CHALLENGES OF TRANSLATING ACADEMIC TEXTS FROM …

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CHALLENGES OF TRANSLATING ACADEMIC TEXTS

FROM INDONESIAN INTO ENGLISH IN INTERLINGUAL

COMMUNICATION CLASS

THESIS

Submitted in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirement

for the Degree of Sarjana Pendidikan

Jovanda Febrianesty Ganiet

112015074

ENGLISH LANGUAGE EDUCATION PROGRAM

FACULTY OF LANGUAGE AND ARTS

UNIVERSITAS KRISTEN SATYA WACANA

2019

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CHALLENGES OF TRANSLATING ACADEMIC TEXTS

FROM INDONESIAN INTO ENGLISH IN INTERLINGUAL

COMMUNICATION CLASS

THESIS

Submitted in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirement

for the Degree of Sarjana Pendidikan


112015074

ENGLISH LANGUAGE EDUCATION PROGRAM

FACULTY OF LANGUAGE AND ARTS

UNIVERSITAS KRISTEN SATYA WACANA

2019

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COPYRIGHT STATEMENT

This thesis contains no such material as has been submitted for examination in any

course or accepted for the fulfillment of any degree or diploma in any university.

To the best of my knowledge and my belief, this contains no material previously

published or written by any other person except where due reference is made in the

text.

Copyright@2019

Jovanda Febrianesty Ganiet and E. Titik Murtisari, M.Trans.Stud, Ph.D.

All rights reserved. No part of this thesis may be reproduced by any means without

the permission of at least one of the copyright owners or the English Language

Education Program, Faculty of Language and Arts, Universitas Kristen Satya

Wacana, Salatiga


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TABLE OF CONTENT

COVER PAGE ............................................................................................................... i

INSIDE COVER PAGE ................................................................................................. ii

APPROVAL PAGE ...................................................................................................... iii

PERNYATAAN TIDAK PLAGIAT ..............................................................................iv

COPYRIGHT STATEMENT .......................................................................................... v

PERNYATAAN PERSETUJUAN AKSES ....................................................................vi

TABLE OF CONTENTS ..............................................................................................vii

ABSTRACT ..................................................................................................................ix

INTRODUCTION .......................................................................................................... 1

LITERATURE REVIEW ................................................................................................ 2

Definition of Translation ................................................................................................. 2

Academic Texts .............................................................................................................. 3

Difficulties of Translating Academic Texts ..................................................................... 4

Grammar ................................................................................................................. 4

Vocabulary ............................................................................................................. 5

Motivation............................................................................................................... 6

Previous Study on Challenges in Translating Academic Texts ......................................... 7

THE STUDY .................................................................................................................. 8

Context of the Study .................................................................................................... 8

Participants ................................................................................................................. 9

Research Methodology ................................................................................................ 9

Data Collection Instrument .......................................................................................... 9

Data Analysis ............................................................................................................ 10

FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION ................................................................................... 10

a. Grammar Challenges of Translating Academic Texts .......................................... 10

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b. Vocabulary Challenges of Translating Academic Texts ....................................... 12

c. Motivation Challenges of Translating Academic Texts ........................................ 15

d. Challenges of Translating Academic Texts in Interlingual Communication Class 17

CONCLUSION ............................................................................................................. 21

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS........................................................................................... 22

REFERENCES ............................................................................................................. 23

APPENDIX .................................................................................................................. 26

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ABSTRACT

This quantitative research examines the challenges of translating academic

texts from Indonesian into English Interlingual Communication class. The issue of

translation and its challenges has not been discussed in the process of Interlingual

Communication field. Therefore, this research is aimed to the difficulties students

face in class. As Interlingual Communication class becomes one of important

course in language learning, this research focuses on academic texts that mostly

known as the hardest texts in the learning activity. This study involved 60 students

from batch 2016 from the English Language Education Program (ELEP) of the

Faculty of Language and Arts, Universitas Kristen Satya Wacana, Salatiga. All the

participants had passed Interlingual communication class. The data were collected

through questionnaires using open-ended questions. This research implies that the

awareness of understanding the features of academic texts is still considered by the

students. Hence, the students face difficult in the process of translating academic

texts. From these findings, it is expected that more researches whichdiscuss about

the challenging that mostly found in translating academic texts can be conducted.

