Contesting Epistemologies in Cognitive Translation and Interpreting Studies

Sandra L. Halverson, Álvaro Marín García, Sandra L. Halverson, Álvaro Marín García

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2021
• Print ISBN: 9780367646813
• eBook ISBN: 9781000533309
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Languages & Linguistics
• Subtopic: Linguistics
• Index: Languages & Linguistics

This dynamic collection synthesizes and critically reflects on epistemological challenges and developments within Cognitive Translation and Interpreting Studies, problematizing a range of issues. These critical essays provide a means of encouraging further development by grounding new theories, stances, and best practices.

The volume is a clear marker of a maturing discipline, as decades of empirical study and methodological innovation provide the backdrop for critique and debate. The volume exemplifies tendencies toward convergence and difference, while at the same time pushing against disciplinary boundaries and structures. Constructs such as expertise and process are explored, and different theories of cognition are brought to the table. A number of chapters consider what it might mean for translation to be a form of situated, or 4EA cognition, while others query interdisciplinary relationships of foundational importance to the field. Issues of methodology are also addressed in terms of their underlying philosophical assumptions and implications.

This book will be of interest to scholars working at the intersection of translation and cognition, in such fields as translation studies, cognitive science, psycholinguistics, semiotics, and philosophy of science.

Part I Challenging Epistemologies

1 Epistemologies of Translation Expertise Notions in Research and Praxis

Hanna Risku and Daniela Schlager

DOI: 10.4324/9781003125792-3

1. Introduction

Since the 1980s, research into the topic of expertise in translation has been shaped in part by a discourse that has sought to legitimise the profession and science of translation. Demonstrating the complexity of translation served to justify not only the research itself but also the existence of translation studies as a degree programme and a university discipline in its own right (Krings, 2005, p. 344). Grbić and Kujamäki (2019, p. 121) refer to this as an “explicit commitment to the professional community”, noting that translation and interpreting studies (TIS) “seems to have emancipated itself from essentialist definitions of the product (e.g., ‘translation’) but still sustains a rather rigorous and homogeneous view of translators and interpreters”. This focus on translation and interpreting as expert tasks also served to delegitimise non-trained laypersons. The trend in the selection of participants for translation process research (TPR) can likewise be seen as symptomatic: while such studies were initially carried out using ‘language learners’ as translators (e.g., Krings, 1986), the legitimisation discourse prompted a move towards comparing the translation processes of translators and non-translators, whereby the ‘translators’ sometimes also included student translators, while bilinguals, language learners and new students were all categorised as ‘non-translators’. This approach was often backed by a normative motivation to study ‘what translators must know/be able to do’ or ‘how experts act’. As Grbić and Kujamäki (2019, p. 121) note, this categorisation of experts and ‘others’ “allows for the construction of the idea of a homogeneous and coherent professional identity with ‘mono-professionalism’ as a core element which determines both the educational framework and the focus of research”.

In the 1990s, the discourse adopted a more descriptive tone. Kaiser-Cooke (1994, p. 135), for example, views expertise from a cognitive science perspective not as an appraisal but as a description of how complex problems can be solved. The more complex the problem solved, the greater the competence (Risku, 1998, p. 89). Risku (1998, p. 90) describes expertise in this sense as a cognitive phenomenon of proficiency and a social phenomenon of remit. While expertise is gained gradually on a cognitive level through learning and experience, it is acquired on the social level through ascription of a role.

In recent decades, different approaches to studying translation competence/expertise have been developed. These range from minimal to multi-component models and indicate a shift from theoretical to empirical approaches and from a knowledge-oriented to a process-like characterisation of competence (doing, experiencing; see Göpferich, 2015; Hurtado Albir, 2017; Risku, 2016; Shreve et al., 2018). Since the early 2000s – and starting with Ericsson’s (2000) influential article “Expertise in Interpreting” – the debate on translation expertise has been increasingly informed by the framework used in cognitive psychology, which defines an expert as someone who displays “consistently superior performance” (Ericsson & Charness, 1994, p. 731) in a certain domain. A key role is assigned to “deliberate practice”, a form of practice that is particularly directed at performance enhancement and requires specific conditions such as regularity and feedback. This is assumed to make the difference between experts and “experienced non-experts” (Bereiter & Scardamalia, 1993, p. 11) and offers a possible explanation as to why experienced or well-qualified professional translators do not necessarily produce better translations than novices (Jääskeläinen, 2010). This approach also ties in with recent endeavours to reach conceptual clarity by replacing the concept of competence with the expertise framework (see Shreve et al., 2018).

