Abstract
This paper offers a meta-reflection of contemporary translation studies (TS) through tracing its polydisciplinary tensions which are approached as both formative forces as well as hindrances. Taking a form of an argumentative essay employing the methods of a reflexive introspection, synthesis and evaluation, the principal aim is to address the potentials and controversies in present-day TS which are connected to its polydisciplinarity. This is a result from the aftermath of Snell-Hornbys integrated approach (1988/1995), TSs cultural and ideological turns as well as cognitive, sociological, anthropological, technological and economic twists. Four major strands of the consequences of the polydisciplinarity in TS are addressed: (a) the clash between the focus on the epistemological core of TS as an antidote to the expanding boundaries of the meta-discipline and embrace of reciprocal interdisciplinarity; (b) the tension between academia as Ivory Tower and practice-minded language industry; (c) the diffusion of the outer boundaries of TS and erasure of its inner boundaries; (d) a multitude of different conceptualizations of TS foregrounding either the abstract or practical. Following TSs inward orientations, two outward turns are suggested, i.e. promoting its relevance to other disciplines and reaching out to translation practice, in tune with Zwischenbergers approach (2019). A continuation of the outward turns may be seen in Gentzlers post-translation studies focusing on the study of pre-translation culture and after-effects of translation in the target culture. Although the paper does not tend to conceptual extremes, it suggests that authentic transdisciplinary TS should be mindful of a constructive and mutually enriching dialogue with donor disciplines and interlacement between theory and practice, with a focus on real-world issues, becomes imperative in order to make TS viable.
Highlights
Considering a discipline’s meta-reflection after more than four decades of its vibrant development, it would be no understatement to say that translation studies (TS), as progressively institutionalized academic field of study related to translation theory and practice, has undergone changing trends and paradigmatic shifts over the past few decades
Since its formal beginnings in western Europe in the 1970s when the term translation studies was neologistically coined by James Holmes and presented in his famous speech “The Name and Nature of Translation Studies” (1988/2004), TS has evolved from an overshadowed sub-branch of contrastive linguistics and comparative literature into a multidiscipline interwoven with many other fields, creating fertile ground for its polydisciplinarity
By way of summing up, it should be reiterated that what emanates from a critical look at the present state of TS as a multidiscipline by means of reflexive introspection, is a need to ponder over its potentials as well as caveats induced by its possible paths of the development, as sketched in this paper
Summary
Considering a discipline’s meta-reflection after more than four decades of its vibrant development, it would be no understatement to say that translation studies (TS), as progressively institutionalized academic field of study related to translation theory and practice, has undergone changing trends and paradigmatic shifts over the past few decades. With regard to a conceptual-structural architecture of this argumentative paper, it is my aim to first, delve into the more recent past of TS in order to identify its contemporary research scenarios and perhaps more importantly, its tantalizing research consequences, in methodological compliance with so-called turns or ‘shifting viewpoints’, to borrow from Snell-Hornby (2006), that have shaped the courses of its development. Following one of the three-tiered yet interlaced aims, the following research question has been posed in the present paper: what potentials and caveats does contemporary TS, with regard to its foreseeable future, hold for players of both academia as well as the practically-minded language industry? Following one of the three-tiered yet interlaced aims, the following research question has been posed in the present paper: what potentials and caveats does contemporary TS, with regard to its foreseeable future, hold for players of both academia as well as the practically-minded language industry? As is evident from the preceding, the methods of reflexive analysis, synthesis and evaluation will have been used to serve the stated research aims
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