CULTUS 10 : Multilingualism, Lingua Franca or What? (2nd call)
Call for Abstracts: 20 December, 2016
Call for papers: 1 April, 2017
Submission info at: www.cultusjournal.com
Cultus 10 will begin with a conversation with renowned linguist, comparative literature and translation theorist Professor Susan Bassnett. The issue will focus on multilingual situations, and how the language issue is resolved. How tenable is the solution and what are the consequences? This brings politics and power into the question, as well as the short and long term costs of the choices made.
Indeed, as we send out this call for papers, so we begin to take in the consequences of Britain’s decision to leave the EU. Almost immediately the following headline appeared, “English could be banned as an official language of the EU (Daily Telegraph, 28/06/2016). This Cultus issue, then, focusses on the realities concerning use of language(s) to communicate, wherever it be: in the institutions, the workplace, the university (with a strong focus outside of the UK on internationalization of its teaching) or the social services.
One solution, discussed in previous Cultus issues is the use of machine translation and interpretation to reduce costs. It was noted, for example, that the Australian Department of Health has started to use Google Translate to convey health information in a range of languages "an un-nuanced and unsophisticated view of human communication that devalues not only the work of professional interpreters and translators, but also the texts being communicated and the audience receiving them” (Liddicoat and Hale, 2015). What evidence is there that this is not only true but will actually increase costs?
With regard to language service provision for immigrants, other cost-cutting measures are fraught with similarly worrying consequences, such as the UK’s disastrous outsourcing of interpreter resources in the UK and the Dutch government’s decision to review, if not end, funding of healthcare interpreting in the Netherlands. What language rights should or do non-native speakers have, and what are the consequences?
We welcome papers that address issues related to the following themes with a focus on translation:
- Multilingualism power and empowerment
- Politics and power in language
- Use of a lingua franca in professional encounters
- Professional practice, discourse and the new media
- The role of machine translation in professional practice
Contributions must be sent to: submission@cultusjournal.com
Cultus: The journal of intercultural of communication and mediation:
double-blind review, MLA/IATIS/TSB indexed ; “A” quality rated by ANVUR
EDITORS: David Katan (University of Salento, Italy) Cinzia Spinzi (University of Palermo, Italy)
Call for papers:Event: Who Appears After Translation? Authors, Artists, and Transcultural Personas — ACLA 2027American Comparative Literature Association Annual Meeting 2027University of Houston, May 20–23, 2027Organizers: Maya Boutaghou and Song Huang, University of VirginiaPossible topics include, but are not limited to:literary translationself-translationmultilingual writingtranslated authors and authorial personastranslators as mediators of cultural identityperformance circulationadaptationvisual translationartistic and celebrity personasdigital mediadiasporic and postcolonial translationmultilingual subjectivityuntranslatabilitytranscultural mediationtranslation and cultural memorytranslation across literary, visual, and embodied mediaSubmissionPaper proposals must be submitted through the ACLA 2027 online portal.Deadline: September 22, 2026More info: https://www.acla.org/seminar/7a421fda-c5ce-4e42-b382-0d05b579746b
Call for Papers:Event: History and Translation Network Conference 2027 Time : September 20-23, 2027Place: Ghent University, BelgiumPossible topics include:translator branding and authorial visibilitygendered and postcolonial invisibilityarchival recovery of neglected translators and mediatorstranslation and mechanisms of canonisationthe historical circulation of texts in manuscript, print, and digital culturesthe materiality of texts, media ecosystems, and publishing networkscensorship, patronage, cultural diplomacy, and cultural policytranslation as labour, profession, and economic practicereaders, reception, and communities of interpretationtranslation and media(tion)the shifting boundaries between human and non-human mediationsocial, intellectual, institutional, and communication networksdigital humanities approaches, network analysis, corpus studies, and archival methodologiesPaper submission deadline: 1 February 2027More info: https://htn2027.ugent.be/en
Call for Papers:International Conference: Translating Sacred Texts: Dimensions, Challenges, and Contemporary Perspectives Date: December 03, 2026Format: In-PersonVenue: Faculty of Arabic Language, Cadi Ayyad University, Marrakech, MoroccoSubmission Guidelines• Abstract: 250–300 words, accompanied by a short biographical note. • Keywords: 4–6 keywords. • Conference Language: English. • Submission Email: sacredtexttranslation@gmail.com• Submission Deadline: September 1, 2026. Read more: https://sites.google.com/uca.ac.ma/sacredtextconference/accueil
Call for Papers Journal: Translation Spaces 18 (1) 2029Theme: Translating the city, curating the museum: city museums as translation zonesGuest editors: Anneleen Spiessens (Ghent University) and Luc van Doorslaer (University of Tartu/KU Leuven)Topics of interest include, but are not limited to:· conceptual convergences between city translation and museum translation· methodological approaches for studying translation in urban or museum contexts· the position of city museums within the broader translational framework of multilayered urban memoryscapes· the role of translation in unlocking multilingual collections· the symbolic and political dimension of language policies in city museums· the role of translation in diversifying museum audiences and fostering sustainable communities· the interplay of interlingual, intralingual, intersemiotic and intrasemiotic translation in exhibition contextsSubmissionAbstracts of up to 300 words should be submitted by 15 September to the guest editors by email (anneleen.spiessens@ugent.be and luc.vandoorslaer@ut.ee).Key dates:15 September 2026: abstract (300 words) and bionote (100 words) submissionIn the course of 2028: online first publication of individual articlesSpring 2029: print publicationMore information: https://benjamins.com/series/ts/call-for-papers-ts.2029.pdf
Call for AbstractConference: the 19th International Postgraduate Conference in Translation and Interpreting (IPCITI)Venue: Dublin City UniversityDate: 3-4 December 2026Theme: Across Academia and Industry: (In)Visibility and Interdisciplinarity in Translation and InterpretingTopics include:Interdisciplinary engagement with translation and interpreting studies (e.g. Comparative Literature, Linguistics, Cultural Studies, Sociology and Anthropology)Interdisciplinarity and knowledge exchange in translation and interpreting studies (e.g. Communication Studies, Information Science, Higher Education Studies)Visibility and invisibility of translation and interpreting research (e.g. Sociology of Knowledge, Media Studies)Translation and interpreting across academia, institutions and industry (e.g. International Relations, Public Policy)Translation and interpreting technologies and digital practices (Computer Science, Human-Computer Interaction (HCI), Natural Language Processing (NLP))Translator and interpreter training and pedagogy (e.g. Curriculum Design, Cognitive Psychology, Applied Linguistics)Community and public service interpreting (e.g. Medical Humanities, Social Work)Specialised translation (e.g. terminology, literary translation, audiovisual translation, localisation)Professional identities, ethics, and labour conditions (e.g. Professional Ethics, Labour Economics, Human Resource Management)Translation, migration, multilingualism, human rights, and social justice (e.g. Human Rights Law, Migration Studies, Political Philosophy)Critical approaches to translation studies (e.g. Decolonisation of Translation and Interpreting Studies, Postcolonial Theory, Gender Studies, Critical Discourse Analysis, Deconstruction)Innovative, creative and interdisciplinary research methodologies in translation and interpreting studies (e.g. Digital Humanities, Corpus Linguistics, Ethnography, Mixed Methods Research)Translation and interpreting in crisis and conflict settings (e.g. Peace and Conflict Studies, Disaster Management, Risk and Crisis Communication)Deadline for abstract submission: 31 August 2026More details: https://www.dcu.ie/ctts/ipciti-2026
