Call for Papers
The Politics of Translation
We are pleased to invite translation scholars and researchers worldwide to contribute research papers to an edited volume, provisionally titled
The Politics of Translation
The proposed volume will be considered for publication as an edited volume in ‘New Trends in Translation Studies’ to be published by Peter Lang (Oxford).
Interested contributors are requested to submit to the volume editors: Ali Almanna and Juliane House a title, abstract and a brief bio sketch of author/s at the earliest (latest by 30th April 2021). They can send it to alialmanna9@gmail.com
Once accepted by editors, the first draft of the chapter (approx. 6000 words) will be due by 1st July 2021. These chapters will be then peer-reviewed before submitting to the publisher. The volume will be published in February, 2022.
Objectives
Events are produced, reproduced and even shaped through translation. The same event might be interpreted, and accordingly, represented differently by different people (be they translators, editors, revisers, translation quality controllers, translation managers, etc.) according to their accumulated value systems, beliefs, assumptions, backgrounds, senses of belonging and societal commitments. Texts are then framed in these agents’ minds in ways that promote the rise of “competing narratives, with important implications for different parties to the conflict” (Baker 2006: 107). As such, translation does not refer to the act of transferring the forging materials from language/culture A to language/culture B, but rather different versions of truth and reality are reflected, (re)produced, enacted, mediated, (re)constructed, (re)framed, (re)narrated and even manipulated and contested in the process. As major agents in the interlingual and intercultural communication process, translators and interpreters are often not ideologically neutral. Rather, they are sometimes motivated by different factors to step with a view to mediating in the process, thereby conceptualising the final product as a kind of discourse. With this in mind, translation and interpreting is looked upon as a political activity closely related to such issues as ideology, power, agency, identity and representation.
This current volume aims at addressing such topics as ideology, power, discourse, identity and representation; therefore, it welcomes submissions involving different language combinations and from a wide range of sociopolitical, cultural and institutional contexts. Potential submissions can be from various theoretical perspectives and draw on different methodological approaches.
Some of the relevant topics might include but are not limited to the following (theoretical insights and methodologies):
More specific topics might include:
Editors
Ali Almanna is series editor of Routledge Studies in Arabic Translation (London/New York) and Associate Professor of Translation at Hamad Bin Khalifa University, Qatar. He obtained his PhD in Translation Studies from the University of Durham (UK) and MA in Translation Studies from Westminster University (UK). His recent publications include The Routledge Course in Translation Annotation (Routledge), Semantics for Translation Students (Peter Lang), The Nuts and Bolts of Arabic-English Translation (Cambridge Scholars Publishing), The Arabic-English Translator as Photographer (Routledge), Re-Framing Realities through Translation (Peter Lang), Translation as a Set of Frames (Routledge) in addition to many articles published in peer reviewed journals.
Juliane House is Professor Emeritus of Applied Linguistics at Hamburg University, founding member of the German Science Foundation’s Research Centre on Multilingualism and Director of the PhD in Applied Linguistics at Hellenic American University in its Athens campus. Her research interests include contrastive pragmatics, discourse analysis, politeness, translation, English as a global lingua franca, and intercultural communication. Her book publications include ‘A Model for Translation Quality Assessment’, ‘Interlingual and Intercultural Communication’, ‘Cross-Cultural Pragmatics’, ‘Misunderstanding in Social Life’, ‘Translation’, ‘Multilingual Communication’, ‘Translation as Communication across Languages and Cultures’ and ‘Translation. The Basics’.
The international conference Translation Beyond Human Languages and Cultures in Times of Ecological Crises welcomes abstract submissions for the event taking place on 12–13 November 2026 at Yıldız Technical University in Istanbul, Türkiye. Researchers are invited to submit their proposals to beyondhumanconf@gmail.com. SUBMISSIONSEach paper presentation will be allotted 20 minutes, followed by 10 minutes for discussion.Submissions for individual presentations should include:- An abstract of no more than 300 words,- A short bionote including name, affiliation, and email address,- Up to five keywords indicating the subject, methodology, and theoretical framework(s).Submissions are open until 01 April 2026.WORKING LANGUAGESAll proposals must be submitted in French or English for peer review by the Scientific Committee. Interpreting between French and English may be offered depending on available resources. Questions and discussions during the conference may take place in both languages.KEYNOTE SPEAKERSMichael Cronin (Trinity College, Dublin) Kobus Marais (University of the Free State, Bloemfontein) Şebnem Susam-Saraeva (University of Edinburgh, Edinburgh)CONFERENCE FEESConference fees will be split into two categories: € 120 regular fee € 90 reduced fee for postgraduate studentsDetails regarding the conference will be shared in due course via the following link: https://avesis.yildiz.edu.tr/researchteamsite/biodemocraticpractices
The Department of Translation, Terminology and Interpreting Studies of the University of Malta, the Graduate Institute of Interpreting and Translation of Shanghai International Studies University and the Department of Theory of Translation and Comparative Linguistics of the National University of Uzbekistan are organizing an international conference in ‘Indirect Translation: A Two-Arched Bridge Between Cultures’ in Tashkent, Uzbekistan, on 15-17 April 2026. For further information see the call for papers at https://www.um.edu.mt/media/um/docs/faculties/arts/translation/CallforPapersTashkent2026_FinalUM.pdf
