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Article http://dx.doi.org/10.26855/jhass.2026.09.003

From Formal Irreproducibility to Relational Translatability: A Semiotic Account of Language Variety Translation

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Lingyi Wang

School of Foreign Studies, Lingnan Normal University, Zhanjiang 524048, Guangdong, China.

*Corresponding author: Lingyi Wang

Published: September 9,2026

Abstract

Literary language variety is a difficult case for translatability because the phonological, lexical, grammatical, or graphic forms that distinguish a variety may themselves contribute to meaning while resisting direct reproduction in another language. This paper approaches the problem from a semiotic perspective. It argues that failure to reproduce a particular form does not necessarily entail failure to reconstruct the relation through which that form becomes significant. Drawing on the distinction between foreground variety and background variety, the paper treats markedness as emerging through textual contrast rather than as an inherent property of isolated markers. A brief illustration from Adventures of Huckleberry Finn and selected Chinese renderings shows that materially different linguistic resources can occupy comparable marked positions within their respective textual environments. On this basis, relational translatability is proposed to describe the possibility of reconstructing a perceptible, source-motivated foreground-background relation in the target text despite formal irreproducibility. The proposal is deliberately limited: reconstruction may be transformed or fail altogether, and formal irreproducibility alone is therefore insufficient evidence of untranslatability.

Keywords

Translatability; language variety; markedness; relational translatability; semiotics

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How to cite this paper

From Formal Irreproducibility to Relational Translatability: A Semiotic Account of Language Variety Translation

How to cite this paper: Lingyi Wang. (2026) From Formal Irreproducibility to Relational Translatability: A Semiotic Account of Language Variety Translation. Journal of Humanities, Arts and Social Science, 10(9), 1043-1048.

DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.26855/jhass.2026.09.003