between theory and practice (Sorbonne Nouvelle)
Meetings of young translators 2023
Translation and interpretation: between theory and practice
Paris, May 4, 2023
The first Meetings of Young Translators, organized by the doctoral students of the doctoral program No. 622 – Faculty of Linguistics (Sorbonne Nouvelle University and Paris Cite University), is intended for master’s students, doctoral students and young doctors in translation and translation sciences or any other field. translation and/or translation studies.
Translation studies have been of great interest for several decades, and academic exchanges on this topic are increasingly numerous and interdisciplinary. The Young Interpreters’ Meetings provide an opportunity for young researchers interested in questions related to the topic
on translation, regardless of language combination, to share research and discuss the evolution of the translation and interpreting professions and contemporary issues affecting the discipline.
Berman defines translation studies as “experiential reflection of translation on itself” (Berman, 1989). For this first edition, we want to initiate a reflection on the different theoretical approaches to translation (stylistic, communicative, sociolinguistic, sociological, ideological, philosophical, political, technological, etc.) tested in practice. Theory allows for formalization of practices that align themselves with the realities of practice.
Communications may address the following topics without limitation:
– Adequacy between theories and practices
Once entering the labor market, young translators and interpreters put into practice the methodologies taught in translation training. For example, over the past two decades, many researchers have demonstrated that corpora are useful in pragmatic translation, for solving terminology or phraseology issues that professionals face (for better adaptation to genres and fields of expertise), analyzing and understanding what translation is. (qualitative analysis, translator visibility, third code, etc.) or a tool to help train pragmatic translators. However, its teaching has not been generalized and its administration remains complex. Recently, the rise of the post-editor in the professional environment involves the teaching of new skills and is accompanied by active research in didactics. Applying theory to practice (or not) in the implementation of translation professions leads us to ask ourselves the following questions: is theoretical knowledge robust enough to allow all types of translators and interpreters to adapt their practice to market demands? How can researchers translate theory into practice? How to start a dialogue between theorists and practitioners? How does didactics enable us to theorize market realities in order to integrate them into teaching? (Ladmiral 2014; Kübler et al. 2018; Granger and Lefer, 2022)
– Evolution of practices
Technological, social and political changes create new challenges that not only practitioners but also theorists must face. Translation aids (machine translation, corpora, translation software, online dictionaries, etc.) contribute to the evolution of practices and question several specificities of the profession: grades, skills, deadlines, data protection, the role of the translator, etc. Likewise, the reflection of gender studies or post-colonial studies, among others, redefines the identity of the literary translator and his place in the translation process. In addition, the adoption and use of digital tools by researchers (corpus creation and annotation, textometrics, automatic translation systems, online survey, dematerialized storage, etc.) today require consideration of new legal and ethical issues, especially during collection, processing. and storage of research data. These developments lead to the emergence of new research directions. How do theories of translation account for these mutations? What does theory say about these pressing questions of translator legitimacy? (Loock, 2016; Ginouvès and Isabelle, 2018; Hernandez-Morin, 2020)
– (In) translation ability
Non-translatability manifests itself in the absence of concepts in the target language, often a symptom of plural origin asymmetry: cultural, historical, functional, etc. Although techniques to avoid untranslatables have always existed and are practiced, they suffer from lack of formalization and thus from being a matter of individual choice rather than recognized, standardized and generalized professional practice. Can we translate any type of text (poetic, legal, multilingual, multimodal, etc.)? How is the translator deployed?
in the face of different theoretical approaches to these questions? (Cassin, 2004; Apter 2005; Mounin 2020 [1963])
– Ethical issues
The dichotomy between theory and practice also raises ethical issues. Ethical principles passed on to translators (mother tongue, tariffs, text reliability, translator invisibility, sharing of data and sensitive information, etc.) cannot represent the multitude of practices and their evolution. Sociological, political, and technological challenges related to translation studies constantly prompt researchers and professionals to question ethical principles related to translation. What is the translator’s responsibility to the public and clients? Can theory inform practice on ethical issues? (Venuti, 2011; Baker, 2018; Lambert, 2020)
These axes are a proposal, and we invite anyone interested in these questions to submit a proposal.
Presentation and practical information
Paper proposals must contain a maximum of 500 words and a keyword list (maximum of ten keywords). They can be written in French or English and must be sent at the latest February 13, 2023 On the Young Translators’ Meetings 2022 website, under the “My Presentations” tab.
As the evaluation of the submissions by the scientific committee is double-blind, we thank you for not mentioning any elements that could identify you in your paper. The languages of the conference are French and English. Verbal communication is the end of each
20 minutes after 10 minutes of discussion.
Scientific committee
BARBIN Franck, BEAUMATIN Éric, BLETON Isabelle, CECCALDI Aurélie, COLLOMBAT Isabelle, CRISTINOI-BURSUC Antonia, EL QASEM Faiza, FRŒLIGER Nicolas, GILE Daniel, KÜBLER Natalie, LEONCILONSTILAINOCK, Frendy Stefa, LEONCILOSSIKA RUBLER, LEONCILOSTINOLINOCK , ZIMINA-POIROT Maria.
steering committee
New Sorbonne University: Bérengère Denizeau, Valentine Pieplu, Sara Salmi
Paris Cité University: Maud Bénard, Marie Bouchet, Anastasia Buturlakina
