Research In Translation Studies Research Articles

Identifying (indirect) translations and their source languages in the Finnish National Bibliography Fennica

Containing information on translations, bibliographies like Fennica, the Finnish National Bibliography, offer a great basis for translation studies research. However, the metadata on translations' source languages/texts is often wanting. In this article, I discuss reasons for this and suggest how bibliographical metadata could be made more reliable. This article builds upon a case study in which the (indirect) Finnish translations of Modern Greek novels and their (mediating) source languages are determined. A list of translations and information on their source languages/texts is retrieved from Fennica. Then, the list is compared with other bibliographies to make sure it is complete, and paratextual material is analyzed to ascertain the (mediating) source languages of the translations. The study shows that the information on the (mediating) source languages/texts in Fennica may be incorrect because there are coding errors in the metadata, or incomplete or missing because the books themselves have inaccurate title/copyright page information. Also, the mediating languages are reported in the bibliography in an inconsistent manner. The situation could be ameliorated by standardizing title/copyright page information, by using a specific field for the language of the mediating translation in the metadata format, and by collectively gathering and implementing amendments into the metadata.

Çeviri göstergebilimi ile bir kısa öykü ve çevirilerindeki anlam evreninin gizlerini çözmek

Literary works, which are fictitious and entangled with signs and symbols, require the support of the reader in the quest for meaning. To scrutinize the narrative and the semiotic universe of a text, translators as readers need to cooperate with the text. Semiotics can help have safe walks in the imaginary forest of literary texts. Accordingly, the cooperation of semiotics and translation can be suggested to pave the way for future research in translation studies. To confirm this connection, the goal of this study is to perform a case study based on a short story and its Turkish translations by two translators. The corpus of the research is The Tell-Tale Heart by Edgar Allan Poe and the Turkish translation Gammaz Yürek by Celal Üster and Dost Körpe. The Model of Original Text Reading and Analysis originated from Umberto Eco's Levels of Textual Cooperation Scheme has bridged over the semiotic review of the original text. The model has three main sections: Structure of Discourse and Narration, Structure of Acts and Functions and Structure of Ideology. In the Structure of Discourse and Narration, the segments, the narrator(s), the discursive tense and the narrative tense, the nature of speech acts of the narrator(s), the perspective(s) of the narrator(s), the codes, the state of the reality, the titles and subtitles, the symbols, the isotopies, the intertextual relations and paratextual details are specified. It is deliberated in the Structure of Acts and Functions how actantial roles and narrative functions of Fabula and Intreccio levels develop in the text. Lastly, the place of the reader in the narration is ascertained in the section of the Structure of Ideology. Upon finding out the universe of meaning in the original text, Turkish translations are examined and compared to the original text in the light of The Reviewing Model of Competent Translator, which consists of Losses and Gains, Translation and Reference, To See Things and Text sections. At the end of the research, some striking points related to the original and the translated texts are brought to light and correspondingly, it is asserted that the substantiality of the semiotics of translation provides a fundamental contribution to translation studies.

The Multilingual Student Translation corpus: a resource for translation teaching and research

The Multilingual Student Translation (MUST) corpus is a corpus of translations produced by foreign language learners or trainee translators collected collaboratively by a large number of partner teams internationally. The corpus represents a prime example of community sourcing, as the data are collected and shared by the members of the MUST network. Two key characteristics of the corpus are that it involves a large number of language pairs and that each text is accompanied by a rich set of standardized metadata related to the source texts, the translation tasks and the students. The web interface on which the corpus is stored allows the data to be aligned and annotated with a purpose-built translation annotation system. The resulting corpus data lend themselves to a range of applications (translator training, materials design, pedagogical lexicography) and can also be used to advance empirical research in corpus-based translation studies.

Wieża Babel czy wieża z kości słoniowej? Recepcja przekładoznawstwa zachodniego w rosyjskojęzycznej nauce o przekładzie – próba rozpoznania

The Tower of Babel or Ivory Tower? The Reception of Western Translation Research in Russian-language Translation Studies – a Reconnaissance The aim of this paper is to survey what texts and authors representing Western translation studies have been translated into Russian over the last seven decades and to describe the dynamics of the emergence of these translations as well as possible agendas behind the choices. It also traces, on a partial corpus, to what extent Russian translation scholars tend to cite and quote Western ones. The findings lead to a tentative conclusion that so far TS knowledge has been transferred mainly by unfrequent references to original publications and by way of mediated accounts (reviews, textbook summaries), while translations of particular studies have only recently begun appearing on a wider scale, their impact as yet uncertain.

