Indicators of Text Complexity
Kristian Tangsgaard Hvelplund · Copenhagen studies in language · 2009
This paper reports on the preparatory steps that were taken prior to conducting a number of translation experiments in which three texts of varying levels of complexity will serve as source text stimuli to a group of subjects. It explains how the relative differences in complexity can be measured using a number of objective criteria such as readability indices, word frequency and non-literalness. It is thought that a set of objective indicators can to some extent account for the degree of difficulty experienced by translators when translating a text. While we do not wish to postulate that complexity (the objective notion) and difficulty (the subjective notion) can be equated, it is thought that these objective measures can help us gauge the degree of difficulty of some types of text and thus help us in finding texts for experimental purposes. The aim of this paper is thus to describe and discuss the potential of these indicators for predicting text difficulty on the basis of illustrative examples from the texts chosen.