Las estrategias de internacionalización en la traducción publicitaria

Abstract

In the era of globalisation, multinational companies, as well as those who aim at having an international presence, are confronted with the choice to internationalise or to localise the promotion of their products. Internationalisation (i.e. the production of a promotional message that will appeal to the widest target audience possible, irrespective of their cultural setting) has emerged as an attractive strategy for cross-cultural communication, because of the assumption that a shared set of values and cultural elements exists globally. Arguable though this may be, an exploration of the impact that the deployment of internationalising strategies has on the work of translators is required. It is posited here that there is a degree of coincidence between translation theory and the principles of international marketing, which is elaborated upon vis-à-vis three common factors: the aim, the relation between the emitter and the recipient and the semiotic approach. It is concluded that the limits of translation, as conventionally perceived, need to be broadened, and that a shift towards the perception of translators as fully-fledged cross-cultural communicators, rather than linguists, is desirable.