Southern African Linguistics and Applied Language Studies
Volume 31(3), 2013
The sociology of translation in a developmental context
Guest editors: Sergey Tyulenev and Marlie van Rooyen
One of the ways in which one can conceptualise the evolution of Translation Studies as a scholarly discipline over the past five decades is as a series of shifts from micro to macro approaches, from text to context, from language to society, and from colonially exclusive to post-colonially inclusive paradigms. Whichever way one looks at it, there seems to be a growing interdisciplinary interest between translation studies and sociology. This interest relates, among other things, to the role of the translator and translation in the development of a society and the interplay between the constraints that society places on the translator and translation praxis, on the one hand, and the activism and resistance of the translation agency, on the other. This interest has been reflected in Translation Studies readers, monographs, edited collections, special editions of TS journals, and a multitude of articles. The uniqueness of this special issue of SALALS (http://www.nisc.co.za/journals?id=9) is that it will consider the role of translation specifically in the developmental context.
See the Jostrans website for more details: http://www.jostrans.org/issue18/issue18_toc.php. The Jostrans is an open-access journal.
The Role of Translation in the Dialogue of Civilizations, An-Najah University, Palestine
Written by Mona BakerThe Faculty of Arts at An-Najah National University announces its first call for papers for its fifth international conference on “The Role of Translation in the Dialogue of Civilizations,” which will take place at An-Najah National University in Nablus, Palestine, Sunday and Monday, September 16th and 17th, 2012. Researchers and translators from all over the world are cordially invited to submit their abstracts.
Victoria University (British Columbia), June 3, 4, 5, 2013.
Program chairs: Sylvie Vandaele and Pier-Pascale Boulanger.
Knowledge is circulated through translation, more particularly through the importation of scientific and technical discourses for purposes more diverse than we usually realize. Many of these discourses serve practical purposes, of course, but all are more or less related to patterns of thought based on world views and philosophical stances that at times stand in opposition. The 26th conference of the Canadian Association for Translation Studies (CATS) will concentrate on the role played by translation in the journey of scientific and technical knowledge through language-cultures.
The idea that translation acts as a mere mechanical channel transmitting knowledge reduces translation to a naive commonplace that prevents us from grasping its various dimensions and analyzing its practice critically. Translation, as it mediates between language-cultures, pre-supposes human intervention and thus sociohistorical circumstances.
MA in Accessibility to Media, Arts and Culture
Written by Magdalena DombekThe University of Macerata, under the auspices of the National Cinema Museum, RAI (Italy’s public service broadcaster) and UICI (Italian Union of the Blind and Visually Impaired), with the support of SUB-TI ACCESS s.r.l., pursuant to art. 3 of the Ministerial Decree 270/2004, announces for the academic year 2012-2013 the first edition of the first-level Master’s programme in “Accessibility to media, arts and culture”, lasting one year for a learning programme worth 60 credits, and corresponding to an overall workload of 1500 hours.
COLLEGE OF ARTS AND LAW, SCHOOL OF ENGLISH, DRAMA AND ACS
Division of English Language and Applied Linguistics
DEPARTMENT OF ENGLISH, University of Birmingham
LECTURER IN TRANSLATION STUDIES
Job Summary
The University of Birmingham wishes to appoint a Lecturer in Translation Studies with effect from 1st January 2013 or as soon as possible thereafter. We seek someone who will make an outstanding contribution to the research profile of the English Department, and will be able to teach across a range of modules including, preferably, Translation Technology and Translation in Professional Contexts.
Internship in Publishing Literary Translations (Arabic)
Written by Mona Baker3-month fulltime internship offered by the Centre for the Advanced Study of the Arab World (CASAW, University of Edinburgh) and funded by the AHRC (Arts and Humanities Research Council, UK).
The Research Centre for Ambient Intelligence and Accessibility CAIAC at Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona is pleased to announce the 4th International Symposium on Live Subtitling: Live subtitling with respeaking and other respeaking applications, to be held on March 12th 2013. This symposium will be the fourth in a series of symposiums on live subtitling and respeaking technology. Its predecessors were held at Forli, Barcelona and Antwerp respectively (see: www.respeaking.net). The symposium will bring together specialists from academia, software development, broadcasting and the service industry as well as consumers and others interested in cutting-edge developments in media accessibility.
Now consolidated as the preferred means of providing live subtitles on TV, respeaking is currently facing a number of challenges as European broadcasters struggle with new legislation and subtitling quotas as well as critical cuts in their budgets. These challenges will shape the future of this relatively young translation mode and test its aim to make audiovisual media accessible for viewers with hearing loss. In countries where respeaking has been used for over a decade and where the quantity of live subtitling is no longer a problem, the issue of quality has become increasingly important, as has the application of respeaking to other contexts such as public events and classrooms. In those countries where respeaking is not yet being used or not used consistently, the further development of speech recognition technology plays a fundamental role. Generally speaking, technological progress is bound to have a significant impact on the nature of respeaking in all contexts, not least with the potential introduction of speaker-independent speech recognition and automatic subtitling. Research in this area is more pertinent than ever. We therefore welcome contributions on the following topics as well as related issues:
- Accuracy and delay in respeaking
- Respeaking in contexts outside TV broadcasting
- Respeaker training
- Software development and training
- Speaker-independent speech recognition and automatic subtitling
- Reception research
- Other areas related to respeaking
Proposals are sought for a forthcoming edited collection (by Dina Tsagari and Georgios Floros, University of Cyprus), entitled "Translation in Lnaguage Teaching and Assessment", to be published with Cambridge Scholars Press (under contract). Deadlines for the submission of proposals: 20 September 2012.