Fact and Fiction: The Contribution of Archives to the Study of Literary Translation

This paper examines the role of traditional physical archives within Translation Studies research, investigating the contribution that such resources can add, providing information that otherwise would not be available in existing scholarly volumes, academic journals and digital material. The question is illustrated with the specific case of F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby (1925) and its first two translations into Italian, carried out respectively in 1936 by Cesare Giardini and 1950 by Fernanda Pivano. Both translations were published by Mondadori, Italy’s largest publishing company, as part of two different series, I romanzi della palma and the later Medusa collection.Adopting a microhistory approach, the study of these translations, through the resource-rich archives of the Fondazione Arnoldo e Alberto Mondadori in Milan, can shed light on a number of issues that the text alone cannot provide: documentation, including the other books published in the same series, highlights the target audience that Mondadori were seeking to address; the paratextual elements of the books themselves are revealing of the prominence (or otherwise) of American literature in general and Fitzgerald in particular within the Italian literary polysystem at the time of their publication; in the case of the first translation, readers’ reports on the novel indicate how the censors of the Fascist regime might receive the somewhat racy themes contained in the book, while, in the case of the 1950 translation, correspondence between the publisher, literary agents and the translator herself highlight the many issues surrounding the ultimate publication of the volume.

Publishing ‘Paper Bullets’: Politics, Propaganda and Polish-English Translation in Wartime London

During World War II, publishing was an important element of the war effort for both the Allies and the Axis powers. Wartime propaganda and cultural diplomacy relied primarily on books, magazines and the daily press. The exiled governments in London, including the Polish government, undertook a major effort to translate, publish and promote numerous books and pamphlets that would appeal to British readers and thereby help to sway public opinion. This paper focuses on translation as an important aspect of wartime publishing that has not yet received much scholarly attention. It offers a contribution to research into the role and place of translations in wartime publishing by discussing the Polish government-in-exile's translation and publishing campaign. Drawing on various archival sources, it demonstrates that publishing translations was an important part of wartime cultural diplomacy and led to the development of extensive state-private networks that brought together exiled governments and British publishers. By analysing this material in a broad cultural context, the paper highlights the historical, ideological and political relevance of translation studies research to wartime publishing and censorship.

Critical archival research in Translation Studies: when a translation scholar becomes an archivist-researcher

In Translation Studies, we are increasingly seeing the use of archival materials that allow translation scholars to find out more about the working conditions of translators, their motivations and relationships with authors, editors or publishers, all of whom have always influenced their work to some extent. This paper builds on the knowledge of working with archival materials and other primary sources already described in Translation Studies, and is complemented by still-useful methods of source criticism and current topics that are addressed by historians dealing with archival research. Particular emphasis is placed on the critical approach of historians specializing in composition and rhetoric who are reassessing methods of archival research and ways of writing about it, and who are encouraging scholars to adopt the stance of archivist-researcher. The paper shows and further discusses the importance of their knowledge and possible application in Translation Studies.Enfoque crítico de la investigación archivística en estudios de traducción: Cuando un investigador de la traducción se convierte en archivista-investigadorResumenEn los estudios de traducción encontramos una tendencia creciente a la utilización de materiales de archivo, que permiten a los estudiosos obtener información valiosa acerca de cuestiones como las condiciones de trabajo de los traductores o las relaciones con otros agentes (autores, editores o correctores) que siempre han influido en cierta medida en su labor. En este artículo partimos de la bibliografía disponible acerca de los métodos de trabajo con materiales de archivo y otras fuentes primarias, ya suficientemente descritos en los estudios de traducción, y la complementamos con una serie de aproximaciones novedosas en los ámbitos de la metodología de la crítica de fuentes y de las nuevas perspectivas empleadas por los historiadores en el análisis de los materiales de archivo. Hacemos especial hincapié en el enfoque crítico de los historiadores respecto de la composición y retórica, que ha permitido una reconsideración de los métodos de investigación archivística y de sus formas de escritura, alentando a los investigadores a adoptar una posición de archivista-investigador. Discutimos y tratamos de remarcar la relevancia de estos planteamientos y de sus posibles aplicaciones en los estudios de traducción.Palabras clave: historia de la traducción, contexto socio-histórico, investigación de archivo, crítica de fuentes, materiales de archivo, fuentes primariasFecha de recepción: 30/04/2019Fecha de aceptación: 30/06/2019¿Cómo citar este artículo?Středová, K. (2019). Critical archival research in Translation Studies: when a translation scholar becomes an archivist-researcher. Mutatis Mutandis. Revista Latinoamericana de Traducción, 12(2), 500-518. doi: 10.27533/udea.mut.v12n2a08

