Analyzing Translation Strategies and Procedures for Culture-Specific Items in Morning and Evening Talk by Naguib Mahfouz

This study explores the translation of Culture-Specific Items (CSIs) in the English version of Naguib Mahfouz's novel, Morning and Evening Talk. The study follows Newmark's (1988) classification of cultural categories and translation procedures, Venuti's (1995) concepts of domestication and foreignization, and Toury's (2012) norms of adequacy versus acceptability. A total of 340 CSIs were identified and categorized. A quantitative analysis was conducted to highlight the distribution and frequency of the translation procedures and strategies. For the qualitative analysis, a purposive sample of 50 CSIs was selected to represent the religious, social, material, historical, and idiomatic aspects. These cultural items were analyzed considering the translator's strategic approach and the procedures used. The findings reveal that there is a consistent preference for foreignization and adequacy—particularly in the rendering of religious and material elements—highlighting the translator's orientation toward preserving cultural authenticity. Unlike the dominant trend of domestication in Arabic–English literary translation, this study provides functional insights into the translation of cultural aspects in literature and examines the translator's role in shaping the representation of culture-specific items through specific strategies and procedures. The results show that direct translation, foreignization, and adequacy prevail over indirect translation, domestication and acceptability. The study not only contributes to the expanding field of CSI translation research but also offers a micro-level account of translation strategies in one of Mahfouz's most ideological novels.