Theory of Translation 1 Introduction

2.10.3 Werner Koller’s Model of Equivalence
As stated earlier, concepts from various approaches like pragmatics, cultural studies, 
etc. are applied in translation studies. Werner Koller, a German linguist and 
translation theorist, has developed the model of translation equivalence taking insights 
from pragmatics. According to him, translation is: 
the result of a text-processing activity, by means of which a source-language 
text is transposed into a target-language text. Between the resultant text in L2 
(the target language text) and the source text in L1 (the source language text) 
there exists a relationship, which can be designated as a translational, or 
equivalence relation (Koller, qtd. in Hatim, 27). 
The pragmatic analysis of a text influences the translation equivalence in various 
ways. The text and its translations are produced under different historical and cultural 
conditions and linguistic, textual and extra-textual factors. They include: 
characteristics and limitations of source language and target language, linguistic, 
stylistic and aesthetic norms and translation traditions. 
Koller emphasizes the source text as the fundamental element and discusses the link 
between the translated text and certain conditions relevant to the production of the 
target text. He observes it as a “double linkage to the source text and to the 
communicative conditions on the receiver’s end” (qtd. in Hatim, 27). As a result, he 
presents five kinds of frameworks as follows:

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(1)
Formal Equivalence: SL and TL words having similar orthographic or 
phonological features. 
(2)
Referential or Denotative Equivalence: SL and TL Words referring to the 
same thing in the real world. 
(3)
Connotative Equivalence: SL and TL words triggering the same or similar 
associations in the minds of speakers of the two languages. 
(4)
Text-normative equivalence: SL and TL words used in the similar context in 
their respective languages. 
(5)
Pragmatic or Dynamic Equivalence: SL and TL words having the same effect 
on their respective readers (Hatim, 28).
Hatim observes that Koller’s five types of equivalence have the further advantage of 
turning equivalence into a relative concept. Equivalence now had “inscribed in it the 
notion of difference (i.e. minimum equivalence), as well as identity (i.e. maximum 
equivalence)” (30). The equivalence relations have complex network between the 
author, the translator and the reader of the translated text. Further studies have 
analyzed the issue of equivalence thoroughly and terms like ‘minimum equivalence’ 
and ‘maximum equivalence’ have been discussed. It means that formal equivalence is 
not much stressed over meaning nor linguistic system over communicative context.