Point of View in Translation: Edgar Allan Poe’s "The Cask of Amontillado" Translated into Polish

The article examines the notion of point of view (POV) in translation by drawing on examples from selected Polish translations of Edgar Allan Poe’s The Cask of Amontillado. First, the paper deals with the question of narratologically-oriented research in translation studies and outlines a short history of the concept of point of view with an overview of definitions proposed by literary scholars. It is argued that recent linguistic analyses of point of view have contributed to examining the notion of POV in literary translations. The article also systematises different research approaches that have been developed to study “point of view in translation.” Finally, the paper follows the linguistically-oriented conception of point of view in order to examine translation shifts with regard to the linguistic indicators of POV, including time markers and modality, based on examples from Polish translations of Poe’s short story.

The impact of teaching specialized terminology on translation performance

PurposeIn an effort to bridge the gap between applying translation corpora, specialized terminology teaching and translation performance of undergraduate students, the purpose of this paper is to investigate the possible impacts of teaching specialized terminology of law as a specific area of inquiry on translation performance of Iranian undergraduate translation student (English–Persian language pairs). The null hypothesis of this study is that using specialized terminology does not have statistically significant impacts on the translation performance of the translation students.Design/methodology/approachThe design of this research was experimental in that there was pretest, treatment, posttest and random sampling. In other words, this research was pre-experimental one-group pretest-posttest design. This design was used in this research as the number of subjects who participated in the research was limited. Apart from being experimental, this research enjoyed a corpus-based perspective. As Mcenery and Hardie (2012) claim, corpus-based research uses the “corpus data in order to explore a theory or hypothesis, typically one established in the current literature, in order to validate it, refute it or refine it” (p. 6). Table I shows the design of this research.FindingsThe results of this research indicated that on the whole, the posttest results had statistically significant differences with that of the pretest. In this regard, the quality of students’ translation enhanced after using the specialized terminology in the form of three types of corpora. Indeed, there was a general trend in the improved quality of the novice translators in translating specialized and subject-field terminologies in an English–Persian context.Originality/valueThis paper is original in that it probes into one of the less researched areas of Translation Studies Research and employs corpora methodology.

Transatlantic Quechuañol: Reading Race through Colonial Translations

Translation is often described with opposed terms likeloyaltyandbetrayal,even though the work of translation defies such a description. New research in translation studies argues for the value of mistranslation and untranslatables, especially in recovering Indigenous knowledge production. This study joins these efforts by documenting how technical writers in the colonial Andes used Quechua terms to form a patois called “Quechuañol” (Quechua plusespañol)and how this hybrid Andean language was obscured in translations of scientific texts in early modern England, Germany, and France. As translators reinterpreted metallic classifications in Quechuañol, including “Pacos, Mulatos y Negrillos”(“paco, mulato,andnegrillometals”), they chose terms that communicated their own, culturally specific ideas about color and categories. Tracing mistranslations in the Atlantic world allows us to document both the Indigenous intellectual contributions to the technical arts and the development of early modern racial classifications.

Tristram Shandy Beyefendi’nin Hayatı ve Görüşleri Adlı Eserin İngilizceden Türkçeye Çevirisine Bourdieu’nün Sosyolojik Kuramsal Çerçevesinden Bakış

In the last three decades, interest in sociology has picked up great momentum in Translation Studies and increasing attention has been paid to the social factors that surround an act of translation. Sociologically-oriented research in Translation Studies has enabled the identification of the relation- ships between the external conditions of a text’s creation and the narrower steps of the translation process. So far, translation scholars who have attempted to explore sociological approaches in Translation Studies have often benefited from Bourdieu’s thinking. Through its involvement of different levels of analysis, Bourdieu’s perspective helps researchers discover different aspects of cultural practice, in this study, the book translation. These aspects range “from the relationship between the cultural field and the broader field of power to strategies, trajectories and works of individual agents” (Bourdieu, 1993, p.16). As Bourdieu (1993) suggests, in order to fully comprehend a given cultural work, due attention needs to be paid to all levels of analysis, each consisting of various components. In this light, this study aims at concentrating on text structures in The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman and translation strategies in its Turkish translation on the one hand, and, on the other, it focuses on the phenomena of translation beyond a textual level. Combining these two levels through Bourdieu’s theory of cultural production, this study entails a comprehensive translation analysis by employing Bourdieu’s key concepts. As a result of the aforementioned discussion, this study concludes that, macro translational choices and strategies in the Turkish translation of Tristram Shandy are not reflected on the translation strategies at a micro level as expected. Ultimately, the translator’s choices including (i) the use of notes/footnotes, (ii) the use of Ottoman Turkish, and (iii) the use of explicitation in the Turkish version of Tristram Shandy seem to fail to fulfill the expectations of “serious literature” readers, which are structured by the field of restricted cultural production and, which largely differentiate from the expectations of “popular literature” readers.

