Leon Burnett University of Essex Interacting with the

Leon Burnett University of Essex

Interacting with the Translation Profession: A Report • Ian Kemble (Portsmouth University) • Questionnaire to 25 universities • 23 responses • Bath Symposium (9 September 2006)

Working hypothesis • “The working hypothesis was that the responses to the questionnaire would show that those courses which were more vocationally-orientated would enjoy levels of interaction with the translation profession which were higher and more varied than those of more theoretically-orientated courses. ”

Spectrum • • 1 ------ 2 ------ 3 ------ 4 -------- 5 ------ 6 ----- 7 ----- 8 ----- 9 • theoretically vocationally orientated • balanced between theory & practice • Spectrum depicting the range of course types

Results of survey • “a total of 6 institutions (24%) declared themselves to be more theoretically orientated, situating themselves between nodes 2 and 4; 7 institutions (28%) declared their courses to be balanced between theory and practice and a total of 12 institutions (48%) described their courses as more vocationally orientated, placing themselves between nodes 6 and 9. ”

Results of survey • 50% vocationally orientated • 25% balanced between theory and practice • 25% theoretically orientated

Hidden assumption 1 • 25% balanced between theory and practice [= vocation] • Implicit equation between ‘practice’ and ‘vocation’ • www. port. ac. uk/translationreport 2006.

Hidden assumption 2 • Spectrum --- continuity • Divide --- partition • Metaphors condition our way of looking at the world.

Theoretically-orientated universities • Warwick • Birmingham • West of England (UWE) • Edinburgh • University College London (UCL) • East Anglia (UEA)

Susan Bassnett • Translation Studies (1980) • Comparative Literature (1993) • Literary Translation?

Critique of reference books • “The Routledge Encyclopedia of Translation Studies, edited by Mona Baker”, in Translation and Literature (Vol. 8, 120 -30), 1999. • “On the Basis of Current Knowledge: A Review of Recent Reference Works on Translation”, in New Comparison (No. 32, 124 -38), 2001. • • • A review of Introducing Translation Studies: Theories and Applications by Jeremy Munday (Routledge: London and New York, 2001), in Wasafiri (No. 40, 55 -57), 2003. The Oxford History of Literary Translation in English. Volume 4: 1790 -1900, in Translation and Literature (forthcoming 2007).

Reference books (by weight) • Dictionary of Translation Studies, 400 g. • The Oxford Guide to Literature in English Translation, 1. 05 kg. • Routledge Encyclopedia of Translation Studies, 1. 18 kg. • Encyclopedia of Literary Translation into English (2 vols. ), 5. 35 kg.

The Oxford History of Literary Translation in English • 5 volumes (Vols. 3 & 4 published) • Aim is “to present for the first time a critical and historical overview of the development of this art or craft in the English-speaking world” – General Editors’ Foreword (italics added)

The Oxford History of Literary Translation in English • “we use the word ‘literary’ in the broad old sense which it has still not completely lost, to encompass something like the full range of non-technical work which has made up the reading of the literate public” – General Editors’ Foreword – Compare Encyclopedia of Literary Translation into English • Literary Translation as its own master.

Literary Translation • Art or craft? • Theory and practice • New divide: transmitting culture/receiving culture • Autonomous work in the recipient culture • The ‘wordface’, not the ‘workplace’.