in the dictionary, and its translation in Indonesian is the
same, it can be concluded that the translation strategy uses direct translation. In
the contrary, when the onomatopoeic expressions cannot be found in the
dictionary, and they were translated in Indonesian, there would be some
adjustments in translation process.
The step to analyze the onomatopoeic expressions that were not listed in
the dictionary was to see the contextual meaning in the pictures. Then, the writer
tried to see the reason using the onomatopoeic expressions by applying the theory
of the origin of the language. The last step was to figure out which translation
31
CHAPTER IV
ANALYSIS RESULTS AND DISCUSSION
In this chapter, the writer is going to deliver the results of the analysis done in the
previous chapter and also the discussion of the findings. It contains the types of
onomatopoeia as stated before in the review of literature and also the strategies of
translating onomatopoeia. The types of onomatopoeia that has been analysed
helps in identifying what the translation strategies are used.
A. Description of Research Data
This study is about types of onomatopoeia and translation strategies used
in onomatopoeic expressions. Since onomatopoeia is usually performed in words
or phrases, therefore the writer observed the words and phrases containing
onomatopoeic expressions. The expressions are not only written in balloons, but
also outside of them. It is written in Encyclopedia Americana (1978:370) that the
dialogue which is written in balloons seems to emerge from the speakers‟ mouth.
Charles Forceville in “Balloonics: The Visual of Balloons in Comic” (2009) says
that onomatopoeia occurs not only inside the balloons but also outside of them.
Hence, from the dialogue the writer found onomatopoeic expressions inside and
outside the balloons. The onomatopoeic expressions found in comic The Life and
Times of Scrooge Mcduck are 63 expressions. The 63 expressions were
categorized into two parts. The first part was onomatopoeic expressions found
onomatopoeic expressions found outside the balloons with 47 numbers. When
inputing data was done, it was found that there were 40 data that are included in
Direct Onomatopoeia, 16 data that are Associative Onomatopoeia, and 7 data of
Exemplary Onomatopoeia.
The data were obtained by listing the onomatopoeic expressions in the
Source Text and then followed by checking the translation in Target Text. The
data would be first analyzed by checking the dictionary. The onomatopoeic
expressions which were found in the dictionary were categorized as lexical
onomatopoeia. As an example, expression „bang‟ was found in the comic. By
checking a dictionary, the writer found its meaning which says, “A sudden loud
noise” according to Oxford Advanced Learners’ Dictionary. This expression
became one of data from lexical onomatopoeia. Otherwise, they would be non
lexical onomatopoeia.
B. Analysis Results
This subchapter will be the presentation of the answers for the first and
second problems. The first problem was about the types of onomatopoeic
expressions which were found from the Source Text and the translation from the
Target Text. Second problem was the strategies of translation that were used in
1. Onomatopoeic expressions found in the comic
The first problem says “What are the types of onomatopoeic expressions
found in The Lifes and Times of Scrooge Mcduck and their translation in Kisah
Hidup Paman Gober?” As what the writer has said previoulsy, there were two
categories of the data. The first category was its expression that could be found
inside the balloons. The second category was the expressions that were found
outside the balloons but they were written in the panels of the comics.
a. Onomatopoeic expressions found inside the balloons
This table below is some data of onomatopoeic expressions which were
found inside the balloon. The contents were the onomatopoeic expressions in ST,
which is English, page where the expression was found in both of languages, its
English phonetic transcription, the meaning of English expressions that were
taken from either Longman Dictionary of English Language and Culture and
Oxford Learner Dictionary or Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary, the translated
onomatopoeic expression in Indonesian, and the last is the text in which the
onomatopoeia was found. This following table is some data of onomatopoeic
N Table 1 Onomatopoeic expressions found inside the balloon
Datum IB01 was gained from first serial, entitled “Master of Mississippi.”
By taking notice at the dialogue “I‟m tellin ya, lad, this river is so dirty, I once
saw it crack goin round and bend,” it could be detected that this expression was
used as a verb. That was why its Indonesian translation is also a verb “patah.” The
writer concluded that this onomatopoeic expression was functioned as a verb, and
not an independent onomatopoeia.
