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Translation and the Construction of Identity: Abstracts
Date: 12-14 August 2004
Venue: Sookmyung Women's University, Seoul, Korea
Carol O’Sullivan British Centre for Literary Translation, School of
English and American Studies, University of East Anglia Hand in hand with growing academic interest in
translation, including literary translation, as a subject worthy of study
above and beyond its pedagogical possibilities has come an increasing
academic interest in ‘creative’, or literary writing, increasingly taught
(particularly at postgraduate level) by professional writers, seeking to
engage with the state of the profession as well as with the development of
students’ writing. Translation trainers are increasingly aware of the status
of literary translation as writing, and hence of the crucial importance of
students’ target language competence. This paper discusses ways in which the development of
courses which consider literary translation as creative writing (CW) can
cast a useful light on issues of wider relevance to translation teaching.
The link with CW encourages students to contextualise their work with
reference to conditions prevailing in the professional world of publishing.
On an intellectual level, teaching translation as creative writing can give
students - including those who are not studying formal CW - a translation
confidence which can be difficult to nurture under other conditions.
Engaging with work by other writers helps students to reflect on and develop
their own voice and writing identity. Teaching students with an active
interest in writing, as well as students formally studying CW, promotes an
extremely high standard of TT production and allows translation classes to
discuss and create TTs at a very sophisticated level. Finally, such courses
help to bring translation to the attention of students who may become
writers, and this will have a knock-on effect as and when these young
writers come to be translated into other languages. In the present climate
publishers often fail to facilitate the vital communication between writer
and translator as part of the intercultural movement of the text.
Panel 8: Teaching Translation - Global Challenges for the Twenty-First Century
Teaching Literary Translation as Creative Writing
© IATIS 2003