Equivalence in translation should be regarded on the basis of a theory of texts as a semiotic category, comprising a syntactic, semantic and pragmatic component, which should be hierarchically arranged.
While
semantic equivalence should obviously stand at a higher level than
syntactic equivalence,
pragmatic equivalence conditions and modifies both the first and the latter. "Equivalence overall, McGuire concludes the approach by Neubert, results from the relation between signs themselves, the relationship between signs and what they stand for, and the relationship between signs, what they stand for and those who use them".
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Neubert views grammar as a system of relations between the formatives, which embraces all rules and prescriptions followed by language users.
Semantics, with meaning as its central notion, can then be envisioned as a system of relations between the formatives of a language and the reflection of objective reality
Pragmatics can be treated as system of relations between the formatives and the speakers, involving also processes of encoding and decoding