Research on Translator Training, Part 2

Part two of a talk on research in translator training – the continuation of the previous post.

Research on Translator Training, Part 1

Part one of a talk on research in translator training – a good overview of where the field's research questions come from.

Building Translator Identity in a Translation Programme

Translator identity and agency have been an ongoing debate in the literature on translator training in higher education. Yet a glance at the history of practice shows that society's image of translators has barely moved: an underrated group who merely "transfer" other people's creative work and get paid for it. No significant social status has been granted. Publishers still leave the translator's or reviser's name off the cover; the book appears under the publishing house's name with no trace of who translated it.

Whose Fault Is It?

The institutions? No. Society? No. It is the community of translators themselves who are responsible for their declining value. With globalisation and the internet, things are getting worse. Everybody is translating. Anyone bilingual, or anyone claiming competence in two languages, takes up translation, and that is where it starts.

In my opinion, the lack of proper training at institutional level, universities mainly, has contributed to this identity crisis, and it lets pirates and industry hyenas seize the opportunity to downplay translators and pay peanuts for their work. If translators were educated in the ethics and value of this honourable and ancient profession, we would be regarded like lawyers, engineers and doctors.

What Kind of Learning Builds Identity?

Review and update both the curriculum and the pedagogy of teaching translation. For instance, embed a sound pedagogy (such as narrative pedagogy and multimedia) to teach the history of translation dynamically, through true stories and biographies of our forebears, Arab, Muslim or European, so that students can identify with them and build a self-concept as future translators. At the very least they will have something to be proud of, and it gives "face validity" not only to the profession but to the course or programme they are in. A programme with face validity is one where students know that what they are studying leads to a clear objective.

Recent graduates and working professionals should also be invited into class, in person or virtually, to update students on the realities of the workplace and the market. Their experiences and stories help trainees develop new identities, or seek one. Bringing in language service providers and employers adds value to the programme and gives students the desire to keep training and build a "can do" attitude.

History and Theory

A historical background matters greatly to the future professional translator: it raises their status and makes them conscious of the heritage of the discipline they have chosen. Teaching the history of translation to trainees and practising translators alike is a crucial step in building professional aptitude, since "they develop a self-concept as translators working in a specific historical situation", as their colleagues did over the ages (Mossop, 2003: 49). Alongside history, alignment with the current market and its requirements is a key factor in any university training or education programme. There should be a continuous narrative from past to present to strengthen that self-concept.

Theory is another factor. Ulrich (1996: 257) puts it this way:

"Members of all professions have a historical and theoretical component to their expertise. It is only against a theoretical background of translation that effective decision making and production can take place (…) the problem arises, therefore, of how to integrate a course on translation theory within the curriculum."

Despite the industry's negative attitude towards theory, we at the university should embed it and teach it intelligently, so that our students are ethically responsible and aware of who they are. They must be agents of their own learning and decisions, and see the moral dimension of their professional activity once they are in the marketplace. The industry will try to impose its industrial model, in place since the eighteenth century, but in a university context we need only court the industry and choose what is best for students and their psychological, social and personal development. Critical thinking is a virtue the industry does not prize: it wants students with skills but has no interest in their lifelong abilities and competencies. Providing this kind of education could perhaps cure the long-standing identity crisis of translators.

Pedagogy and People

Mentoring, project work, and case-based and problem-based methods should be embedded in the teaching philosophy. Apprenticeship-based methods should be applied from the first year of an undergraduate translation programme, not after it. Dynamic methods instil confidence, self-esteem and self-concept.

Still, where do teachers' abilities and competencies stand in this equation? We are left reviewing not only products (content) and processes (teaching and learning) but also human resources: teachers, faculty and students alike, their knowledge frameworks and beliefs, their learning and teaching styles, and their characteristics.

Call for Papers: HETL 2014 Conference in Anchorage

Sharing a call for papers from the International Higher Education Teaching and Learning Association (HETL) for its 2014 conference. The theme, the impact of social and mobile media on higher education, is directly relevant to anyone teaching translation with technology.

Call for papers and presentation proposals on teaching and administration topics in higher education

The International Higher Education Teaching and Learning Association (HETL) invites you to submit a proposal for a presentation at its 2014 International HETL Conference, to be held in Anchorage in partnership with the University of Alaska Anchorage, 8–10 June 2014. Proposals are solicited on all topics related to higher education, including new technologies and globalisation-related issues. Both scholarly and practice reports are invited. Proposals on the conference theme, Impacts of Social and Mobile Media on Higher Education, are especially welcome.

As at our January 2013 conference at the University of Central Florida, participants will come from the full range of academic disciplines across the arts, sciences and professions, as well as from administrative and staff functions that deliver and support new technologies and approaches to learning. As with every HETL conference, we welcome participation from around the world. Please submit your proposal before the deadline of 26 July 2013, or simply join us as an attendee by registering. No proposal is required if you are attending but not presenting.

