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The Semantics of Emotion: Exploring Synonym Rings to Evaluate Emotive Contexts in Translations Across Sinhala and English

Alahapperuma, Malithi; Vlachidis, Andreas; (2025) The Semantics of Emotion: Exploring Synonym Rings to Evaluate Emotive Contexts in Translations Across Sinhala and English. In: Sfakakis, Michalis and Garoufallou, Emmanouel and Damigos, Matthew and Salaba, Athena and Papatheodorou, Christos, (eds.) Metadata and Semantic Research (MTSR 2024). (pp. pp. 349-362). Springer: Cham, Switzerland.

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Abstract

Each language has its own body of emotion vocabulary. It is also possible to map emotion terms of one language to similar terms in another language. However, the mere existence of similar terms across languages does not guarantee that emotion concepts being translated are identical. Emotion terms can evoke different feelings in different individuals and often embody the societal and cultural norms of a linguistic community. Hence, conveying emotions across languages poses a unique challenge in translation. This paper explores the role of knowledge organisation systems and synonym rings for enabling better understanding and encoding of emotionally weighted material in translations. The study uses synonym rings to present emotion vocabulary across Sinhala and English and employs contextual evidence and literary text translations to analyse and evaluate the findings. The research identifies and utilises three pillars of inquiry: (1) Cognition, (2) linguistics, and (3) socio-cultural factors to explore the ways in which individuals perceive and express emotions across Sinhala and English.

Type: Proceedings paper
Title: The Semantics of Emotion: Exploring Synonym Rings to Evaluate Emotive Contexts in Translations Across Sinhala and English
Event: 18th Research Conference, MTSR 2024
Location: Athens, Greece
Dates: 20th-22nd November 2024
ISBN-13: 978-3-031-81973-5
DOI: 10.1007/978-3-031-81974-2_29
Publisher version: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-81974-2_29
Language: English
Additional information: This version is the author accepted manuscript. For information on re-use, please refer to the publisher's terms and conditions.
UCL classification: UCL
UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > UCL SLASH
UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > UCL SLASH > Faculty of Arts and Humanities
UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > UCL SLASH > Faculty of Arts and Humanities > Dept of Information Studies
URI: https://discovery.ucl.ac.uk/id/eprint/10199928
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