Multimodaliteit as vertaaluitdaging van strokiesprentvertaling: Calvin and Hobbes as gevallestudie

Multimodality as translation challenge in translating comics: Calvin and Hobbes as a case studySince a translator cannot solely rely on interlingual translation (translation between two verbal languages) for the translation of multimodal texts such as comics, the translation process poses its challenges.In addition to the inevitable interlingual translation challenges that come with translating any text type or genre, the process of comics translation is complicated on various other levels.These not only include intercultural or pragmatic challenges, because comics are cultural products that are incorporated into a specific cultural, economic, and political environment (Celotti 2008:35), but also multimodal challenges due to both the handling of purely nonverbal elements in the translation process and the interplay between the verbal and nonverbal elements in the comic that are in a complementary relationship to each other.These multifaceted challenges then require careful attention from the comics translator if a wellrounded and well-functioning translation product is to be established.Kaindl (2010:37) writes that if the scope of comics translation as a field of research is broadened, it will pave the way for a more comprehensive understanding of these problems (i.e., challenges) of comics translation -this is where I hope to contribute by providing a description of the nature of comics translation.