A Handbook for Translator Trainers

Dorothy Kelly

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2014
• eBook ISBN: 9781317641735
• Topic: Languages & Linguistics
• Subtopic: Linguistics
• Index: Languages & Linguistics

The community of translator trainers is growing constantly, as new courses are set up in diverse contexts throughout the world. After a brief overview of current approaches to translator training, this book offers practical guidance to sound training practices in different contexts. Given the very wide variety of backgrounds translator trainers come from, the text aims to be equally of use to language teachers new to translation, to professional translators new to teaching or training, to recent graduates in translation intending to embark on academic careers in translation studies, and to more experienced trainers wishing to reflect on their activity or to train new trainers. For that reason, no specific prior knowledge or experience of training is taken for granted. A systematic approach to curriculum and syllabus design is adopted, guiding readers from the writing of learning outcomes or objectives through to the design of teaching and learning activities, to the assessment of learning and course evaluation, all this applied throughout in detail to the field of translation. Chapters contain exercises and activities designed to promote reflection on practice and to help trainers to develop their teaching skills, as well as their own course material. These activities are suitable both for self-learners and for groups on trainer training and staff development courses.

1. Setting the Scene

Summary and aims

This initial chapter has two main parts. Firstly, it takes a brief look at translator training in its historical, social, professional and academic settings, with the aim of contextualizing the issues dealt with throughout the book. The chapter will consider, among other aspects some historical antecedents and the appearance of the first institutional training courses; different types of training; academic and vocational courses available; the role of professional and academic associations and training; the role of industry in training. As there are regional and national differences in the way in which translator training has evolved, the aim of the chapter is in no way to offer information on all contexts, but rather pointers which will help readers to situate their own regional and national tradition, and to reflect on the implications of working in that particular context for training design and decisions. Secondly, the chapter offers an overview of major recent literature on translator training. To this end principal authors and their approaches are reviewed briefly. In carrying out such reviews, it has been customary to group authors according to their theoretical school, and it is certainly true that each author’s translational approach influences training proposals in some way. For the purpose of this book on training for trainers, however, I have found that grouping authors from a methodological perspective is more appropriate. Hence rather than moving from contrastive approaches, through the théorie du sens to functionalism, cognitive approaches and so on, I have preferred to begin with the so-called traditional approach to training, through the first objective-based teaching proposals in our field, moving on to other learner-centred pedagogical approaches, or to highly professionalized situational approaches, as general headings under which loosely to classify leading authors and approaches. By the end of the chapter, readers should be familiar with major authors and their overall approaches. Further reading is strongly recommended.

Brief history

It is probably true to say that with few exceptions – such as the Colbert decree in France in 1669, which set up formal training for interpreters between French and Turkish, Arabic and Persian (Caminade and Pym, 1998) – institutional translator training is a phenomenon which begins in the mid twentieth century. Until then translators were essentially either language specialists or bilinguals, self-taught in translation, or with some form of apprenticeship or mentoring alongside more experienced colleagues. Indeed, a certain percentage of today’s translators still enter the profession in this way, both in countries with institutional training courses and in countries where these do not (yet) exist. Self-taught and informally trained translators will probably continue to join the ranks of the profession, given the nature of the activity and the sectors in which it is carried out. However, they now account for a much smaller proportion of those employed or self-employed as professional translators as the institutionalization of training has proved to be a powerful and irreversible movement.

According to information offered by the institutions themselves, the oldest of the institutions devoted to generalist translator (and/or interpreter) training are the Moscow Linguistic University (ex-Maurice Thorez Institute, founded in 1930), the Ruprecht-Karls-Universität Heidelberg (1933), the Université de Genéve (1941) and the Universität Wien (1943), with a second group appearing after the Second World War in the Universität Innsbrück (1945), the Karl-Franzens-Universität Graz (1946), the Universität Johannes Gutenberg Mainz (at Germersheim, 1947), or the Universität des Saarlandes (at Saarbrücken, 1948). Two French institutions (École Supérieure d’Interprètes et de Traducteurs and Institut Supérieur d’Interprètes et de Traducteurs) followed in the fifties, the decade in which the CIUTI, or Conférence Internationale Permanente d’Instituts Universitaires de Traducteurs de d’Interprètes, an association of prestigious university training courses, was formed in order to:

…ensure the quality of professional translation and interpretation and thus meet the needs of the ever changing global professional environment for highly qualified translators and interpreters, […] to contribute to the development of research in translation and interpretation and to the continued development of the training of professional translators and interpreters across the world. (www.ciuti.org)

The growing need for professional translators and interpreters both in bilingual contexts and due to the internationalization of the economy, later led to the founding or extension of courses in an increasing number of countries (Belgium, Canada, Italy, Netherlands, Australia, Denmark, UK, Spain…). Caminade and Pym (1998) calculate that the figure of approximately 250 courses worldwide was reached in the 1990s, and despite apparent saturation in some parts of the world, the figure certainly has not fallen since then, as countries such as Portugal, South Corea, or Poland set up their own programmes. The Intercultural Studies Group offers a list of existing translator training institutions at http://isg.urv.es/tti/tti.htm.

