Gastronomic Culturemes in Andrić’s Works: Challenges of Translation into Italian

Abstract

The language of Ivo Andrić is characterized by a distinctive style that combines archaic, literary, and folk elements, contributing to the recognizable expressiveness and rhythm of his works. Within this stylistic framework, gastronomic references hold a significant place, not only as a means of character depiction but also as a reflection of the broader social and cultural context. The translation of gastronomic culturemes – which include names of food, beverages, and traditional meals – represents both a linguistic and cultural challenge. The aim of this study is to examine how gastronomic culturemes from Andrić’s novels and short stories have been rendered in Italian translations. These lexical elements, deeply rooted
in a specific sociocultural environment, rarely have direct equivalents in Italian, necessitating the application of various translation adaptation strategies. The research corpus comprises selected works by Ivo Andrić in which terms related to food, dishes, and beverages were first identified and subsequently subjected to a contrastive analysis with their Italian translations. The study also focuses on the issue of functional equivalence, balancing fidelity to the source text with adaptation to the target audience. The findings highlight diverse translation strategies and provide insights into the challenges of translating gastronomic culturemes in the context of intercultural communication.