Keywords: translation, academic texts, grammar, vocabulary, challenges,

interlingual communication

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Introduction

Translation plays a big role in English language learning. Nowadays,

translation is used into any aspects such as culture, economy, education, and literacy

(Saroukhil, Ghalkhani, & Hashemi, 2017). In the educational field, translation

concern on how language learning becomes a language testing tool, especially for

students of undergraduate degree programs. Hence, translation is the basis of

language learning that can be used for academic purposes (Laviosa, 2014).

According to Poiarkova (2015) (as cited in Dogoriti & Vyzas, 2015, pp 141-

2), academic translation takes a big part in a lexical level as a tool to control

linguistic knowledge. This kind of translation is aimed to transfer the meaning of a

message (Sofia, 2016). Dogotriti and Vyzas (2015) also stated that translation is

beneficial for students to handle academic tasks and help them to increase their

language learning ability in developing their language knowledge.

Translating academic texts becomes one of the challenging tasks in

translation class. While translating academic texts, students have to give extra

attention to the features of academic texts because errors may happen when they

cannot analyze text well (Crystal, 2008). Furthermore, when students do academic

texts translation, they have to understand that each language has different concepts

and they have to take responsibility for their translation (Munday, 2004). Those

things make students need to pay attention when translating academic texts.

As today, translating academic texts has been the main issue in translation.

The issue is proved by how students in Interlingual Communication course of the

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Faculty of Language and Arts of Universitas Kristen Satya Wacana feel anxious

when they do translating academic texts. This is because some features in academic

texts are difficult to be translated, such as grammar and vocabulary. The evidence

that proves strengthen academic texts to be a hard type of texts to translate is the

result that the students get after they do translation tasks.

Thus, I am interested to learn in detail about the challenges of translating

academic texts in Interlingual Communication course at FLA, UKSW. Hopefully,

the results of this study will help the current condition of translation practice and

become an aid to help teachers or lecturers in teaching translation of academic texts

in more effective ways.

Literature Review

This part presents some reviews of related literature that are related to the

proposed research: they are the definition of translation and academic texts,

translating academic texts, and the difficulties of translating academic texts.

Definition of Translation

Nugroho’s (2004) research shows that translation becomes a basis of

language that helps students to understand texts or spoken words from the source

language into the target language. As a basis of language learning, translation

contains a process for the transfers of meanings from the source language texts into

the target language. The process should pay attention not only on the meaning

transfer but also on the grammatical orders of the target language itself. The things

that are transferred include linguistic, semantic and pragmatic meaning (Al-

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Musawi, 2014). Linguistic relates to the structure of words, semantic is logical

meaning, and pragmatic is meaning that has theoretical considerations. In this

study, researchers found that as a basis of language learning, translation has an

important part to produce a good translation.

According to Nida’s (1964) theory, a natural translation can be seen from

some aspects, such as from the selection of words and the rules of translating. It

shows how the readers response to the result of the translation. For the term itself,

some researchers, such as Chesterman (1997), Hejwowski (2004), & Kearns (2009)

believe that translation has rules. The rules that students have to understand before

producing a translation such as a start from vocabulary, and structure (Płońska,

2014). It will guide the student to get a good result in translation.

Academic Texts

An academic text is a type of texts that can help students of English

Education Program to know more about language learning. Academic texts can be

used to practice translation skill. According to Svenska (2008), there are three

features of academic texts. The first is the introduction section which functions as

a place where the explanation of the study is placed and it becomes an umbrella for

the content. The second feature is the method section where students or researchers

have to tell the readers or audience how they collect the data and prove what they

have researched through other research’s result as a review of the literature. The

third feature is the result section where researcher has to combine the theory that

they have got and the result of the research.

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Another theory about academic texts come from Samigullina (2018). In her

journal, she stated that academic texts consist of complexity, formality, objectivity,

and accountability. She further explained that complexity talks about the structure

and meaning of words. Formality talks about issues that need to be discussed or

aspect of language. Objectivity talks about the theory that becomes the base of the

writing like supporting an idea, and references. Then, the last is accountability, it

talks about how the writer applying citation as their references. As a conclusion,

academic texts are product of writing that has a complete feature of each section

rather than other writing that consist of complete order such as introduction, method

and section, and contents such as complexity, formality, objectivity, and

accountability.

Difficulties of Translating Academic Texts

1. Grammar

Crystal (2008) believes that some grammar errors are done by translators

did because they cannot analyze grammar well. They make errors in analyzing the

grammar and get the wrong perception of the source language text. Nugroho (2004)

stated that translation is not a product, but it is a process. When the meaning is not

suitable with the source texts, the mistake comes from the process of the translation.

In addition, Baker (2011) found that some errors which translators often made are

grammatical equivalence, textual equivalence, and pragmatically equivalence.

