Incorporating trans-cultural elements as integral part of translation, Peter Newmark in A Textbook of Translation, defines culture as "the way of life and its manifestations that are peculiar to a community that uses a particular language as its means of expression" (Newmark 1988).Caught between the complicated intricacies of SL and TL cultures , translation often engages " two languages and two cultures" (Toury 1978) because "no language can exist unless it is steeped in the context of culture , and no culture can exist which does not have at its center, the structure of natural language" (Lotman et al 1978). Because "language is part of a culture" (Vermeer 1989), translation theorists emphasize the significance of linguistic and cultural variations in the process of translation from SL into TL. In this context , the paper explores the linguistic and cultural hurdles embedded in the translation of African-American literary texts into Arabic due to differences in cultural and linguistic traditions. Since " differences between cultures may cause more severe complications for the translators than do differences in language structure " (Nida 1964) and because the attempt " to impose the value system of the SL culture onto the TL culture is dangerous ground" ( Bassnett 1991), more emphasis will be given to translation problems rooted in cultural transfer. On this basis , the paper starts with a systematic methodology and an entrance to translation strategies suitable for rendering SL culture-specific realia into TL context. Then, a survey of potential semantic and cross-cultural problems encountered in the translation of literary texts will be conducted using Dutchman, an African - American drama, as an example of literary texts which often present challenges to translators.