The translation of cultural and literary expressions denotes a valuable area of investigation for translation researchers. Numerous studies have investigated and analyzed translations and identified the translation procedures utilized in them. In the present context, Dweik (2013) conducted a study on translating cultural and literary expressions from English to Arabic, in which he employed different perspectives to examine culture and translation. Dweik’s study was conducted at the Middle East University in Jordan and investigated problems confronting some graduate and undergraduate English majors in translating cultural and lexical expressions into Arabic, for instance, idioms, collocations, metaphors, proverbs, and some proper nouns. An aggregate of 20 students was selected to accomplish a translation test. Participants were asked to convert some culture-bound items within a given time. The test aimed to collect precise data on difficulties faced in translating cultural and lexical expressions. Dweik (2013) tabulated the ST items and noted their translations in the TT to analyze the data and evaluate the performance of the participating students. He also interviewed some participants to explore their problems during the translation process. Dweik (2013) discovered that the students performed poorly in translating cultural and lexical expressions and attributed their deficiencies to the paucity of their knowledge of the target language and target language culture.

Farahani and Mokhtari (2016) investigated CSIs in the English Translation of Hedayat’s Blind Owl. Their study began by defining translation and discussing its transformation from a linguistic-oriented operation to a more culturally oriented task. Farahani and Mokhtari (2016) employed theories and examples to highlight the importance of culture in translation and its relationship to language, subsequently introducing their methodology by overviewing the selected corpus, Sadegh Hedayat’s Blind Owl, and discussing the literary significance of this text. They collected data by listing the CSIs and identifying the utilized translation techniques. They analyzed the data using tables and pie charts to categorize and analyze every CSI example they discovered in the book. Farahani and Mokhtari (2016) reported that “the translator restored extensively to domestication as the major strategy in dealing with translating CSIs.”

Aldawood (2017) studied the translation of CSIs in literary texts, examining how translators represent the target language culture in their translations, specifically Arabic into English, and noting the stereotypes with which Westerners associate Arabs. She examined a book rich with CSIs, Saudi author Yousef Al-Mohaimeed’s فخاخ الرائحة /fixa:xu rra:?iɦa/(translated by Anthony Calderbank as Wolves of the Crescent Moon) as a case study. Aldawood (2017) collected data by selecting 20 CSI examples from the original Arabic text, compared the examples to the translated version, and discussed the translation strategies that were used. Aldawood (2017) found that literal translation and transliteration were widely used strategies and that foreignization was favoured over domestication. She also discovered that the translator used a glossary to explain CSIs that the TT reader might not understand and to afford such readers more insight into Saudi culture.

People have travelled throughout history for numerous and varied reasons, such as tourism (curiosity), immigration, exile, trade, diplomacy, and educational purposes. Travel writing eventually became a form of literature through which people documented their journeys for others. Travel literature has a long history and has been read through the ages. For instance, “travellers’ tales were probably the most popular form of reading in seventeenth-century France” (Warwick, 2009: 53). Anjum (2014) asserted that travel writing was a very broad domain and described it as “fluid and versatile” stating that its complexity made its definition difficult. Anjum (2014) also mentioned the different forms of travel writing, including guidebooks, itineraries, routes, maps, accounts of journeys accomplished via land or water, and mere descriptions of experiences (Al Shehhi’s Uncle Sam & Myself is a good example of this type). Anjum (2014) further explained that travel writing could be inscribed as prose or poetry and encompass historical or (auto-) biographical works. Anjum (2014) and Borm (2004) disagreed on the notion that travel writing should be non-fictional, with Anjum (2014, p. 193) claiming that travel writing is “a collective term for a variety of texts both predominantly fictional and non-fictional whose main theme is travel.” Venu (2018: 67) defined travel writing as “one of the interesting mediums to translate culture, as the writer travels, makes observations and translates the observation based on real experience verbally through the travelogue.” Travel writing essentially involves writing about one’s own country or traveling to other lands to document foreign cultural practices such as religions, food habits, traditions, politics, and customary practices. Travel writing also concerns translating the identity of a foreign culture for another society by transferring a culture’s ideas and its linguistic and lexical terms to another. Travel writing can additionally incorporate precise illustrations, descriptions, and historical contexts through means such as maps. Venu (2018: 67) stated that “the traveler uses the work as a mouthpiece to take the readers to new destinations and exposes the culture of that place in a detailed manner through vivid descriptions.” She (2018: 72) added that “it is appropriate to state that travel writers record their expeditions for someone else to relive and recapitulate the moments that they have experienced.” Hence, travel writers experience different cultures and customs for the sake of the reader’s enjoyment and attempt their best to deliver their experienced realities to their readers.

