Berlusconi’s Language in the British Press:Translation, Ideology and National Image in News Discourse across Italian/English Linguacultures

Abstract

The thesis examines the representation of Silvio Berlusconi’s language in the British press through the reverberations of linguistic taboos when translated from Italian into English. The analysis is set within the overarching premise that ‘Linguistic relations are always relations of symbolic power’ (Bourdieu 1992: 142). In order to navigate through the analyses, the trajectory of Berlusconi and his language is first set against the Italian sociolinguistic and historico-political backdrop. Then, through a triangulation of methodological approaches, the study attempts to understand some of the underlying mechanisms that influence the ways in which news producers shape knowledge on cultural difference. Critical Discourse Analysis methods are used to reveal the implicit propositions and evaluative translational choices in three datasets of online news texts drawn from British quality and tabloid newspapers. The first dataset examines news narratives on Berlusconi’s sexist and taboo language and the translational decisions of these ‘critical points’ (Munday 2012). Textual framing and cultural stereotyping are the focus of the second dataset that analyse a meta-debate across Italian and British newspapers on national image. The third dataset examines ‘anti-gay’, ‘sexist’ ‘racist’ narratives on Italy, as portrayed in British news discourse. Semi-structured interviews with the journalists who were among the active agents in these framing practices provide data on the habitus of the ‘journalator’ (van Doorslaer 2012) and the role of the journalist/translator as cultural mediator. A tentative approach to sample the ways in which readers respond to the framed discourses was made in order to gauge the impact of these news narratives on the image of Italy in the eyes of the audiences.