According to the Baker (2011) research, grammar becomes one of the hardest

equivalence when translating a text, because of sentence of structure of the source

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language and the target language may be totally different. Grammatical errors could

happen if sentences are written not in the right ways and the errors will be evident

in the writing.

2. Vocabulary

Vocabulary takes a big part in the translation process. It has been proven by

Joyce’s (2015) study that shows students who have a lower proficiency in language

learning can reach high scores by learning vocabularies through translation. The

study shows that vocabulary becomes one of the important things that students have

to develop when producing a translation.

The relation between vocabulary and academic texts gets big attention in

the translation process. Coxhead (2012) states that words of academic texts focus

to combine particular needs in the academic content. Hence, vocabularies of

academic texts need to be translated to help the readers understand the purpose of

the text.

Academic texts have specialized words, which is known as terminology.

Christiane North (2016) (cited in Stiegelbauer, Schwarz, & Husar, 2016, p 1) states

that terminology becomes the culture of the language. It means that terminology as

a background of a language must be understood well. The wrong understanding of

the meaning in the target language can be a problem in translation process. Hence,

it becomes difficult for the translators to translate words or texts. Another aspect

that affects the product of translation is the differences between understanding and

interpretation of the language that will be translated. Some terminology words that

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is written in a dictionary has been translated into a complete sentence. It makes

translator have to interpret the words literally into the target language. Based on the

culture of the language, there are two possible problems that students may have to

face when translating texts.

Faber and Rodriguez (2012) stated that terminology is known as a

specialized language that shows a concept of technique for a particular instance.

The language is presented as an encoded language that becomes a center of some

information and unit, it becomes one knowledge. Terminology is a part of applied

linguistic, knowledge about lexical, technique of writing and specialized of

translation. As a part of the language, terminology and translation have interaction

in language learning (Pavel & Nolet, 2001).

Some students who have lack of knowledge about terminology will find it

difficult to do a translation. Students have less freedom in dealing with the meaning

of words when translating a specific language of words (Thelen, 2015). On the

handbook of Terminology which was written by Pavel and Nolet (2001), it is said

that the difficult thing that the students face when translating terminology in a text

is how they identify the term, and classify the terminology. These principles must

be understood first if the students want to produce a good translation.

3. Motivation

In learning process, motivation cannot be denied as one of important thing

that students need before starting to learn a language. It becomes a base to build

students’ passion on something they will learn. Motivation helps the students to

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increase their skills and reach their goals in language learning (Karaoglu, 2008). A

pedagogy will work well when students have motivation on the language learning

process. It will make the learning becomes effective if students are motivatied

enough (Liu & Yu, 2019). Gardner (2016) believes that a motivated person will do

something maximal to reach the goal, but they who do something without

motivation will was their energy without no good result.

The same as other skills in language learning, students who want to do

translation need to be confident. Based on Liu and Yu’s (2019) research, it was

found that students who were motivated in the learning process would be more

confident when completing or producing their translation without being forced. It

shows that motivation will not only affect to the students’ passion, but it will also

affect the students’ self-confidence. The research also showed that motivation could

come from how the teacher treated students, or whether the learning process was

interesting enough for students or not.

Previous Studies on Challenges in Translating Academic Texts

Empirical research has been conducted to look the difficulties that the

students found in translating academic texts. The results that has been collected is

about the challenging in selecting vocabulary in academic texts who is conducted

by Rosa, Pieta, and Bueno (2017) their study found that the use of words was clearly

different between general words and the terminology itself. In the results, it showed

that students find it difficult when they are looking for the meaning of the

terminology in academic texts to the words literally. In addition, Joyce (2015) has

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that on translation found it a nature of the language and methods have a relation in

the final product of the translation. The participants of the study were 48 Japanese

students who were enrolled as full-time freshmen in English language major

undergraduates. The results showed that the way of the students had used to

translate academic texts impact of the quality on the final result of a translation.

Both of the previous study showed two different things in a case of the

challenges in translating academic texts. The first is the vocabulary feature of the

academic texts and the last one is the impact of translation method on a translation

product.

The Study

Context of the Study

The study is about “Challenges of Translating Academic Texts from

Indonesia into English in Interlingual Communication Class.” This study was don

in the English Education Program, Faculty of Language and Arts, UKSW, Salatiga.

The faculty offers translation lessons in a course called Interlingual Communication

which usually consists of twenty students in each class. The tasks in the course are

divided into several kinds of texts. The type of texts that is researched in this study

is academic texts because the texts are often considered as the hardest text to be

translated.