Getting in with the theory of origin, this expression could be included in
the Bow Wow Theory. The theory said that the simplest word is imitative of
natural sounds. The sound crack is considered as a sound that is produced when it
is broken. Furthermore, by checking at the types of onomatopoeia, this expression
could be included into Direct Onomatopoeia in reason of the sound of this
expression resembles to the sound that it names. This picture below is the panel
where the expression was found.
Picture IB01 page 15 “Master of Mississippi”
Datum IB04 was obtained from serial “Buckaroo of the Badlands”. The
expression was “Yee haw” which was translated into “Yiihaa”. Even though this
expression was not listed in the dictionary, it was categorized as an onomatopoeic
word. By taking a look at the context or the picture below, the writer realized it as
that makes the utterance. He is imitating sound of horse that was ridden by the
cowboy.
Picture IB04 page 5 “The Buckaroo of the Badlands”
The sound of “yee haw” is predicted by the writer to be pronounced as /ji:
hͻ :/. By comparing of the pronunciation from some words such as “keep”,
“sheet”, “bee”, “meet” whose double letters –ee are pronounced as /i:/, the writer
made “yee” to be pronounced as /ji:/. For the second word of this onomatopoeia
expression, by paying attention the words such as “jaw”, “raw”, “law” whose
letter a is pronounced as /ͻ :/, therefore, the writer decided to use /hͻ :/ as
pronunciation of “haw.” In result, the pronunciation of “yee haw” becomes /ji:
hͻ :/.
Considering the origin of this expression, the writer assumed that “yee
haw” belongs to Yo-He-Ho Theory. Crystal (1987) said that language is produced
because of human physical effort, such as people work together. In this
expression, as shown by the picture and the context, the expression was taken
when a person-especially in this picture is a cowboy- rides a horse. The human
horse. That becomes the reason why the writer chose onomatopoeia “yee haw”
belonging to Yo-He-Ho theory.
Onomatopoeia “yee haw” could be included to direct onomatopoeia. Even
when it was not listed in the dictionary, this expression has been conventionalized
because it has been known by people and they may use the word “yee haw” to
represent the expression of cowboy riding a horse.
Onomatopoeic words might be arisen as our creative use of language.
Fromkin in his book, An Introduction to Language (1999), when comes to topic
of onomatopoeia “To say that we are creative in our use of language means that
language use is not limited to stimulus-response behavior.” Here is the example,
when someone steps on our foot, we might automatically respond by screaming or
groaning. That is one of the behaviors which happens as a respond of some kind
of feelings or emotions.
The third datum which is going to be analyzed is number IB08. The
picture will be presented below this paragraph. As what has been explained
previously, this onomatopoeic expression might not an imitation, but this
expression is one of onomatopoeias which shows emotions or feelings. The
picture below shows the expression of this kind of onomatopoeia. The word of
Picture IB08 page 1 “Terror of the Transvaal”
Datum IB08 shows feeling of dissatisfaction. The panels before the picture
above tell that Scrooge Mcduck goes to a place in Transvaal to get gold. It can be
seen then after Scrooge says, “Bah! Too much hubbub! Too many people! I‟ll find
a hole that big filled with gold. And all mine!” The expression definitely shows
dissatisfaction due to what he has been saying after the expression “Bah!” He said
that that there are too many people. It is known that Scrooge wants to obtain much
gold for him to get rich. In addition to the amount of people that come to that
place, it makes him get less of the gold, which is why he feels disappointed.
Based on the theory of origin, it is indeed included in The Pooh-pooh
Theory, because the expression „bah‟ comes from dissatisfaction that reveals
human emotion which is suitable with this theory. As said about the theory of
origin, the writer then chose direct onomatopoeia as its type, because the sound of
this word resembles to the word.
This following datum is still an onomatopoeic expression which was found
inside the balloon. Datum number IB09 shows the onomatopoeia about animal, in
through the conversation inside the balloon and the image where the balloon is
pointed to the animal that the writer has said that is not a cat, but lion. The
following is the picture from the Source Text comic.
Picture IB09 page 7 “The Terror of the Transvaal”
The picture above shows a lion with the balloon above his head written “Meow”.
It is a common knowledge that the tiger‟s sound is not “meow”. We already know
that “meow” is used for a cat‟s sound. It could be seen from the Longman
Dictionary which says that meow is to make the crying sound a cat makes. The
picture above is telling us that the lion becomes afraid or sad because its neck is
tied by a rope from the duck, which is Scrooge McDuck.
