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Tímto bych chtěla velmi poděkovat vedoucí své práce PhDr. Markétě Malé, Ph.D. za její
trpělivost, ochotu a cenné rady, bez nichž bych práci jen stěží dokončila. Dík také patří všem,
kteří mě podporovali během celého studia, především tedy mé rodině a přátelům.
Prohlašuji, že jsem diplomovou práci vypracovala samostatně, že jsem řádně citovala všechny
použité prameny a literaturu a že práce nebyla využita v rámci jiného vysokoškolského studia
či k získání jiného nebo stejného titulu.
Souhlasím se zapůjčením diplomové práce ke studijním účelům.
V Praze, dne 23. 8. 2013
I declare that the following MA thesis is my own work for which I used only the sources and
literature mentioned.
I have no objections to the MA thesis being borrowed and used for study purposes.
ABSTRAKT
Cílem této diplomové práce je analyzovat a popsat české překladové protějšky anglických
polovětných konstrukcí tvořených přítomným participiem nebo participiem perfekta, a to ve
funkci postmodifikátoru a příslovečného určení. Ačkoliv v češtině existuje formální protějšek
anglického participia – přechodník – je tento tvar považován za velmi příznakový a archaický.
Na základě analýzy 210 vět excerpovaných ze tří děl současné americké beletrie popisuje
práce pravidelné postupy, jichž se využívá při překladu zmiňovaných forem do češtiny.
Potvrdila se zjištění předchozích studií, že zatímco angličtina upřednostňuje nominální a
verbo-nominální způsoby vyjadřování, čeština spoléhá spíše na vyjadřování slovesné. Mezi
překladovými protějšky převládají divergentní způsoby překladu, zejména finitní věty
souřadně spojené s protějškem anglické věty hlavní. Ačkoli je překlad participia určitým
tvarem slovesným explicitnější, koordinace obou vět v češtině umožňuje zachování vágnosti
sémantického vztahu mezi nimi, typického pro participiální polovětné konstrukce.
Klíčová slova: participium, participiální věta, polovětná konstrukce, přechodník,
postmodifikátor, přívlastek, adverbiale, příslovečné určení, překladové protějšky
ABSTRACT
The aim of this diploma thesis is to analyse and describe the Czech translation counterparts of
English present- and perfect-participial clauses which function as postmodifiers and
adverbials. Although there is a formal counterpart of the English participle – the transgressive
– this form is considered very marked and archaic in Czech. Therefore, based on an analysis
of 210 sentences excerpted from three American works of contemporary fiction, the thesis
describes the recurrent patterns used in the translation of the forms in question. The analysis
confirmed the findings of previous studies that while English prefers nominal and verbo-
nominal means of expressions, Czech relies rather on verbal expression. The majority of the
translation counterparts are divergent correspondences, above all finite clauses connected
paratactically to the counterpart of the matrix clause. Although the translation of a participle
by a finite verb form is more explicit, the coordinative relation makes it possible to retain the
semantic indeterminacy of the relation between the clauses which is specific for participial
constructions.
Key words: participle, participial clause, transgressive, postmodifier, adverbial, translation
counterparts
TABLE OF CONTENTS
ABBREVIATIONS .........................................................................................................................8
LIST OF TABLES ..........................................................................................................................9
LIST OF FIGURES ........................................................................................................................9
1 INTRODUCTION ....................................................................................................................10
2 THEORETICAL BACKGROUND .............................................................................................11
2.1 Non-Finite Verb Forms...............................................................................................11
2.1.1 Terminology........................................................................................................12
2.2 The Present Participle .................................................................................................13
2.2.1 Participle vs. Adjective .......................................................................................15
2.2.2 Participle vs. Gerund...........................................................................................17
2.3 The Syntactical Functions of Participial Clauses .......................................................20
2.3.1 Modifying Clauses ..............................................................................................21
2.3.2 Participial Postmodifier vs. Object Complement................................................21
2.3.3 Adverbial Clauses ...............................................................................................22
2.4 The Subject of Adverbial Participial Clauses .............................................................23
2.5 The Semantic Indeterminacy of Participial Adverbial Clauses ..................................30
2.5.1 Temporal Relations .............................................................................................33
2.5.2 Conditionality......................................................................................................34
2.5.3 Instrumentality, Manner, Exemplification/Specification....................................35
2.6 The English and Czech Manner of Expression...........................................................36
3 MATERIAL AND METHOD ....................................................................................................38
3.1 Material .......................................................................................................................38
3.2 Method ........................................................................................................................39
3.2.1 Supplementive Clause vs. Postmodifier .............................................................39
