International Research Training Event II
Researching the History of Translation and Interpreting
Workshop leaders
Professor Christopher Rundle, University of Bologna, Italy
Professor Mona Baker, Director of the SISU Baker Centre for Translation & Intercultural Studies
Sunday 5 April
9-11.30 am
Session 1: Doing Research on Translation History
Professor Christopher Rundle
Based both on his own research experience and on select examples from the work of other scholars, Professor Rundle will discuss the different approaches that are used in conducting historical research on translation and interpreting and consider their respective merits. He will argue that there are, broadly speaking, three dimensions to translation history that each represent a distinct approach: the texts, the translators and the context. Each of these approaches involves a different methodology, and while the first two have been adopted frequently, the context has only rarely been the focus in translation history. This imbalance needs to be redressed, and it is therefore useful to consider some of the particular advantages of focusing on context, including the way in which it lends itself to an interdisciplinary dialogue with historical studies. The session will conclude with a reflection on the relationship between translation history and historical studies: the shared methodology and key concepts from historical studies which seem to have a particular relevance to translation history, such as: narrative theory, microhistory and histoire croisée.
14.30-16.30 pm
Session 2: Methodological Issues in Researching Translation History
Professor Christopher Rundle
This workshop will consist of a group discussion, introduced and led by the workshop leader, of theoretical and methodological implications of conducting research on the history of translation and interpreting. Questions addressed will include how the sources consulted by researchers condition the methods they use; the contribution that the study of translation and interpreting can make to our understanding of other historical issues/topics/areas of study; the relationship between translation history and historiography and the difficulties involved in establishing a genuine interdisciplinary dialogue; whether we can use translation as a lens through which to examine history and how this might differ from more common approaches in translation history; and who might constitute our natural audience when presenting historical research on translation.
Monday 6 April
9-11.30 am
Session 3: Publishing in International Journals
Professor Mona Baker
Publishing in peer-reviewed international journals is now key to progressing in an academic career anywhere in the world. With the proliferation of journals that are becoming increasingly focused on either specialist strands of various sub-disciplines or on specific cross-disciplinary themes, identifying a suitable outlet for a research article and pitching it at the right level for that outlet has become a complex affair. This session will draw on the tutor’s extensive experience in editing the international journal The Translator, as well as refereeing submissions for a large number of high-ranking periodicals within and outside the field of translation studies. In addition to established journals of translation studies, emphasis will be placed on publishing in journals in neigbouring disciplines – such as journals of discourse studies, corpus linguistics, digital humanities, pragmatics, history and ethnography – that are potentially open to engagement with scholars of translation. Illustrative, anonymized examples from various types of submission and referee feedback will be used to outline recurrent patterns of writing and structuring research articles that result in negative assessment and rejection, and guidance on avoiding such patterns and producing research articles that meet international standards of excellence will be provided. In addition, examples of well argued submissions that are rejected because of a lack of fit with the priorities of a journal outside translation studies will also be discussed and suggestions will be offered to improve their chances of being accepted.
Workshop Leaders
Christopher Rundle is associate professor in Translation Studies at the Department of Interpreting and Translation of the University of Bologna, Italy. He is also Research Fellow in Translation and Italian Studies at the School of Arts, Languages and Cultures of the University of Manchester, UK. His main research interests lie in the history of translation, in particular translation and fascism. He is the author of the monograph Publishing Translations in Fascist Italy (Peter Lang, 2010), which was recently published in Italian with title Il vizio dell’esterofilia. Editoria e traduzioni nell’Italia fascista (Carocci, 2019). He is co-editor with Kate Sturge of the volume Translation Under Fascism (Palgrave Macmillan, 2010). He is also the editor of the Special Issue of The Translator (Vol. 20 No.1, 2014) on Theories and Methodologies of Translation History. He is the editor of the forthcoming Routledge Handbook of Translation History; co-editor with Federico Zanettin of the forthcoming Routledge Handbook of Translation Methodology; and co-editor with Anne Lange and Daniele Monticelli of the forthcoming Routledge Handbook on the History of Translation Studies and of the forthcoming volume Translation Under Communism (Palgrave Macmillan, 2020). He is the co-editor with Pekka Kujamäki and Michaela Wolf of the book series on Routledge Research on Translation and Interpreting History; and he is the coordinating editor of the online translation studies journal inTRAlinea (www.intralinea.org).
Mona Baker is Director of the SISU Baker Centre for Translation and Intercultural Studies and Professor Emerita of Translation Studies at the University of Manchester, UK. She is Principal Investigator on the AHRC-funded project Genealogies of Knowledge: The Evolution and Contestation of Concepts across Time and Space, recipient of the 2015 Kuwait Foundation for the Advancement of Sciences Award in the field of Arts and Languages, Studies in Foreign Languages and Literatures, and honoree of the 2011 Fifth Session of Abdullah Bin Abdulaziz International Award for Translation, for contributions to the field of translation. She is author of In Other Words: A Coursebook on Translation (Routledge, 1992; third edition 2018) and Translation and Conflict: A Narrative Account (Routledge, 2006; Classics edition 2018), editor of Translating Dissent (Routledge, 2016; winner of the Inttranews Linguists of the Year award for 2015), the Routledge Encyclopedia of Translation Studies (1998, 2001; third edition 2020, co-edited with Gabriela Saldanha); Critical Concepts: Translation Studies (4 volumes, Routledge, 2009); and Critical Readings in Translation Studies (Routledge, 2010). Her articles have appeared in a wide range of international journals, including Social Movement Studies, Critical Studies on Terrorism, Social Semiotics, The Translator and Target. She is founding Editor of The Translator (St. Jerome Publishing, 1995-2013), former Editorial Director of St. Jerome Publishing (1995-2013), and founding Vice-President of IATIS, the International Association for Translation & Intercultural Studies (2004-2015).