The voices of John Phillips and John Stevens through the paratexts of the translations of Don Quijote and of Spanish chronicles of the conquest

This article studies the paratexts of the translations of Don Quijote into English by John Stevens and John Phillips, and of the translations of Brevísima relación de la destrucción de las Indias by John Phillips and Crónica del Perú by John Stevens. It draws on the work of Gérard Genette, who discussed the use of paratexts in literary studies, and applies it to the translations covered here in order to discuss the concepts of "voice" and "translatorial identity", as used by translation scholars. After introducing the relevance of paratexts in Translation Studies research, the article studies the titles, the dedications and the prefaces of the four translations, and argues that these texts showed that the two translators had different aims in mind: while John PhillipsÕs agenda was first and foremost ideological, John Stevens was particularly interested in producing faithful renditions of the original works.

Текстовые, моральные и психологические голоса перевода

The concept of voice has engendered a growing amount of research in translation studies in the last decades, especially regarding literary translation. Voice is typically used in studies that investigate stylistic or structural characteristics of translated texts, intertextuality and other forms of multivocality and ethical questions related to agency, ideology and power in translation and interpreting. The first part of this article defines two essential concepts related to voice in translation — voice and text — and describes the state of the art of research in this field. The second part aims to deepen the discussion on voice in translation studies by intro­ducing the notion of the voice of conscience from philosophy and political science and the no­tion of inner voices from psychology.

A Conceptual Inquiry: What May Retranslation Offer for Translation Studies Research?

The purpose of this article is to lead a discussion regarding the nature of the retranslation concept. A growing body of literature on the subject attests to some challenges about how to connect various studies around the same concept. Outi Paloposki and Kaisa Koskinen (2010), for one, point out the problematic borders between various practices and underline the relevance of definitional and methodological considerations in retranslation research in their article entitled “Reprocessing Texts: The Fine Line between Retranslating and Revising.” Advocating that retranslation discussions cannot abstain from how translation is approached as a concept in the first place as a further point, the current article refers back to the definitional leg of Translation Studies research. Similar problems were deemed “unproductive” (9) by Theo Hermans (1985) in “Translation Studies and a New Paradigm” in favor of a “goal-directed” approach (14) in the past. It is reiterated here that essentialist positions need to be sidestepped to gain new results with translational practices and theoretical underpinnings of concepts recognized for possible connections between different studies. For a possible progress in research, Gideon Toury’s (1980) working definition for translation has been critically interpreted for retranslation. By proposing “assumed retranslation,” the article believes that the retranslation concept will be operationalized with a focus concentrated on circumstances of retranslation practices and accumulating data sharing the same conceptual terrain will help understand nature, reasons and consequences of retranslation products better.