This study aims to find the aspect that make the students find it hard to

translate the academic texts. The study’s research question is “What are interlingual

communication students’ challenges in translating academic article/texts?” At the

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end of this research, the researcher hopes that the result can help teachers to find

ways to assist students to face the challenges of translating academic texts.

Participants of the Study

The participants of the study were students of Interlingual Communication

class. There are 60 students. The participants were randomly chosen from 2016

batch who had just taken interlingual communication course in the last term. The

researcher chose those students because they had just learned translation of

academic texts.

Research Methodology

The data for this study were collected by using a quantitative method of

distributing a questionnaire to the 60 Interlingual Communication students of the

English Language Education Program of the Faculty of Language and Arts, UKSW

to ask about their opinions and beliefs of the challenges of translating academic

texts in Interlingual Communication Class.

Data Collection Instrument

The instrument used in this study is a questionnaire. The questionnaire

included students’ difficulties in translating academic texts based in the grammar,

vocabulary, motivation, and learning process. The questionnaire provides 5 open-

ended question. The questionnaire had piloted to students of 2015 batch who had

taken Interlingual Comunication Class last year.

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Data Analysis

Researcher used the descriptive data to analyze the results. The results were

presented in a percentage of participants` choices from the questionnaires based on

learners’ perception of challenges in translating academic texts. The research

findings also supported by the open-ended question that has been analyzed to be

categorized for each explanation.

FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION

The data were collected using quantitative method with the research

question: “What are interlingual communication students’ challenges in translating

academic article/texts?”. There were four issues addressed in this research:

grammar challenges of translating academic texts, vocabulary challenges,

motivation challenges, and challenges of translating academic texts in Interlingual

communication class.

The segmentation of each issues was based on the statements in the

questionnaires. Furthermore, the qualitative descriptive analysis was used to

complement the quantitative results of this study. For the qualitative analysis, the

interviews were used to provide participants’ reflective explanations on their open-

ended answers in the questionnaire. The result of the issues will be described below.

a. Grammar challenges of Translating Academic Texts

Table 1

No Statement SA A Tot N D SD Tot

1

I found it challenging to

translate sentences with

complex structures into English when translating

academic texts.

13,3% 51,7% 65% 26,7% 6,7% 1,7% 8,4%

11

2

I found it difficult to decide the right grammar in general

when translating academic

texts.

11,7% 43,3% 55% 33,3 11,7 - 11,7%

3

I found it difficult to decide

the appropriate tenses for

different contexts when

translating academic texts.

8,3% 25% 33,3% 45% 18,3 % 3,3% 21,6%

The first issue of this research states how grammar becomes one of the

difficulties when translating academic texts in Interlingual communication class.

The results show that in the S1 (statement) gained the highest score which are 65%

from the total of strongly agree and agree. The process of arranging words with

complex structure was reported as the first challenging part in translating academic

texts. S2 get the second place of grammar challenging with the percentage 55% of

11,7% strongly agree and 43,3% agree that deciding the right grammar in general

when translating academic texts is difficult. Then, the last statement (S3) for

students who claimed that deciding the appropriate tenses for different context is

hard has gained 33,3% of strongly agree and agree.

According to the result, it was shown that the most of the learners agreed that

grammar becomes the hardest part in translating academic texts. The challenge

comes from how they deciding and choosing an appropriate tense. They claimed

that it was challenging to find the relation between the meaning and tenses between

the source language and target language in translating academic text. It is also

supported by student 12 through a statement “English has a lot of tenses and you

may have to decide the appropriate tense for your translation”.

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Students who reported struggle on grammar also stated that the differences of

adverb of time in Bahasa Indonesia made them to do extra work in a process of

translating. Hence, they have to be more paying attention to the time on the texts

were focused. They also believed that it is such a crucial thing in translating process

especially academic texts, because if a translator chose the wrong grammar to

express the time, it will deliver the wrong message from the source of the texts into

the target language. Addition, students believed that grammar is actually a basic for

the process of translating, but if someone lack basic preparation, it will make them

hard to face the process of translating.

b. Vocabulary challenges of Translating Academic Texts

Table 2

No Statement SA A Tot N D SD Tot

4

I found it difficult to find

the English equivalence

of expressions/words in

Indonesian

5,0% 58,3% 63,3% 33,3 3,3% - 3,3%

5

I found it difficult to

translate academic texts

with the proper vocabulary in English

when translating

academic texts.

