Thesis (M.A.) - Cairo University - Faculty of Arts - Department of English

The present study aims at investigating how three different translators (J.M. Rodwell, Muhammad Asad, and Muhammad A.S. Abdel Haleem) from different linguistic backgrounds, translated examples of linguistic deviation in the Qur'an. The study aims at finding answers for the following questions: which strategies do the three translators use in order to overcome the difficulties involved while rendering linguistically deviant structures in the Qur{u2019}an? How far do the different linguistic backgrounds of the three translators in question affect their choices? Which is more appropriate for the target reader: to get the rhetorical effect of linguistically deviant examples or to read them as unmarked structures? Which translation technique is more appropriate to adequately render examples of linguistic deviation? Leech's comprehensive model of the types of linguistic deviation (1969) is adopted to define the types of linguistic deviation in the Qur'an and evaluate the translators' strategies to render the selected examples. Although this model has widely been used in investigating linguistic deviation in literary texts including poetry and novel, it has hardly been used to investigate linguistic deviation in the translation of the Qur'an. A model of compensation strategies is built on previous studies in order to understand the choices of the translators during the translation process. A comparative approach is used to investigate how far the different linguistic backgrounds of the three translators in question affect their choices. The study suggests that the linguistic background of the translator does not alone affect his/her understanding and therefore, translation of linguistically deviant examples in the verses examined

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