2.2.1. Al Shehhi’s أنا والعم سام /?na : wa l؟am sa:m/ ( Uncle Sam & Myself )

Jamal Ibrahim Al Shehhi is a notable publishing and writing personality in the United Arab Emirates. He founded the Kuttab Publishing House in 2010 and served as the Executive Director of the Arab Children's Programme at the Mohammed Bin Rashid Al-Maktoum Knowledge Foundation. He is also Secretary General of the Emirates Award for Fiction. In addition to founding the Kuttab Café, a cultural café-cum-bookshop in Dubai, Al Shehhi has published several texts, including the book Uncle Sam & My Self and a children's story series titled The Dairy of Moshagheb, which was also featured in newspapers such as Al Etihad and Gulf News. Al Shehhi holds a bachelor’s degree in Human Sciences from a university in the United States and also earned his master's degree from the University of Wisconsin-La Crosse in the US.

Emirati author and publisher Jamal Al Shehhi (2016) wrote أنا و العم سام /? na: wa l؟am sa:m/, which was translated as Uncle Sam & Myself by Renaissance Translation & Businessmen Services in 2017 (no specific translator(s) is named). This autobiographical account comprises short stories and may be defined as travel literature combined with Al Shehhi’s amusing writing and narrative skills. In this book, Al Shehhi recounts his journeys as a foreign student in the land of Uncle Sam (US), where he was confronted with numerous obstacles as a scholarship student because of expensive lifestyles, unusual weather, and new friendships. Therefore, he moved from one state to another until he found an affordable and convenient place to live and study. The author narrates his daily life in the US, the celebrations, visits to different states, the nostalgia from which he suffered, and scholarship students who struggle to stay in the US and strive not to return to their homelands empty-handed. Al Shehhi also conveys the mixed feelings of many scholarship students experience, recounting stories about his friends and their emotional relationships.

Culture is an immensely complex term that combines varied phenomena within its meaning. It manifests in diverse forms and may be distinctively described from one region to another. Newmark (1988, p. 94) defined culture as “the way of life and its manifestations that are peculiar to a community that uses a particular language as its means of expression.” Newmark (1988) asserted that culture was a focal facet of the ways of life of a people, influencing how they communicate within their communities, including their use of language to express themselves based on their cultural practices. Culture is, therefore, a significant factor in shaping one’s way of life. Newmark (1988, p. 94) distinguished between the universal, cultural, and personal use of language. Universal words such as sun and moon in English cause no problems in translation. They are translated into Arabic as الشمس /aʃams/ and القمر /alqamar/. Most universal words are usually translatable, but they can connote different meanings depending on their SL and TL cultures and how specific cultures define and use them. Cultural terms cause some translation problems if a difficult-to-bridge cultural gap exists between the SL and TL. For example, translation problems occur in the process of converting certain culturally related religious concepts to target readers belonging to a different religion with different expectations and taboos. Newmark (1988) described personal language as an idiolect that normally leads to translation problems because of a personal usage of a certain word to express or refer to something. Newmark (1988) argued that translation problems occur when language becomes increasingly specific and, therefore, more culturally focused. In such instances, literal translations affect the meaning, and a descriptive-functional equivalent must be included in the translation. According to Newmark (1988), there are four general considerations governing the translation of cultural terminology:

Newmark (1988) classified cultural items as

The paragraphs that follow present translation procedures posited by Newmark (1988), along with English–Arabic or Arabic–English examples that exhibit how such procedures are used in English/Arabic translations.

2.2.1. Literal Translation

As a technique, literal translation has always been controversial because it is sometimes viewed as a necessary and valid method but can often cause funny and unacceptable conversions. Newmark (1988: 68–69) stated that “the prevailing orthodoxy is leading to the rejection of literal translation as a legitimate translation procedure… However,… literal translation is correct and must not be avoided if it secures referential and pragmatic equivalence to the original.”

Consider the following example and its Arabic translation in which every English content word except powdered has an Arabic lexical counterpart:

Troops went by the house and down the road, and the dust they raised powdered the leaves of the trees. The trunks of the trees too were dusty, and the leaves fell early that year.

و كانت القوات المسلحة تمر بالمنزل ثم تهبط الطريق، وكان الغبار الذي تثيره يغطي أوراق الأشجار. و كانت جذوع الأشجار مغبرة أيضاً و قد تساقطت أوراقها باكراً، ذلك العام.

