Why Translators Need a Degree and Ongoing Professional Development

Do translators need a degree and continuing professional development? Yes, and yes. Resisting either, in my view, degrades our professional status as social actors.

The Old Debate

Many members of the translation community, especially those who learnt by doing, as artisans do, dislike the idea and insist on the primacy of practice, even though acquiring those skills would take less time with some initial training. This discourse has been going on for ages. All opinions deserve respect, and multiple perspectives are normal. The trick is whether these differences can be synergised.

What Medicine and Law Can Teach Us

Why should we not have the same professional status as older, established professions such as medicine or law? Doctors, in ancient times, also started out learning by doing, on a hit-and-miss principle. But medicine developed as a profession over time and was institutionalised through education and training, which brought social and political recognition. We are following the same cycle. It is the destiny of every profession, and we may already be there, now that the field is well established in academia under the name of translation studies.

Time to Stop Being Invisible

Why must translators always be timid and lacking in self-esteem when it comes to making our voices heard? We do social work of the same order as doctors, lawyers and engineers. We contribute to the well-being of society and the economy alike: we make the unknown known through language, we build powerful relations between nations and peoples through linguistic communication, and we build a heritage of knowledge.

Focusing only on the artisanal job, on doing translation and being skilful, is not enough. We need to keep developing and upgrading our competencies and skills through education and training. We need to know the technique, but also to make sense of it and reflect on our own practice as human beings. Every profession has gone through the same process: from learning by doing, to theorising and institutionalising the profession, to gaining social recognition and respect. We cannot stay invisible, acting behind the scenes, forever.