3.2.2 Absolute Clause vs. Postmodifier .......................................................................40
3.2.3 Classification of Translation Counterparts .........................................................41
4 RESEARCH PART..................................................................................................................43
4.1 Congruent Correspondences .......................................................................................43
4.1.1 Postmodifying Clauses........................................................................................43
4.1.2 Adverbial Clauses ...............................................................................................45
4.2 Divergent Correspondences ........................................................................................45
4.2.1 Coordinated Finite Clause...................................................................................46
4.2.2 Subordinate Finite Clause ...................................................................................55
4.2.3 Other Means of Translation by a Finite Clause ..................................................63
4.2.4 Verbless Constructions .......................................................................................68
4.3 Zero Correspondences ................................................................................................72
5 CONCLUSION ........................................................................................................................74
REFERENCES.............................................................................................................................77
SOURCES ...................................................................................................................................78
RÉSUMÉ ....................................................................................................................................79
APPENDIX..................................................................................................................................84
Congruent Correspondences ................................................................................................84
Divergent Correspondences: Coordinated Clauses ..............................................................85
Divergent Correspondences: Subordinate Clauses ..............................................................93
Divergent Correspondences: Other Finite Clauses ..............................................................96
Divergent Correspondences: Verbless Constructions ..........................................................97
Zero Correspondences ..........................................................................................................99
ABBREVIATIONS
CGEL A Comprehensive Grammar of the English Language
CamGEL Cambridge Grammar of the English Language
MSA Mluvnice současné angličtiny na pozadí češtiny
OED Oxford English Dictionary
LIST OF TABLES
Table 1: The participial forms (MSA: 8.85.3) ...........................................................................14
Table 2: The gerundival forms (adapted from MSA: 8.85.2) ....................................................17
Table 3: The translation paradigm of English participial -ing clauses .....................................43
Table 4: Distribution of adverbial participial clauses translated by a coordinated clause ........49
Table 5: Translations of adverbial participial clauses by a subordinate clause ........................57
Table 6: Other means of translation by a finite clause..............................................................64
Table 7: Translations of participial clauses by verbless constructions .....................................69
LIST OF FIGURES
Figure 1: A scale of informativeness for semantic relations (Kortmann, 1991: 121)...............32
1 INTRODUCTION
Contrastive studies of the English language as compared with Czech have a long
history within the tradition of the Prague linguistic school. The aim of this thesis is to
contribute to the already existing studies on the issue of the different manner of expression of
the two languages, namely the preference for nominal and verbo-nominal expression in
English against verbal expression in Czech. Specifically, these tendencies are manifested on
the syntactic level by the frequent use of non-finite verb forms in English where Czech
usually employs a finite clause. The focus of this paper is to compare English present- and
perfect-participial clauses functioning as adverbials and postmodifiers with their Czech
translations.
Based on the brief description just given, the expectation is a high frequency of finite
clauses replacing the English participles. From the point of view of translating these forms
into Czech, the main issues are, first, the ambiguous semantics of participial clauses which are
rarely introduced by a conjunction that would specify their semantic role, and second, the
absence of the subject of the non-finite form which has to be retrieved from the context, either
textual or in some cases situational. For this reason, part 2 of this thesis describes the formal
properties of participial clauses with special attention to the identification of the implied
subject and the nature of their semantic indeterminacy.
One of the means to study the ways of expressing the same content in different
languages is the use of electronic parallel corpora which was also the source of material for
our analysis. The analysis, which will be described in detail in parts 3 and 4, will be based on
a sample of 210 participial clauses excerpted from three works of American contemporary
fiction. These will be analysed in terms of their semantic role, position (if relevant), and the
presence or absence of a subordinator; the description of the results will be based on the
grouping of the Czech counterparts as congruent or divergent, i.e. syntactically identical or
different.
10
Description:adverbials. Although there is a formal counterpart of the English participle – the transgressive. – this form is considered very marked and archaic in Czech. Therefore, based on an analysis nějaká nebeská síla zabránila Tedovi zahlédnout chevrolet zaparkovaný šikmo přes ulici naproti