STYLE AND INTERTEXTUALITY OF H.H. MUNRO’S NOVEL «THE UNBEARABLE BASSINGTON» (1912) IN THE CONTEXT OF THE EDWARDIAN EPOCH

The article probes the stylistic and intertextual features of H.H. Munros (Sakis) novel The Unbearable Bassington (1912), which has not yet been considered from the linguistic point of view The relevance of the research is conditioned by the fact that most of his texts have not been translated into Russian, and by the writers interest in Russian history and culture, which makes his work essential in terms of intercultural communication.
 The purpose of the paper is three-fold: to reveal the type of lexical connotations prevalent in the text; to analyze the means of expressive syntax used in the novel; and finally, to comment on the links the text demonstrates in relation to the social, historical and aesthetic realia of the Edwardian epoch.
 The research is based on the findings of international scholars on the work of H.H. Munro and other authors of the early 20th century (A.J. Langguth, S. Byrne, G.J. Spears, B. Gibson, L.M. Birden, J.S. Salemi, V.S. Pritchett, D. Trotter), and on connotative lexis and expressive syntax (O.S. Akhmanova, O.V. Alexandrova, M.Y. Blokh, G.A. Zolotova, L.V. Polubichenko).
 Among the methods applied are linguostylistic and descriptive-analytical analyses, as well as linguostylistic stratification. The following lexical items in the text were investigated: formal and French lexis, proper names, quotations from other literary sources, words semantically pertaining to the topic theatre. In terms of minor syntax, marked word combinations in deformed proverbs and sayings were analyzed. The study of major syntax was focused on compound sentences with paratactic bonds describing banal, everyday situations.
 The results showed that the social connotations found in formal vocabulary and French words prevail in the novel. The less frequent literary and mythological connotations are carried by proper names and quotations. It was established that a typical syntactic trait of the text is using extended compound or complex sentences where the subject and predicate are separated from each other by parentheses containing formal lexis. The text was divided into three strata where the marked units mentioned above are present in different proportions.
 The article contains parallels with the texts of O. Wilde, R. Firbank, N. Coward, V. Sackville-West, H. James, E. Waugh, J. Conrad.
 The results obtained are applicable to further research in linguostylistics, functional stylistics, semantics, and translation studies.

Jakość przekładu w warunkach konkurencji rynkowej a kompetencje tłumacza

The quality of translation and translation quality assessment are the subject of heated debates both in translation studies research and translation practice. Translation agencies try to convince clients to use their services and emphasise high quality of services provided, especially facing increasing competition in the translation industry. This article attempts to look at the quality of translation from the perspective of quality standards used in the translation industry. The paper will present quality assurance criteria applied by Polish translation agencies. Due to the fact that there is a direct relationship between the competences of the translator and the quality of the generated product, the article will seek to identify the competences necessary for beginning translators in order to effectively compete in the translation market.

How to Become a Recognized Translator: Refining a Social Habitus Into a Special Habitus

When arguing for a pivotal status of the translator’s habitus in translating activities, Simeoni (1998) suggests a distinction between a social habitus and a special habitus and asserts ‘becoming a translator is a matter of refining a social habitus into a special habitus’. Picking up his distinction, researchers in habitus-oriented translation studies utilize this useful dichotomy. This paper attempts to explore how to ‘become a translator’, i.e. the ‘matter of refining a social habitus into a special habitus’. With Dong Leshan, a famous contemporary translator in China, as an illustrative case, it elaborates on four important aspects of a translator’s social habitus: socialized trajectories, bilingual competence, work ethic and influence of patronage and three key aspects of a translator’s special habitus: translation strategies, professional reputation and working conditions. Through an analysis of the underlying relationships between those aspects, I demonstrate that the process of becoming a recognized translator can be adequately described as a result of refining the social habitus of a translator into his/her special habitus, thus presenting an empirical study of Simeoni’s viewpoint.

통번역학 연구 대상으로서의 통번역정책 - ‘번역청’ 설립 및 통역사 인증제 도입 정책연구에 대한 메타 분석 -

통번역학 연구 대상으로서의 통번역정책 - ‘번역청’ 설립 및 통역사 인증제 도입 정책연구에 대한 메타 분석 -

Shorter than a text, longer than a sentence

Abstract This paper investigates what effect the length of the source text has both on the translation process and on the translation product. In an eye-tracking and keystroke logging experiment, we compared three conditions, namely full texts, three-sentence sequences and single sentences as source items. The results suggest that translations of single sentences differ significantly from full texts, whereas three-sentence sequences are representative of the full text condition. Therefore, research in process-based translation studies might benefit from using shorter source texts without endangering the ecological validity of experiments.

Interdisciplinary multilingual practices in NGOs

Abstract Emanating from the recent sociological turn of translation studies scholarship (Wolf 2006, 2007, 2009 and 2010), translation and interpreting practices in non-governmental organizations has become a field of research that imperatively requires cross-disciplinary approaches. This paper investigates multilingual initiatives carried out by the Human Rights Investigation Lab (HRIL) and Translators Without Borders (TWB) and their contribution to ensuring language access in crisis scenarios. Based on interviews with delegates from both organizations, and taking into consideration legal and sociological perspectives, it sets out a broad reflection on how translation studies research is evolving in the area of NGOs. It intends to address the caveats that can arise from both conceptual and empirical approaches in the design of future projects, as it explores the notion of discipline-specific knowledge and relevant concepts in translation training and external collaborations.