To submit a proposal, go to the submission form. See the conference page for more details.

It's more affordable than you may think. The Anchorage area has many attractions, including glaciers, majestic mountains and a wide diversity of wildlife. The average June temperature is 16°C (62°F) with sunny days. Airfare to Anchorage is more reasonable than we anticipated: a check on Kayak.com suggests a round trip from New York around the time of the conference might cost about $350, from London $1,000, and from Tokyo $1,100. We anticipate that hundreds of rooms at the University of Alaska will be available for well under $100, along with rooms at partner hotels in Anchorage.

We look forward to seeing you in Anchorage!

Patrick Blessinger and Charles Wankel, St. John's University, New York
Higher Education Teaching and Learning Association
patrickblessinger@gmail.com

Knowledge Frameworks and the Hidden Curriculum in Translation Programmes

Kearns (2006, 2008, 2012) has written extensively about the persistent syndrome of the hidden curriculum in translation programmes worldwide. His questions remain pressing:

• Do the conception, development and evaluation of a translation course follow educationally sound and professional guidelines suited to the local context of students and institution? Who does this work?
• What frameworks do teachers base their programme planning and classroom interventions on?
• Do they draw on recent advances in translation studies and translation pedagogy?
• Do they consciously plan, design and develop their courses, or do they work intuitively, with no clear objectives?
• Is there a follow-up system to check whether intended outcomes were actually achieved?
• How does assessment fit in? Do they assess the product (the translated text) or the process (learning and performance)?

These questions sum up my concern here: the knowledge conveyed in a translation classroom by faculty (and students), and the issues of curriculum and course design, development and assessment.

The gap in the Arab world

My preliminary review of the literature in the Arab world shows that, apart from publications bemoaning the deficiencies of language students (usually EFL students) in translation, none has discussed the human factor in translator training programmes (faculty, teachers, students) at any depth or with qualitative rigour. The same has been reported elsewhere (Kelly, 2009). On teachers' pedagogical competencies and knowledge of the real world of translation (in-house or freelance), the very few committed Arab researchers in translation teaching (Atari, Farghal, Buhmaid) have repeatedly confirmed the problem.

Faculty in translation programmes deserve guidance and support to design their courses with reference to knowledge frameworks specific to the field: translation studies, the profession and its pedagogy. Relying predominantly on other, inherited types of knowledge (linguistics, literature) in a translation education context contradicts the originality and face value of a respectable translation programme.

No more hit and miss

The epistemological, indeed ideological, element is crucial in a professionally oriented programme within a university context. There should be no hit and miss policy when setting up translation programmes. Translation is a respectable discipline that has confirmed its presence worldwide, even if it is mostly shelved under language departments; conferences, symposia, organisations, journals and books abound. Everyone directly or indirectly involved, from administrators and faculty to industry and other stakeholders, needs to take the building of translation programmes and the selection of adequate human resources seriously. The pay-off is quality performance outcomes: students trained to find work in translation, teachers who improve each semester through action-based pedagogy and student feedback, and local employers content with their new recruits.

Takeaway: two questions need answering. What type of knowledge should be privileged in a translation programme and classroom? And how do we end the dominance of the hidden curriculum, in which people who mostly lack translation-specific curricular, pedagogical and real-world knowledge design and teach courses whose face validity students cannot see? Why do I study theory? Why contrastive studies? Why these texts and not those? How will what I am studying now serve my translation career in the twenty-first-century job market?

What Gulf Universities Ask About Translation Pedagogy

I recently interviewed with three universities in the Gulf region, and the questions the panels asked told me a great deal about where translator training in the region is heading. In one university, the head of department even asked searching questions about my PhD research on teaching with technology, which I appreciated enormously.

The Questions

All three universities asked versions of the same questions:

• What is the difference between teaching EFL/ESL and teaching translation?
• How do you design and develop a translation course for future translators?
• How do you teach translation theory: by lecturing, or otherwise?
• How do you integrate technology into a translation course?
• How do you evaluate translation students' learning and performance?
• How do you organise training for consecutive interpreting?

These are specific and intriguing questions, and I was genuinely pleased to hear them. As a researcher, I now know where the tendencies are heading in the region's translation programmes, and I will keep readers of this blog abreast of current orientations in the Arab world, particularly the Gulf.

A Discipline Still Misunderstood

One further conclusion: stakeholders' perception of translator training in the region, with a couple of exceptions, still misreads the complexity of the discipline and the profession. Training a qualified, professional translator, interpreter or reviser transforms not only the individual, as with language students, but also, and mostly, society and the economy. A translation programme capable of delivering that kind of output needs competent faculty and well-designed, well-developed curricula and pedagogies.