6,7% 53,3% 60% 28,3% 11,7% - 11,7%

6

I found difficult to find

formal vocabulary when

translating academic texts

from Indonesian into

English.

6,7% 46,7% 53,4% 31,7% 15% - 15%

7


understand the

terminology when

translating academic

texts.

5% 46,7% 51,7% 38,3% 10% - 10%

8

I found it difficult to understand the meaning

of academic vocabulary


English when translating

academic texts.

6,7% 40% 46,7% 33,3% 18,3% 1,7% 20%

13

Regarding this issue, students were asked about the difficulties of the use of

vocabulary when translating academic texts in Interlingual communication class.

This issue took a big attention in this research, because most of the students faced

a difficulty on how they try to learn the vocabulary in academic texts. The result of

this study reached the highest score with S4 63,3% and S5 60% students who chose

strongly agree and agree that finding the equivalence and finding the proper

language is difficult when translating academic texts.

The statement shows that translating vocabulary is difficult comes from how

the students find the equivalence of English words in Bahasa Indonesian in

translating academic texts. The lack knowledge in words equivalence between

English and Bahasa Indonesia make the students confuse on which tense that can

be used to express the source language into the target language.

In this case, most of the students stated that Bahasa Indonesia has some

different meaning in expressing words. It is proven by the data collected that there

are 3 students strongly agree and 35 students agree that the use of vocabulary in

expressing words become the other challenging thing in the translation. They

argued that in expressing a language equivalence, choosing the right vocabulary is

important, because vocabulary becomes the one instrument in delivering

information.

Then, in the S6 53,4% and S7 51,7% students chose strongly agree and agree

that finding the formal language and understanding the terminology is difficult. The

students who chose finding the formal language is difficult because they claimed

that the familiarity of the vocabulary that they used to read mostly about daily

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vocabulary. Hence, when they were asked to translate using formal language, they

face it difficult when finding the appropriate vocabulary that is suitable with the

context. However, to translate academic texts, students need to know more about

formal vocabulary. There are 36 students who reported had been struggled on

translating academic texts by choosing proper vocabulary. Further, 32 students

found it difficult to find formal vocabulary for completing their academic texts

translation.

On the S8 the results showed inconsistency responses between all of the

percentage. The results showed 46,7% students chose strongly agree and agree,

33,3% chose neutral and 20% chose strongly disagree and disagree that vocabulary

becomes a crucial thing of translating academic texts. 28 students chose strongly

agree and agree in responding to the statement that they found a difficulty to

understand the meaning of academic texts. Meanwhile, the rest result which is 20%

who chose strongly disagree, claimed that they have been exposed to academic texts

that they have not faced any difficulties understanding academic vocabulary.

Most of the students stated that because of the unfamiliarity, it made them

difficult to do the translation specially to understand terminology. It is shown from

their statements, the first comes from student 3 stated that

“Karena kita jarang membaca teks akademik, jadi kita harus terbiasa sama

pemilihan katanya”. “Because we rarely read academic texts, so we have to

get used to the word selection”,

The other statement is “Karena mungkin dari semester awal kita tidak

terbiasa menerjemahkan kosakata akademik. Karena kita langsung

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menggunakannya dalam context Bahasa Inggris. “Maybe, since beginning

of the semester, we were not used to translating into academic vocabulary.

It is because we apply it directly to the context in English”.

Both of those statements show that familiarity affects someone’s ability in

learning language. These statements are supported by Walley and Metsala (as cited

in Goodrich & Lonigan, 2013, p 15) who found that the more often the words were

found, the easier they were to be recognized in a process of translation. The

students’ understanding of meaning and explanation of the terminology become

challenges to them in translating academic texts. It was expressed through student

18’s statement “Karena tidak semua terminology dapat diterjemahkan secara

harafiah”. “Because terminology cannot always be translated literally”.

c. Motivation challenges of Translating Academic Texts

Table 3

The next issue that has been observed in this research is how motivation

becomes one of the challenges in completing the task. In this research, it shows

No Statement SA A Total

SA + A N D SD

Total

D + SD

9

I did my translation

tasks just to pass the

course.

15% 35% 50% 21,7% 25% 3,3% 28,3%

10


motivate myself in translating academic

texts.

3.4% 26,7% 30% 41,7% 25% 3,3% 28,3%

11


find my passion on

translation when


texts.

3,3% 20% 23,3% 36,7% 35% 5% 40%

12

I completed translating

academic texts because

I liked translating

activities.

5% 13,3% 18,3% 58,3% 20% 3,3% 23,3%

16

that most of students chose neutral and researcher found no significant differences

on the results.