The Bow-wow theory is the most suitable theory for this kind of
expressions. As David Crystal (1987) says, the bow wow theory is a speech arose
through people imitating the sounds of the environment, especially animal calls.
In this context, the animal sound which was being imitated is a cat. As seen in its
expression is a direct onomatopoeia, since the word is a imitation of the sound of
a cat.
By reading the sentence after its expression, it is known that the
conversation shows the feeling that is not good, which may be dissatisfaction, or
feeling of anger. Even in that balloon, there is still one more onomatopoeic
expressions, it is „hisss‟. Based on type of onomatopoeia, „hiss‟ is one of example
of direct onomatopoeia because the sound it resembles is also the member of its
class. The definition of „hiss‟ according to Oxford Advanced Learner’s Dictionary
is a sound like long –s. In accordance to its definition which gives clue that is a
sound, it is said as onomatopoeia.
The expressions “boo” and “hisss” were taken from this sort of comic as
what the writer has added below. It shows the conversation of the characters in the
comic. The one that does the conversation containing the onomatopoeic
expression „boo‟ and „hiss‟ is the one wearing a blue hat.
The focus for the expression the writer means is in the word „boo‟.
According to Longman Dictionary, „boo‟ means „a sound to make disapproval or
contempt‟. For this dictionary meaning, the writer concludes it as one of examples
of Direct Onomatopoeia because the sound of the word resembles the sound that it
names. If we take a look at the origin of language, this onomatopoeic expression
will be from The Pooh-pooh Theory which says that it comes from human
emotion, which in this context is human emotion for feeling dissatisfied then
showing disapproval.
There are also some onomatopoeic expressions that are not found in the
dictionary, but they were still translated into Indonesian, such as „yee haw‟ and
„grrr‟. They are categorized as onomatopoeia because they denote the sound of
showing mad for „grr‟ and the sound of cowboy riding a horse for „yee haw‟. As
what the writer has written before, they can be called as conventionalized words,
or the words that have been accepted and used by people.
b. The onomatopoeic expressions found outside the balloon
The following data was taken from the expressions written not inside the
balloon, but the written text outside the balloon. One important thing to match the
expressions was to pay attention at the pictures on the comic. It was because the
expressions must be suitable with the context of the story described into the
No Pa
Table 2 Onomatopoeic expressions found outside the balloon
This table above is some data found outside the balloon. The contents
were the number of data, page the onomatopoeia was found in both of source text
(English) and its target text (Indonesian), onomatopoeic words or expressions in
English and their translation in Indonesian with English pronunciation, and also
the context of the expressions that were correlated with the pictures in the comic.
The situational context that the writer included in the table helps the
understanding of the function of each expression that was written in the comic.
(a) (b)
First datum to be analyzed was picture OB06 with expression of
“Arooo”. Readers were expected to notice the panel order. The writer has said that
in reading a comic, order of the panels is important. In this comic, the order is
from left to right. At the picture above, the picture on the left (a) is what the writer
means by the text outside the balloon. There is no balloon in its picture such as in
the picture of (b). On picture (a), the text “Aroooo..” is outside the balloon, while
on the picture (b), the texts “Har Har! This Hound costume works just as well as it
did 200 years ago!” and “And why not! The McDucks will never recover from
that humiliation!” are inside the balloon.
It could be seen that there is no connection between the onomatopoeic
expressions with the pictures inside the square. This is a special case. The truth of
the expression is revealed in the next square, that the sound “Arooo..” is truthfully
the sound makes by a man that imitates a sound of dog. Even though, there is no
meaning that can be found in the dictionary, it was translated into “Auuu”. This
case proves that the reference of cataphora was used. In this occasion, the
reference is not the sentences, but pictures. Cataphora is used for referring
forward. This supports the idea that comic should be read in order. While in
Manga (Japanese comic), the order is from right to left. For American, conversely,
it is read from left to right.
The word “Arooo” can be put into the type of Direct Onomatopoeia,
since its sound resembles a soun the word it denotes. It is also a part of Bow-wow
theory from the origin of the language, because bow wow theory is usually related