On an empirical level, researchers continued to conduct experimental studies that compared the performance of translators with different levels of experience. The methodological repertoire was extended thereby to include technologically advanced data collection methods like keystroke logging, screen recording and eye tracking.

On the theoretical level, the situated or 4EA (embodied, embedded, extended, enactive, affective) cognition approach that emerged in the 1980s (Brooks, 1995; Clancey, 1997; Clark, 1997; Hendriks-Jansen, 1996; Steels & Brooks, 1995; Suchman, 1987; Van Gelder, 1998) gained hold in translation studies in the 2010s, offering a new perspective on translation expertise. In this approach, expertise is visible particularly in interactions with resources, thus according an important role to artefacts and social contacts. Expertise is viewed here as an accomplishment of the overall situation, i.e. the complete social network (including technologies). This new theoretical approach also marks a transition towards the sociological consideration of the term ‘expertise’ in translation studies.

To account for the situated, embodied nature of cognition and complex, dynamic contexts in which translators usually work, Muñoz (2014) proposes a multidimensional model of translation expertise, revisiting key aspects of the cognitive-psychological construct of translation expertise and embedding them in a situated cognition perspective. Like Angelone and Marín (2019), he emphasises the importance of adaptability. But while Muñoz focuses on the realm of measurable expertise and research in a controlled laboratory setting, Angelone and Marín step outside into an authentic working context. In a small-scale quantitative survey, they investigate how translators and translation project managers conceptualise translation expertise and if, or to what extent, their thoughts reflect concepts from expertise research. Their initial findings reveal a clear gap between the definitions of expertise used in translation studies research and those of working professionals in the language industry. These differences between academia and praxis indicate that expertise is socially constructed. This prompted us to take a closer look at the social dimension of expertise and examine the notions of expertise that are visible in our own ethnographic data. In the next chapter, we will briefly discuss expertise as a social construct before presenting the specific categorisation of epistemological positions used in our study.

2. Expertise as Social Construct

The history of various constructs of expertise in translation studies and the differences between those used by scholars and working professionals suggest that translation expertise is “not a self-evident or objective category” (En & En, 2019, p. 218) but is instead constructed socially and discursively. Expertise can mean something different for each individual and emerges from interaction. Constructs of expertise (both academic and non-academic) imply diverse epistemic positions and can sometimes be linked to specific, ideologically motivated interests (Pym, 1998).

From a sociological perspective, discourses on expertise essentially function as a means of social closure and occupational control (Evetts et al., 2006). Distinguishing between ‘experts’ and ‘non-experts’ establishes professional identities and furthers the institutionalisation of a profession. This phenomenon can be described as “boundary work” (Gieryn, 1983): boundaries are drawn between groups of insiders (experts, professionals) and outsiders (non-experts, amateurs, laypersons). This drawing of boundaries defines who is inside and who is outside the group and the criteria used to determine this status. Several aspects of boundary work are interesting in the translation studies context, including the professionalisation processes of translators and interpreters (Grbić, 2010, 2014) and the role played therein by scholars (Koskinen & Dam, 2016). Recent research has also focused on boundary work in a volunteer translation context, the active part played by non-professionals in establishing boundaries (En & En, 2019) and the role of boundary work in narrowing down the disciplinary subject area by largely ignoring non-professional translation and translators (Grbić & Kujamäki, 2019). While we do not focus on boundary work in this paper, we do need to bear in mind that expertise is co-constructed in multiple situations and various settings and with consequences on different levels. This includes our own role as authors, whose choice of relevant examples likewise contributes to the construction of expertise.