Based on the data, the students who chose strongly agree and agree in S9 50%

that they do the translation only for pass the class to complete their lessons. S10

30% chose strongly agree and agree that they found it difficult to motivate

themselves to do the translation, otherwise in this statement most of the students

are prefer to choose neutral because they believe they have not faced any difficulties

when motivate themselves in translating activity.

The result shows that 30 students did translation only to pass the course, it is

also supported by the result on the fourth question, there are 14 students chose

disagree and strongly disagree on are they like translating academic activity. Hence,

researcher found that even though students did the academic texts translation

without feel any forced in motivating themselves, most of them claimed that the

reason why they did it because the responsibility in taking the class.

Moreover, most of the students showed that they have not found any difficulties

in motivating and finding passion for themselves in translating, there are still some

students who faced struggles on how they have to build their motivation to do

translation since they think that grammar, vocabulary and certain terminology

become hard enough to be understood. They stated that the way they build their

motivation by start positive thinking, because they believe that if they start to think

it is difficult, the process become hard (student 23).

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Further, in S11 23,3% students chose strongly agree and agree that they found

it difficult to build they confidence to increase their passion in translating academic

texts. However, 40% students chose strongly disagree and disagree they claimed

that it was not hard to find out their passion to do the academic texts translation.

Then, S12 mostly 58,3% students chose neutral for completing translating academic

texts as a task that they like.

d. Challenges of Translating Academic Texts in Interlingual

Communication Class

The last issue that is presented in this research is about the internal

challenges that the students faced in the Intelingual Communication Class itself.

These statements produced variety results of opinion according to the challenging

in translating academic texts in Interlingual Communication Class that they have

faced in the last semester.

No Statement SA A

Tot

SA +

A

N D SD

Tot

D +

SD

13

I found it difficult when


without using a gadget.

18,3% 33,3% 51,6% 30% 16,7% 1,7% 18,4%

14


translate academic texts individually.

6,7% 38,3% 45% 33,3% 18,3% 3,4% 21,7%

15


the proper instrument to

help me learn translating

academic texts.

1,7% 35% 36,7% 33,3% 26,7% 3,3% 30%

16


the right dictionary to help

me translating academic

texts.

5% 21,7% 26,7% 28,3% 40% 5% 45%

17

I found it difficult to learn


collaboratively in a group

5% 20% 25% 28,3% 40% 6,7% 46,7%

18

Table 4

In general, the percentage of the whole result in this issues have reached the

highest score with the percentage 52,6% students who chose strongly agree and

agree of the use of gadget in Interlingual Communication class as the instrument of

translating academic texts (S13). 31 students gave positive response that gadget is

the best instrument to support their translation project. They claimed that using

gadget, they were not only helped by looking for vocabulary, but it is also help them

in looking for the meaning of terminology, they also stated that dictionary is not

provide a scientific meaning of terminology. A printed dictionary and offline

dictionary not provides the things they need such as an information. The last is they

mentioned that gadget help them to minimize the use of time in finishing translating

academic texts.

Then, the next difficulty is followed by Statement 14. S14 reached 45%

students who chose strongly agree and agree that working academic texts

individually is difficult. Contrast with the S17 that showed translation in working

collaboratively in group, the students did not found difficulty when they working

together. The result showed that the students felt difficult to do the translating by

individually. The lack of knowledge that they have become their limitless in

translating academic texts. They claimed that in a group they can help and be helped

18



with the topics given in the

course.

3,3% 20% 23,3% 43,3% 31,7% 1,7% 33,4%

19

by each other. They also added that working in a group could give them more

knowledge by the discussion. Otherwise,

Further, in S15 36,7% students gave positive responses that find out a proper

instrument to support academic texts translation activity. In this case, the results

showed inconsistency score, 33,3 % students chose neutral and 30% students gave

negative responses. The data has collected that 22 students who chose strongly

agree and agree who reported has faced difficulty to find the proper instrument to

help them to finish their translation. It is followed by 16 students also reported faced

difficulty in looking the proper dictionary when completing their translation. Those

results have a strong related to the first statement that sound gadget is really needed

in finishing their academic texts translation.

In the case of instrument, students claimed that they did not faced difficulty

in learning academic texts translation through dictionary. It showed from 46,7%

students chose strongly disagree and disagree. However, there were 26,7% students

chose strongly agree and agree that finding a proper dictionary that can be used to

learn academic texts translation. They believe that dictionary only provide the brief

meaning, but not for the terminology itself. It made them to work twice to find the

other instrument that can help them in translating academic texts.