When were the first translator training courses set up in your country/context? How many are currently in operation? What differentiates your course from others in the same country?

Types of institutional training

Not all of these programmes take the same form. National contexts and traditions mean that some of them are full undergraduate courses (Germany, Belgium, Spain, Canada), while others are postgraduate (France, US, many but not all UK courses). Some are fully integrated into the university system and thus linked to departments which also conduct research; these tend to include a higher proportion of theoretical elements. Others are offered by institutions which do not belong entirely to the university system, granting vocational diplomas which do not lead on to postgraduate education, and tend not to include, or to include only a minimum of, theoretical content.

The aims of the programmes vary also from very generalist training, to training in specific areas of translation (literary translation, technical translation, legal translation, audiovisual or screen translation, conference interpreting, community interpreting). Length varies from short one year courses to long courses of up to five years.

What are the general characteristics of your course: under- or postgraduate? Academic or vocational? Generalist or specialized? Long or short?

Professional associations and training

Of course, just as early translators were not trained at universties, not all contemporary training happens in institutional educational settings. Non-institutional training may be subdivided into that offered by two major stakeholders in translation: professional bodies and the industry itself.

Most countries have at least one association which brings together professional translators with the aim of jointly defending their interests, promoting the profession and ensuring standards. The vast majority of these organize professional development programmes for members, normally in the form of short courses designed to deal with very specific aspects of translators’ work: new technologies, marketing, tax, copyright, terminology management, revision, and so on.

Similarly, some of them organize longer-term programmes such as the American Translators’ Association (ATA) mentoring scheme, whereby senior experienced professionals offer guidance to novices over a period of time, facilitating their entry into the profession. This association also has a Continuing Education programme whereby member must earn a minimum of 20 points every three years in order to maintain their accreditation.

Which professional translators’ associations exist in your region or country? Have a look at their website to see what kind of training activities they organize. Do they have a mentoring scheme or similar?

Industry and training

Larger translation companies run short staff development courses, and longer initial training for recent recruits. SDL International, for example, runs a six-month training programme covering essentially technological aspects of professional translation and localization. Many also have agreements with universities whereby they offer work placements to advanced level students, allowing them to acquire on-the-job experience to complement more academic training.

Which are the major translation companies in your area? Do they offer training programmes for recruits? With what content? Do they have arrangements for student work placements which your students will able to make use of?

Academic associations

Academic associations and societies in the field of translation studies are mostly devoted to research issues, but as training has been a much researched subject in our field and many researchers are also translator trainers, most have an interest in it. Many have training committees, for example; this is the case of large international associations such as EST or IATIS, as well as many national societies. These committees organize seminars, offer bibliographical data, and promote research into the training of translators in general. As such their activities are of interest to all translator trainers.

Have a look at the website of the European Society for Translation Studies (EST), or the International Association for Translation and Intercultural Studies (IATIS). In what way do they organize their interest in training? Do they offer resources of interest to you as a trainer?

What about your national or regional academic associations, where these exist? Do they have a body which deals with training issues? In what way? Could their activities be of use or interest to you?

Major approaches to translator training

Early training approaches

For a long time in the history of translator training, trainers have assumed that students or apprentices learn to translate simply by translating. As professional translators with little time to devote to reflection on how to organize teaching and learning, many early trainers limited class activity to asking for on-sight (oral) translation of journalistic and literary texts, with little or no prior preparation on the part of the students, and to offering their own “correct” version as a model after public confirmation that the students’ versions lacked professional quality. This approach to training was essentially apedagogical, and of course extremely frustrating for students. Fortunately, translator training has evolved, not only alongside Translation Studies as a discipline and alongside Linguistics (with the consolidation of text linguistics, discourse analysis, pragmatics, for example), but also with educational approaches in general (consolidation of student-centred paradigms as opposed to the teacher-centred transmissionist tradition). It is, however, still possible to find variations on the traditional model in translator training courses today. In the following few pages, we will give an of necessity brief overview of the evolution which has taken place, through reference to major authors and their approaches to training.

The importance of establishing teaching objectives: Delisle

The basic educational premise of establishing clear objectives for any teaching/learning process was probably first applied to translator training by the Canadian scholar Jean Delisle, as late as 1980. In his first major publication L’analyse du discours comme méthode de traduction (1980), he offers a systematic proposal for a practical introductory course in English-French translation, for which he suggests 23 teaching objectives. In his second major publication ...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Table of Contents
• List of Figures
• List of Abbreviations
• Acknowledgements
• How to Use this Book
• 1. Setting the Scene
• 2. Planning and Writing Objectives/outcomes
• 3. Participants in the Training Process: Trainees and Trainers
• 4. Curricular Content
• 5. Resources, Old and New
• 6. Method: Teaching and Learning Activities
• 7. Sequencing
• 8. Assessment
• 9. Training the Trainers
• Glossary
• References
• Index