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This dissertation entitled “The Relative Effect of a Pragmatic Approach on Improving the Comprehension and Translation Skills of the Advanced-Level Program Students in Amman Private Schools” is based on the importance of culture in translation and social communication. This aim includes the close interrelationship between pragmatics and translation. Likewise, pragmatics as the most effective tool for eliminating the problems that the translators encounter is included. The cultural problems that Arab translators face along with the classification of the cultural words and phrases are also among the purposes of the study. The data upon which this study is based comprise thirty questions divided into two sections each of which is composed of fifteen questions. The first part was translated into Arabic and the second part was translated into English. The two sections were given to a representative group of students in Al-Ma’aref Schools in order to ensure the test validity. The same test was given to ninety students from the New English Schools who were randomly divided into two groups; the control group and the experimental group in order to investigate the effect of the pragmatic approach on improving the advanced–level (AL) students’ translation and the comprehesion skills. After applying the pragmatic approach on the experimental group, the results shown were:
1. There was a more positive effect of using a pragmatic approach than a non-pragmatic approach on improving the translation skills of students translating from Arabic into English and vice versa. 2. There was a more positive effect of using a pragmatic approach than a non-pragmatic approach on improving the comprehension skills of the students when translating from English into Arabic and vice versa. These results emphasized that what is communicated is determined not merely by what is said; the structure and meaning of the expressions used are essential; but the variant meanings also constitute an important part of the final meaning. Any language has two levels of knowledge as shown below and translators have to take them into account, but with more concentration on the second level: 1. The decontextualized knowledge of phonology, syntax and semantics, which is called linguistic competence; and 2. The knowledge of how to use a language appropriately in context, which is called communicative or pragmatic competence. Based on these grounds, there is no boundary among lexis, grammar and other lingual components, because these lingual components are interdependent. (Stubb1996: 36 as quoted in Christopher and Mercer 2001:14) Thus, relying only on one aspect, e.g. grammar rules, in order to generate a communicative sentence, and overlooking other components, e.g. the social and religious situation will result in communication breakdown. Based on these results, the researcher reaffirms the great effect of pragmatics on translation and the comparing and contrasting of two languages (Arabic and English) may help students improve their translation skills. Thus it is valuable that students learn some of the cultural associations related to the foreign language, which will minimize cultural misunderstandings if a student participates in transferring of the foreign language. Hence, it seems important as well to suggest that the teachers of a conversation or a translation class devote certain time, when necessary, to point out specific cultural aspects of the foreign language. Or he /she may, mostly, suggest topics, which concentrate on prominent aspects of the foreign culture in order to give students more chance to get acquainted with such aspects.
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