/wa ka:nati lquwa:tu lmusallaɦatu tamurru bilmanzili Ɵumma tahbițu țțari:q wa ka:na lɣuba:ru juɣați ?awra:qa l?ʃɜa:r wa ka:nat ɜuðu:؟u l?ʃɜa:r muɣbaratun ?ajḍan wa qad tasa:qațat ?awra:quha ba:kiran ðalika l؟a:m/

The adoption of literal translation in the abovementioned example proves that this method is sometimes valid and that it represents an important technique. According to Newmark (1988), literal translation can be tested using the back-translation test in which the TL sentence is translated back into the SL. If the translation was satisfactory, it would pass the back-translation test. For example, a black frame is translated into الإطار الأسود /al?ița:ru l?aswad/ in Arabic. The back translation in English is correct. However, it should be noted that this test does not work with languages that display lexical gaps (Newmark, 1988).

2.2.2. Transference

Transference involves borrowing and is “the process of transferring an SL word to a TL text” (Newmark, 1988: 81). It is generally employed in the conveyance of proper names, names of countries, or untranslated titles of literary works such as plays, films, and other types (Newmark, 1988: 82). For instance, Arabic has borrowed many English words and phrases like cricket كريكت /krikit/ Likewise, English has borrowed numerous Arabic words such as Intifada إنتفاضة / ?intifa:ḍa/

2.2.3. Naturalization

This process “adapts the SL word first to the normal pronunciation, then to the normal morphology … of the TL” (Newmark, 1988: 82). Taking Arabic into consideration, Ghazala (1995: 193) defined naturalization as “the attempt to adopt the English terms to the morphology of Arabic word structure and can be seen as the evolution of the transcription method.” For example, Alexander the Great is translated as الاسكندر الأكبر /aliskandaru l? akbar/ in Arabic.

2.2.4. Cultural Equivalent

A cultural equivalent is utilized when an SL cultural word or phrase is translated through a TL cultural word or phrase (Newmark, 1988: 83). The cultural differences between English and Arabic require cultural equivalents to be widely used in the translation of non-literal expressions between the two languages as in the conversion of it rains cats and dogs to إنها تمطر كأفواه القرب /? innaha: tumțiru ka? fwa:hi lqirab/

2.2.5. Functional Equivalent

Newmark (1988: 83) defined functional equivalence as a procedure that “requires the use of [a] culture-free word.” A translator may employ a TL word or phrase that discharges the same function as the SL word or phrase, even if the literal meaning differs. السلام عليكم /assala: mu ؟alajkum/in Arabic is translated into Hello in English despite the difference in the literal meanings of the two terms because both discharge the same function and serve the same purpose.

2.2.6. Descriptive Equivalent

The descriptive equivalent paraphrases the SL term in the TL without the presence of the SL word (Ghazala, 1995: 204). Kremlin in the SL is translated using descriptive equivalent as مجلس النواب الروسي /maɜlisu nuwa:bi rru:si:/ in Arabic.

2.2.7. Synonymy

This technique utilizes “a near TL equivalent to an SL word in the context, where a precise equivalent may or may not exist” (Newmark, 1988: 84). This procedure is often used when the translator cannot find a one-to-one substitute in the TL. The English term sword is a synonymy for many words in Arabic, including سيف /sajf/, مهند /muhannad/, حسام /ɦusa:m/.

2.2.8. Through-Translation

Through-translation “is the literal translation of common collocations, names of organisations, the components of compounds… and perhaps phrases” (Newmark, 1988: 84). It is also called calque or loan translation (Newmark, 1988). يلعب دورا /jal؟abu dawran/ in Arabic is a through-translation for playing a role in English.

2.2.9. Shift or Transposition

Newmark (1988: 85) defined shift or transposition as “a translation procedure involving a change in the grammar from SL to TL.” Some examples in which a grammatical change is necessary are inscribed below:

2.2.10. Modulation

Modulation may be defined as translation through a “change in the viewpoint, of perspective… and very often of [the] category of thought” (Newmark, 1988: 88). The following examples illustrate such modifications:

2.2.11. Recognized Translation

The process of recognized translation is employed to “normally use the official or the generally accepted translation of any institutional term” (Newmark, 1988: 89). However, Newmark suggests that if a translator is skeptical of the official translation of a certain word, they should gloss it to register disagreement with the official version. For example, the term environment-friendly bags is officially translated into the Arabic حقائب صديقة للبيئة /ɦaqa:?ibu ṣadi:qatun lilbi:?a/ even though it is inapt. It would be impossible to translate the phrase into a more acceptable term because this translation is generally accepted and widely used in Arabic. However, a translator could gloss it to register disagreement with such a rendering.