Association of Programmes in Translation and Interpreting UK and IrelandWe are delighted to announce that the 2026 APTIS conference will take place in Wales for the first time, being jointly hosted by Cardiff University and Swansea University. The conference will take place from 15-17 April 2026 in Cardiff, with an optional ‘cultural’ day in Swansea on Saturday 18 April. We welcome abstract submissions for traditional papers, book launches, workshops, and students’ flash talks. Please note that the deadline for proposal is 15th December 2025. For more information and to submit an abstract proposal, please go to our website: https://www.aptis-translation-interpreting.com/aptis-2026
Guest editors:Anna Strowe (University of Manchester)Richard Mansell (University of Exeter)Helle V. Dam (Aarhus University)This special issue focuses on the normative expectations around translators, including norms around translator identity, as well as around hiring or selection processes and understandings of competence or expertise. By applying the concept of norms to the area of translators and translatorship, we hope to connect conversations about the multiple intersecting systems of values that underpin those norms, often silently, ranging from beliefs about education, language skill, and qualification, to understandings of professionalism, economics, and translation itself, while continuing to explore the dimensions and qualities of translator identity and presentation. The norms themselves are at the centre of the topic, along with the values from which they emerge and with which they engage, but as with investigation of other types of norms, they must be extrapolated from available forms of data, for example texts by and about translators, or trends in hiring or training.As scholarship in translation studies has broadened, first from linguistic approaches to cultural and sociological approaches, and then to a focus on the translator, we have increasingly come to understand that we must view translation as a socially-situated practice or set of practices, carried out by agents whose behaviour and choices are influenced by a variety of external as well as internal factors. A large part of the focus has been on using this perspective to better understand the choices that are made in translating – that is, the specific textual decisions made by translators – but interest has also grown significantly in questions that move beyond textual choices and comparative textual analysis. There are significant threads of scholarship for example on the cultural or structural aspects of non-professional translation and interpreting (e.g. Antonini et al. 2017; Pérez-González and Susam-Saraeva 2012), the relationships between translation and activism (e.g. Boéri 2024; Gould and Tahmasebian 2020; Tymoczko 2010), and the impact of emerging technologies and digital spaces on perceptions of translatorship (e.g. Zhang et al. 2024), among many others.Norms have long been a productive tool for translation studies, but existing articulations and uses have focused on the translational norms that we understand as governing micro- and macro-level translation choices. Meylaerts (2008) discusses individual translators and their identities and profiles in relation to the norms of translation and the profession, following Simeoni (1998) in connecting these to Bourdieu’s notion of habitus. However, behaviour around translator identities and characteristics, such as hiring or self-presentation, can also be examined in terms of norms. In a recent article, Strowe (2024) suggests considering translator selection as norm-driven could help us better recognize the values and decisions around translator recruitment and deconstruct assumptions around translator choice and identity.These norms are reflected in patterns in hiring trends, the translation industry, job advertisements, and translators’ websites or blogs, for example, but they also inform a variety of aspects of how translatorship is constructed. The self-image and presentation or representation of translators is informed by beliefs about what responsibilities, tasks, and capacities are involved in being a translator, areas that intersect both with culturally constructed notions of what constitutes and delimits translation itself (see Tymoczko 2007) and with what forms of social, cultural, and legal understandings we have about various agents’ forms of responsibility for texts (see Bantinaki 2020; Pym 2011).The special issue will collect both empirical studies that explore areas related to translator norms, and articles exploring either the theorization of translator norms or the methodological possibilities of this kind of work. Potential questions to explore include (but are not limited to) the following:How might we theorize norms around translator identity, self-presentation, hiring etc.?What kinds of translator norms can be identified within the LSP industry or in other contexts in which translation is done?What differences are there in translator norms across different contexts or domains, and how do these differences affect practices of translation?How can we understand projections of translator image as a form of representation of translator norm? • How are translator norms changing in the face of developments in digital technology?What kinds of research methods facilitate the exploration of translator norms?This is an open call, and the editors particularly welcome proposals from researchers whose workintersects with translator identity or self-presentation;looks at industry expectations around translators and hiring practices;seeks to describe and delimit the spaces of human agency and identity around translation amidst the growing presence of AI.Submission Abstracts of up to 300 words should be submitted by November 24 to Anna Strowe by email (anna.strowe@manchester.ac.uk). Once invited to do so by the editors, selected authors will be asked to submit an article of between 7000 and 8000 words, including references, through the journal’s online portal no later than May 30, 2026.A full schedule of dates plus the bibliography is available here: https://benjamins.com/series/ts/callforpapers.pdf
Life Writing and Translation Thursday 18 – Friday 19 June 2026 University of Geneva Abstract of no more than 250 words (bibliography excluded) in English or French are now invited and should be submitted to lifewritingtranslation@unige.ch by 16 November 2025. Notifications of acceptance will be distributed at the beginning of February 2026. Please find more information on abstracts on the Conference website: https://www.humanmovement.cam.ac.uk/events/translating-conflict-and-refuge-language-displacement-and-politics-representation