S17 that has been discussed before has explained that most of the students

disagree that working collaboratively in a group is difficult. They believe that work

in group help them a lot in exchange information that was not in the printed or

20

offline dictionary. Students also stated that work in group is more effective rather

than individually.

In the last statement (S18), the data showed that 43,3% students chose

neutral, 33,4% students chose disagree and strongly disagree and 23,3% students

chose agree and strongly agree that a given topic is difficult when translating

academic texts. Students who chose neutral argued that they have never found that

a given topic is easy or even a crucial thing in academic texts translation process.

However, students who chose disagree and strongly disagree believe that a given

topic will help them to wide their knowledge for something that they have never

known before. They claimed that even it is challenging, but they like it. In contrast

with the students who chose agree and strongly disagree. They argued that they

must be think harder to translate an academic text with a topic that sound unfamiliar.

They also stated that it could be easier if the topic can be chosen by themselves,

because they will understand well what the topic talks about.

Regarding to the way students finishing their translation, the proper

instrument becomes the important thing to support their process of translating

academic texts. They believe that by using gadget they can do translation well,

because gadget could give them the complete information rather than a printed

dictionary that they claimed have many limitless.

21

Conclusion

The aim of this study is to find out what are the difficulties that the students

faced when translating academic texts in Interlingual Communication class. In

conclusion, this research showed that most of the students faced a difficulty in

vocabulary, then followed by grammar, the use of gadget and closed by motivation

case. Vocabulary gets the highest place as the most difficult issue in translating

academic texts, because of the unfamiliarity of terminology and the use of formal

language that students rarely found and used. It is also related to the use of gadget

that strongly prohibited use in class activity. Instead of looking an explanation of

certain words, printed dictionary is hard to be used for them.

Furthermore, grammar as the basis of language learning process takes the

second place in the difficulty of translating academic texts. On the progress of

translating, besides understanding the order of English words, students must also

understand the grammar of Bahasa Indonesia. The last, in the process of translating

academic texts, the result in motivational case showed inconsistency result which

showed that motivation became not a crucial thing in the Interlingual

Communication class. The further research in needed to see the effect of technology

in translation process, such as how far technology is being helpful, and what certain

application or web that can help students in translation process.

22

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

First of all, I would like to express my greatest gratitude to Jesus Christ who

gives me His grace and guidance during my thesis process. I also would give my

deepest thank to my beloved family for never ending supports. Then, I would like

to tell that I am very blessed for this amazing 4 years in Faculty of Language and

Arts, Universitas Kristen Satya Wacana, Salatiga. I thank to Bu E. Titik Murtisari,

P.Hd as my Wali dosen and Thesis supervisor for the unforgettable advice and cares

during my college process, and then I thank to Bu Antonina Anggraini S, M.Pd as

my thesis examiner who supported me through the great feedback that help me in

completing my thesis.

Not to forget, I would like to say thank you to all of my friends. Christine,

Angel, Fika, Deviliani, Sarai, Windy, Feni, and Inka as my un-biological sister who

always gives me strength when I faced difficulty time. Virna, Sari, Eka Devi,

Michellin, Vita, and Veronica who give me strengthen when I need a friend to share

with. I would like to say good luck for fifteen-ers as my college family for your

next step of life. Last but not least, I would say thank you for sixteeners who have

helped me in completing the data.

There are many people who have helped me in doing this thesis whom I

might not be able to mention one by one. I would like to thank them because I would

not have been where I am today and what I am today without all of their support

and prayers.

23

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26

APPENDIX

Survey Questionnaire on Challenges of Translating Academic Texts from

Indonesian into English in Interlingual Communication Class

Kuesioner ini bertujuan untuk mengumpulkan data mengenai persepsi mahasiswa terhadap

tantangan dan kesulitan dalam menerjemahkan akademik teks dari Bahasa Indonesia ke

dalam Bahasa Inggris di kelas Interlingual Communication. Mohon diisi dengan

sungguh-sungguh dan sejujur-jujurnya berdasarkan pengalaman Anda dalam mengerjakan

tugas atau menerjemahkan teks akademik di kelas-kelas yang telah Anda ambil agar

kualitas data yang diperoleh baik. Jawaban anda tidak akan mempengaruhi nilai Anda

dalam mata kuliah apa pun.

Jawab dengan memberi centang (v) pada salah satu kotak dan beri penjelasan singkat, padat

dan jelas pada jawaban Anda!

