Dynamic Equivalence and Mother-Tongue Translations of the Bible
ISSUE: Vol.4 No.1 September 2018 Article 19 pp.243-250
AUTHORS: Patrick Yankyera,Jonathan E. T. Kuwornu-Adjaottor, & Solace Ago Yankson
ABSTRACT
African theologian discourses have tended to remain perpetually foreign and neo-colonist in thought and language, which is quite often irrelevant to the contemporary Ghanaian and African context. This has resulted from the fact that African theological education has been integrated into typical European and North American academic traditions neglecting the norms, values and principles inherent to Ghana and African culture. This includes the introduction of Western methodologies of Bible translation into the translation curriculum of African seminaries and universities. This paper discusses two major philosophies of Bible translation – formal equivalence and dynamic equivalence – and their relevance to mother-tongue translations of the Bible. Using evidence from literature and observations made by the authors, it argues that if Ghanaians and African translators and theologians want their readers to identify with God’s word then dynamic equivalence translation philosophy should be used to translate mother-tongue Bibles.
© 2020 The Author(s). Published and Maintained by Noyam Publishers. This is an open access article under the CCBY license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).