Contrastive Analysis of English Idioms and their Czech Equivalents

Abstract

This thesis explores the challenges of translating idiomatic expressions from English into Czech, focusing on their structural, semantic, and pragmatic aspects. The theoretical part defines idioms, their characteristics, and existing translation strategies. The practical analysis examines selected idioms and their Czech equivalents using corpus data, assessing translation adequacy through established linguistic criteria. The findings indicate that while most idioms undergo structural and semantic adaptation, some translations remain inadequate due to literal interpretation or cultural differences. The thesis highlights the importance of a flexible, context sensitive approach in idiom translation.