No Questions Strongly

Agree Agree Neutral Disagree

Strongly

Disagree

Grammar challenges of Translating Academic Texts

1.


decide the right grammar

in general when


texts.

Saya kesulitan untuk

menentukan tata bahasa

yang benar secara umum

ketika menerjemaahkan

teks akademik

2.


the English equivalence

of expressions/words in

Indonesian.

Saya kesulitan

menemukan padanan kata Bahasa Inggris dari

kata/ungkapan dalam

Bahasa Indonesia.

Why do you think deciding the appropriate tenses for different contexts when translating was

difficult? (Mengapa menentukan tenses tepat untuk konteks yang berbeda itu sulit?)

3.

I found it challenging to

translate sentences with

complex structures into


academic texts.

27

Saya kesulitan untuk merjemahkan kalimat

yang memiliki struktur

yang kompleks ke dalam

Bahasa Inggris ketika

menerjemahkan teks

akademik.

Vocabulary challenges of Translating Academic Texts

4.


understand the meaning

of academic vocabulary



academic texts.


memahami arti dari kosa

kata akademik dari

Bahasa Indonesia ke

dalam Bahasa Inggris

saat menerjemahkan teks

akademik.

5.


decide the appropriate

tenses for different

contexts when translating

academic texts.


menentukan tenses tepat

dalam konteks bacaan

yang berbeda ketika

menerjemahkan teks

akademik.

6.

I found difficult to find

formal vocabulary when



English.


menemukan kosakata

yang formal ketika

menerjemahkan teks

akademik dari Bahasa

Inggris ke Bahasa

Indonesia.

7.



with the proper

vocabulary in English

when translating academic texts.

28

Saya kesulitan untuk menerjemahkan

akademik teks dengan

kosakata yang tepat

dengan Bahasa target

saat menerjemahkan teks

akademik..

Contoh:

Accountability: keadaan

untuk dipertanggung

jawabkan,

pertanggungjawaban.

Why do you think translating academic texts with the proper vocabulary from Indonesian into English was difficult? (Mengapa menerjemahkan teks akademik

menggunakan kosakata yang tepat itu sulit?)

8.


understand the

terminology when


texts.


memahami asal bahasa terminologi ketika

menerjemahkan teks

akademik.

Contoh

Terminology:dwibahasa

= bilingual

Rencana Pelaksanaan

Pembelajaran=Lesson

plan

Why do you think understanding the terminology was difficult?

Mengapa memahami terminologi itu sulit?

Motivation Challenge of Translating Academic Texts

9.


motivate myself in


texts.


memotivasi diri saya

untuk menerjemahkan

teks akademik.

10.

I found it difficult to find my passion on translation

when translating

academic texts.

29

Saya merasa kesulitan

untuk menemukan

minat/semangat saya saat

menerjemahkan

akademik teks.

11.

I did my translation tasks

just to pass the course.

Saya menerjemahkan

tugas hanya karena saya

harus lulus kelas ini

(Interlingual

communication).

12.

I completed translating academic texts because I

liked translating

activities.

Saya menyelesaikan

terjemahakan teks

akademik karena saya

menyukai kegiatan

menerjemahkan.

Challenges of Translating Academic Texts in Interlingual Communication Class

13.


learn translating

academic texts collaboratively in a group


untuk belajar

menerjemahkan teks

akademik didalam

kelompok.

14.



individually.

Saya kesulitan

menerjemahkan teks akademik secara

individu.

15.



with the topics given in

the course.


menerjemahkan teks

akademik dengan sebuah

topik yang diberikan

dalam mata kuliah.

Why do you think translating the given topics difficult? (Mengapa menerjemahkan topik yang diberikan sulit?)

30

16.


the proper instrument to

help me learn translating

academic texts.


mencari instrumen yang

tepat untuk membantu

saya dalam belajar

menerjemahkan teks

akademik

17.

I found it difficult to find the right dictionary to

help me translating

academic texts.


menemukan kamus yang

tepat untuk membantu

saya menerjemahkan teks

akademik.

18.

I found it difficult when


without using a gadget.

Saya kesulitan ketika

menerjemahkan teks

akademik tanpa

menggunakan gadget.

Why do you think gadget is important when you do translation? (Mengapa kamu

menganggap gadget sangat penting saat menerjemahkan?)

NIM :

No. Hp (WA) :

Saya bersedia untuk diwawancara lebih lanjut

Ya | Tidak (Lingkari salah

satu)

Documents

CHALLENGES OF TRANSLATING ACADEMIC TEXTS FROM …