Students Are Not Daft

Finally, students, our clients, are digital natives. They consult social media and online forums to see what is happening in their discipline and future profession, and they will quickly spot the absence of fresh, market-oriented content and of qualified faculty who can respond to their aspirations. Student demographics and translator working patterns have changed. New content and pedagogies are needed to meet those needs and those of the professional and local context.

Translator Training in Higher Education : Pedagogy, Practice, Research and Educational Technology: BA programs (Translation Majors) in the Gulf Count...

Translator Training in Higher Education : Pedagogy, Practice, Research and Educational Technology: BA programs (Translation Majors) in the Gulf Count...: Few months ago, and as part of my ongoing PhD research enquiry, I was surveying the universities which deliver degrees, diplomas or certi...

BA Translation Programmes in the Gulf: A First Look at Course Outlines

A few months ago, as part of my PhD research, I surveyed the universities in the Arab world that offer degrees, diplomas or certificates in translation and languages. What their websites reveal, and fail to reveal, says a lot about how translators are trained in the region.

What I was looking for

For each institution I checked two things:

1. Whether it publishes a course outline showing the objectives, types of activity and assessment methods designed by faculty (or the institution) for a specific translation or interpreting course.
2. Where it does, whether those elements (objectives, activities and assessment) are aligned with one another. In other words, whether faculty and other stakeholders in course design are consciously aware of the dimensions and implications of what they have designed, above all for students' learning outcomes. By this I mean meaningful, significant outcomes, such as applying what students have learnt and creating something of their own from it.

Preliminary findings

The first round of this informal survey led to four conclusions:

• Course outlines are largely missing. Apart from a very few universities and colleges in the Gulf, most translation, or English and translation, departments publish no course outlines at all (see Atari, 2012; Buhmaid, 1995). For the sake of quality teaching and learning, programmes should display clear, functional and workable outlines that show the teaching philosophy adopted for translator training in that context, and whether teaching is teacher- or student-centred. This is an important criterion in higher education today. Translation is a multifaceted discipline, and it makes sense to design domain-specific pedagogies for teaching and learning it.
• Programmes lean towards teaching, not training. The content of the surveyed programmes is geared more and more to teaching rather than training or coaching. Lecture-based content is fine for first- and second-year students, but not for third-year students or finalists. This may be the case in the Arab world, but here in Canada students enter the real world of translation soon after the second semester and receive a mix of university teaching and workplace training during their internship. Context may decide the pedagogical planning we need.
• Too much theory, too little real world. The amount of theory in these programmes will not help in training future translation professionals. The real-world factor is missing: I hardly saw courses on research methods and documentation for translators, terminology extraction, language technologies, revision, professional aspects of translation or project management for translators. It is high time to renew the content.
• Pedagogical foundations are unclear. I am not yet sure whether faculty base their classroom practice on educational approaches or models specific to translator training at all, such as socio-constructivism (Kiraly, 2000, 2003) or constructivism, or on active pedagogies for organising practical translation work, such as problem-based learning (Cormier, 2007) or project-based learning (Gouadec, 2007; Kiraly, 2003, 2012).

For reasons of space I will limit my preliminary remarks to these four points. The remaining ones can wait for another post.

Notes from Acfas 2013: Six Issues Facing Translator Education

From 6 to 10 May 2013, Université Laval in Quebec hosted the 82nd Acfas congress, which brings together French-speaking universities from around the world. I presented a paper on enhancing educational technology in translator training to improve teaching and learning outcomes, and came away with six issues worth sharing.

The Experience

It was a great experience. I enjoyed being among my peers, exchanging ideas and debating questions about translation studies, technologies for translators, the translation industry, and translator education and training. I also met and networked with many colleagues in Canada, professors and PhD students alike. It was a pleasure to get to know them in person rather than only through their articles in international translation journals.

The event boosted my confidence (especially in presenting in French), put my progress in context, and served as a self-evaluation test for my ongoing learning pathway.

Issues That Caught My Attention

• It is not enough to be proficient in your subject field. You also need to convey and monitor other kinds of knowledge: pedagogy and andragogy, and how to use technology in your teaching, given that we live in a knowledge-based society.
• Virtual and distance learning in translation programmes is a trend of the future.
• Innovation in curriculum and course design is needed, including new types of content.
• Multilingualism matters, and so does translating into the non-mother tongue (L2).
• The university has a social mission in training translators: educating socially functioning citizens who can use their abilities throughout life, not merely convert words and structures.
• The translator's role vis-à-vis technology: we need to emphasise the translator's agency as a decision-maker in the industry, not just a word engineer.

These were the major points raised and discussed in the two days of sessions I attended.