Following En and En (2019, p. 218), it seems useful in our context to distinguish between two ways of conceptualising expertise. The first is more person-oriented and focuses on identity construction, individuals and their roles as experts or non-experts. The other is more process-oriented and emerges from the description of knowledge practices that people engage in, the sort of knowledge that is performed rather than possessed (see also “knowing-in-practice”, Olohan, 2019). Translators engage in multiple knowledge practices to navigate through their tasks, and while this has long been a topic of interest in TPR, expertise as a social role has remained under-researched. As En and En (2019) suggest, while the status and role of an expert can be ascribed on the basis of knowledge practices, this does not necessarily have to be the case. Not all people who are labelled ‘experts’ engage in ‘expert’ knowledge practices, just as ‘non-experts’ can use knowledge practices that are often ascribed to experts (such as intense reflection about the translation work on a meta-level).

As will be shown later, process- and person-oriented notions are epistemologically tightly linked: specific assumptions of the translation process bring about corresponding expectations of what it means to be a translation expert, i.e., a person who possesses or, rather, performs expertise. We would therefore like to stress that we do not see the terms ‘expert’ and ‘expertise’ as belonging to different conceptualisations. Both can refer to the process-oriented and to the person-oriented understanding alike.

In the following, we examine how constructs of translation expertise are expressed in cognitive TPR and translation praxis. We begin by discussing different epistemic positions and their consequences for the understanding of expertise and the role of experts. We then discuss the corresponding notions of translation expertise in TPR. To examine the understandings of translation expertise in translation praxis, we draw on data from a multi-case field study that uses interviews and participant observation to study translators and translation project managers (TPMs) directly at their workplaces and apply this data to investigate the epistemic positions and notions of experts encountered in these settings.

3. Epistemologies of Expertise

To capture the current theoretical discourses on translation and cognition, we follow Venkula (1987/1994; see also Risku, 2009) and divide the epistemic positions into three main categories: empirical-positivist, hermeneutic-constructivist and pragmatic-cooperative. Since this categorisation stems from the area of science that investigates the philosophical, social and historical foundations of scientific research, we feel it is particularly apt for our purpose. This simplified categorisation serves as a framework for analysing the various epistemic approaches and resulting expert roles in TPR and translation praxis.

Most of the translation process studies literature we use as examples to demonstrate different epistemological positions do not deal explicitly and exclusively with the topic of translation expertise (or epistemology for that matter) but instead describe translation processes, competences, skills etc. Thus, our analysis of the notions of expertise and their epistemological categorisation is based on the characterisations of translation and translators: a particular understanding of what constitutes translation informs a compatible epistemic position on what constitutes translation expertise.

3.1 The Empirical-Positivist Notion of Expertise

Empirical epistemic approaches assume that knowledge and insight are based on sensory experience (cf. Venkula, 1987/1994, p. 29). In contrast to their rationalist counterparts, which regard pure thought or reason as the primary source of knowledge, empirical approaches attribute it to sensory impressions such as observations (cf. Locke’s tabula rasa). Combining this with the positivist notion that humans can potentially recognise and perceive the truth about the world and its properties as such results in the empirical-positivist position whereby true knowledge can (only) be recognised through sensory experience (Venkula, 1987/1994, p. 29). If a statement cannot be checked and verified through sensory perception, it must be categorised or rejected as mere speculation and fantasy.

Empirical-positivists regard knowledge – and thus also expertise – as objective, impartial and universal: it is valid independent of the observer (Venkula, 1987/1994, p. 30). Experts have access to empirically verified knowledge that they have learned through experience/education and/or is stored in the resources they have at their disposal.

In the empirical-positivist standpoint, this also...

Table of contents

• Cover Page
• Half Title Page
• Series Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Contents Page
• List of Figures Page
• List of Tables Page
• List of Contributors Page
• Preface Page
• Introduction: Scientific Maturity and Epistemological Reflection in Cognitive Translation and Interpreting Studies (CTIS)
• Part I Challenging Epistemologies
• Part II Converging Epistemologies
• Part III Pluralist Epistemologies
• Index