2.2.12. Compensation

This process occurs “when loss of meaning, sound-effect, metaphor or pragmatic effect in one part of a sentence is compensated in another part or contiguous sentence” (Newmark, 1988: 90). This technique is used to make up for the loss of a certain ST effect by creating a similar effect in the TL. For example, the English pun Try a blue moon in a blue moon is a Beer ad that employed a pun (once every blue moon) to advertise a product. This phrase is used to express something rare and extraordinary (every blue moon). An Arabic translation could be جرب المستحيل دائما /ɜarribi lmustaɦi:la da:?iman/. The compensation here is within the meaning of the pun.

2.2.13. Componential Analysis

Newmark (1988: 90) described the componential analysis as “the splitting up of a lexical unit into its sense components, often one-to-two, three or four translations.” A comparison is performed between “an SL word with a TL word which has a similar meaning, but is not an obvious one-to-one equivalent, by demonstrating first their common and then their differing sense components.” (Newmark, 1988: 114). Unfortunately, no clear example is found in English–Arabic translations.

2.2.14. Reduction and Expansion

Newmark (1988: 90) defined reduction and expansion as “imprecise translation procedures” that were usually used in translating poorly written texts when the translator was required to adjust the TT. Reduction occurs when translating a phrase using fewer words; for example, غير رسمي /ɣajur rasmi:/ in Arabic is translated to Informal in English by reducing the number of words to produce a more suitable translation. Expansion is the complete opposite; BBC is translated into قناة البي بي سي البريطانية /qana:tu lbi: bi: si: lbirița:nija/ in Arabic adding قناة /qana:tu/ and البريطانية /albirița:nija/ in the interests of clarification.

2.2.15. Paraphrasing

A paraphrase “involves providing additional information to help readers recognize the referents of the source words in the absence of direct equivalents.” (Mughazy, 2016: 38). For example, etymology is paraphrased in Arabic into علم دراسة أصول الكلمات /؟ilmu dirasati ?uṣuli lkalima:t/.

2.2.16. Translation Label

This process involves “the provisional translation, usually of a new institutional term, which should be made in inverted commas, which can later be discreetly withdrawn. It could be done through literal translation” (Newmark, 1988: 90). For example, Kremlin is translated into الكريملين: مجلس النواب الروسي /alkrimlin majlisu nnuwa:bi rru:si:/.

2.2.17. Equivalence and Adaptation

Vinay and Darbelnet (1958/1995) postulated other procedural possibilities, including equivalence which is “an unfortunately named term implying approximate equivalence, accounting for the same situation in different terms.” (Newmark, 1988: 90). It concerns the similarity between two words from two different languages. For example, the word Apple in English is translated into its direct equivalent, تفاحة /tuffa:ɦa/, in Arabic. Adaptation is the “use of recognised equivalent between two situations. This is a matter of cultural equivalence” (Newmark, 1988: 91). For example, the English saying as rich as Croesus is translated into يملك مال قارون /jamliku ma:la qa:ru:n/ in Arabic.

2.2.18. Couplet

A translator may combine two or more translation procedures to tackle a single problem. This technique is particularly common for the translation of cultural words (Newmark, 1988: 91) when two different procedures are combined in one translation (couplets) or three or four processes are applied to a single translation (triplets/quadruplets). For example, the popular American dessert apple pie is translated into الابل باي فطيرة التفاح /al?abil ba:j fați:ratu ttufa:ɦ/ using two translation procedures: borrowing and literal translation.

2.2.19. Notes, Additions, and Glosses

These translation procedures allow translators to provide additional information within a text, at the bottom of a page, end of a chapter, or in a glossary at the end of a book (Newmark, 1988: 91–92). They are usually used to bolster the translation with more information for clarification. The additional information offered by a translator is primarily cultural and seeks to bridge the gap between the SL and TL. Such information can also be technical and/or linguistic. For example, the Arabic Islamic cultural term المسحراتي /almusaɦara:ti/ is translated into the Musahharati, and the translator describes the term at the bottom of the page as a man walking the streets at night during the holy month of Ramadan singing and drumming to arouse people for their late-night meal in preparation for fasting.