A Truck Driver with a Ninth-Grade Education

[원문]:Nevertheless, I was upset with the Reagan administration, and had come to Maine determined to do something about it. It had just dramatically tightened the eligibility rules for federal disability benefits. Just as with the black-lung program ten years earlier, there had been abuses of the disability program, but the Reagan cure was worse than the problem. The regulations were so strict they were ridiculous. In Arkansas, a truck-driver with a ninth-grade education had lost his arm in an accident. He was denied disability benefits on the theory that he could get a desk job doing clerical work. (My Life, Bill Clinton)


[원문역]:사실 나는 레이건 행정부에 대해서 불만이 많았기 때문에, 메인에 와서 무언가를 해야겠다고 마음먹고 있었다. 레이건 행정부는 장애연금의 수혜자격 기준을 엄격하게 제한하고 있었다. 10년 전의 진폐증 프로그램과 마찬가지로 장애인프로그램 역시 심하게 남용되어 왔지만, 레이건의 처방은 문제를 더욱 악화시키고 있었다. 규정들이 너무 엄격해서 도저히 이해할 수 없는 경우도 있었다. 아칸소에서 9학년 학생이 트럭을 운전하다가 사고로 한쪽 팔을 잃었다. 그는 사무직으로 일할 수 있다는 이유로 장애연금 혜택을 받지 못했다. (빌 클린턴의 마이 라이프, 도서출판 물푸레)


[a truck-driver with a ninth-grade education]:역자는 이 부분을 “9학년 학생이 트럭을 운전하다가”로 옮기고 있으나 오역입니다. 그런 표현이 되려면 “a ninth-grade student driver of a truck"이 돼야 합니다.


[a truck-driver with a ninth-grade education]:1)with 전치사구는 a truck driver의 경력이나 이력을 나타내는 것입니다. 2)with 전치사구는 관계대명사 대용입니다. 따라서 이 부분은 a truck driver who had had a ninth-grade education이 되는 것입니다.


[a ninth-grade education]:1)9학년 교육은 8학년을 마치고 9학년에 진급하여 교육을 받았다는 의미입니다. 미국에서 9학년은 초등학교 (elementary school)와 중등학교 (secondary or middle school)를 마치고 고등학교 교육이 막 시작된 상태를 나타내는 말입니다.


[정역]:...전략...아칸소에서 9학년 이수 학력을 가진 한 트럭운전수가 트럭을 몰고 가다가 사고로 한쪽 팔을 잃었다....하략


[comments]::1)It is one of the most important matters to be considered in translation and interpretation process in general, I think, that the version workers should clarify, among all things, who is who. Naturally you should have doubts about the validity of version works if agents, specific doers in specific situations, that is, are not correctly identified.


2)The translator has got it wrong. Utterly wrong in that he or she has been mistaken in the identity of the truck driver at issue. The translator has misconstrued the phrase {{a truck-driver with a ninth-grade education}} to mean in effect "a truck driver who was a ninth-grade student."


3)In short, who was driving the truck at that time? Was he a ninth-grade student? Definitely not. He was an adult driver "with a ninth-grade education." In other words, he was an adult who had had a schooling background of nine or so years' formal education.


4)Why does Author Clinton not make a direct mention of the truck driver, say, introducing him as a " high-school dropout truck driver," lest the Korean translator misinterpret the context? To begin with, "a person with a ninth-grade education" implies something, but the expression is not identical to the expression of "a high-school dropout," and not a politically correct mode of discourse, either. Any cultured member of the civilized society is used to such a round-about way of discourse and you the Korean translator should get used to it.