Interlingual and Intersemiotic Translation in Children’s Literature: A Case Study of “Wimpy Kids” Children Volumes

Abstract The emergence of modern developed high-tech societies, with their international and intercultural communications, led to the rise of demands for various kinds of translation or translation-like activities. The present research took a deep look at one of these kinds of translation or translation-like activities, which is intersemiotic translation. The main focus of this research was on intersemiotic translation of children’s literature because literature exerts direct influence on the formation of children’s personality and their cultural and social understandings. In the present study 60 illustrations (30 from the originals and 30 from the translated books) selected from three volumes of The Diary of a Wimpy Kid were investigated with respect gender representation in order to detect which components were ignored or completely omitted after being translated. Moreover, 60 parts of the texts (30 from the originals and 30 from the translated books), which were related to the illustrations were analyzed with respect to gender representation to find out how ignored and omitted components resulted in maintenance or ignorance of the text-image interaction and/or affinity between STs and TTs after being translated. To find the answer, the illustrations and the texts in both the STs and the TTs were analyzed according to the five social distances proposed by Kress and Van Leeuwen’s (1996) model of semiotic analysis regarding gender representation. For the analysis of the possible interactions and/or affinity between words and images, Nikolajeva and Scott’s (2000) model was also applied. The results of the research showed that the coherence between illustrations and the texts in the STs were overlooked in TTs, which resulted in misunderstanding and confusing stories in TTs and target society. Key Words: International and intercultural communication, intersemiotic translation, CHL.