Phraseological loan translations in Bulgarian and in French: a cross-linguistic and cross-cultural study

Phraseological loan translations can be described as a special type of Anglicisms (Picone 1996: 3), less evident to the naked eye than loanwords or other direct or semi-direct borrowings. Nevertheless they are pervasive and extremely widespread in all European language families and constitute a major sign of globalization, in general, and of linguistic Anglicization, in particular. French (Fr) and Bulgarian (Bu), and their sister languages for that matter, are no exception to this global trend. An important number of these loan translations have been detected in corpora, the media and on the Internet such as Fr. franchir la ligne rouge and Bu. пресичам червената линия (to cross the red line), Fr. etre sur le meme bateau and Bu. в една и съща лодка сме (be in the same boat) or Fr. au milieu de nulle part and Bu. в средата на нищото (in the middle of nowhere). Lexicographical, typographical, contextual and multilingual methodological criteria have been used in selecting potential loan translations. Even though most of the strings are calques in both languages, a few of them can be said to be specific to one language or the other, even though specificity should be regarded rather as frequency of use and consequently degree of integration in the recipient language. Some instances of language-specific calques are Bu. имаш пеперуди в стомаха (have butterflies in the stomach) and слон в стаята (an elephant in the room) or Fr. ce n'est pas ma tasse de the (it's not my cup of tea) and ete indien (Indian summer).