Calls for papers

The Symposium is aimed at students who have recently begun their research as M.A. students, PhD students or those who have recently completed their PhD theses. The purpose of this symposium is to provide a scientific forum within which the next generation of researchers can exchange ideas and present their current research in the field of Translation, Interpreting, Intercultural Studies or East Asian Studies. We invite proposals for papers relating to the research interests of the Department of Translation and Interpreting & East Asian Studies (UAB), namely: Translation and interpreting Specialized translation Literary translation Audiovisual translation and media accessibility Interpreting Information and communication technologies in translation Translator and interpreter training History of translation and interpreting Interculturality, ideology and the sociology of translation and interpreting Textuality and translation Cognitive studies in translation and interpreting Professional aspects of translation and interpreting Empirical research in translation and interpreting East Asian studies East Asian languages and literatures Politics and international relations in East Asia Culture, thought, and interculturality in East Asia Economy of East Asia For more information, click here Deadline for applications: 31 March 2023

Two-day symposium organized by Alexa Alfer and Cornelia Zwischenberger, held 6-7th July 2023 in London, UK This symposium will be devoted to explorations of the concept of labour arising from Translab’s hallmark blending of ‘translation’ and ‘collaboration’. It posits that the concept of labour, as distinct from ‘work’ (Arendt 1958/1998; Narotzky 2018), warrants more sustained engagement on the part of both Translation Studies and the translation profession. While digital labour (Fuchs 2020), playbor (Kücklich 2005), fan labour (De Kosnik 2012), affective labour (Hardt 1999; Koskinen 2020), emotional labour (Hochschild 1993), or (im)material labour (Negri & Hardt 2004) may present themselves as particularly topical sites for such exploration, both labour and work are also important yet largely underarticulated dimensions in discussions about translation in a professional context and in debates about the distinction between professional and non-professional translation. Last but not least, we are keen to extend consideration of the labour concept to translation as such, and to interrogate its relevance to current debates about the translation concept. While the concept of work is perhaps more readily associated with translation in professional discourses at least, translation as labour, i.e. as an activity structurally embedded in capitalist chains of surplus-value production (Zwischenberger and Alfer 2022), features far less prominently in current debates. However, foregrounding labour as a fundamental dimension of translation (and, for that matter, interpreting) allows both researchers and practitioners to investigate translation and interpreting more closely from a socioeconomic perspective. This should, in turn, help develop impactful alternatives to the prevalent ‘professionalisation’ discourses intended to raise the socio-economic status of translators, and critique the ways in which many of these discourses create idealised narratives of translation and interpreting that tend to foreground the processes of work while masking the labour involved in producing outputs whose value is, quietly or overtly, appropriated by those with a stake in the means of their production. Shining a spotlight on the surplus-value inherent in translation as the commodifiable expansion of a source text thus also uncovers the translation concept itself as the site of an unarticulated and unresolved tension between two competing and converging cultural narratives that pivot on conceptions of value as, on the one hand, inextricably bound to and, on the other, posited firmly “outside of a profit-motivated relationship” (Fayard 2021, 216). For more information, click here Deadline for submissions: 3 April 2023

In recent years, there has been a surge in publications addressing the political impact of translation and interpreting across a variety of locations and settings (Baker, 2016a and 2016b; Doerr, 2018; Evans and Fernández, 2018; Fernández, 2020a; Valdeón and Calafat, 2020; Tesseur, 2022, to name a few). In this context, this special issue seeks to highlight the importance of translation and interpreting for the practice of solidarity. Although this is a powerful and frequently used concept, it is also conflicting and has generally remained undertheorised (as argued by Bayertz, 1999; Pensky, 2008; Featherstone, 2012). In this sense, this project will follow Featherstone (2012, pp. 5) in understanding solidarity as ‘a relation forged through political struggle which seeks to challenge forms of oppression’. Importantly, this also implies that solidarity is ‘transformative’, as it constructs ‘relations between places, activists, diverse social groups’, while creating ‘new ways of relating’ (ibid.). In other words, solidarity does not need to happen exclusively between groups that are similar and homogeneous; quite on the contrary, it can be innovative, developing unexpected links between previously unconnected realities. In this light, the practice of solidarity shows strong similarities with the work of translation and interpreting, as both seek to establish new connections between individuals and groups. In fact, translation can be the decisive factor in the construction of solidarity, as it brings to the fore an issue or conflict that would normally remain unnoticed due to linguistic and cultural barriers. Despite these affinities, solidarity has been rarely used as a frame of analysis in Translation Studies (some notable exceptions being Abou Rached, 2020; Baker, 2016b, 2016c and 2020; Mortada, 2016). This seems even more striking if we consider that solidarity could play a central role in understanding a variety of issues and practices that are already relevant within the discipline, such as the activity of volunteer translators —either individually (Guo, 2008; Cheung, 2010) or as part of communities (Baker, 2006a; Boéri, 2012; Pérez-González and Susam Saraeva, 2012)— and the involvement of interpreters in the protection and well-being of migrants (Aguilar-Solano, 2015; Taronna, 2016; Fathi, 2020). At the same time, solidarity can be also understood as a narrative (in the sense proposed by Baker, 2006b): citizens and activists who engage in the practice of solidarity frequently rely on a narrative, that is, a kind of shared story that guides their behaviour and legitimises their purposes and motivations, shaping the identities of those involved in the process and the elements that bring them together. While some narratives might be based on ‘universal’ values (e.g. justice, human rights, moral duty), others might depend on more concrete factors (i.e. supporting the same political values or belonging to the same creed). Furthermore, the mobilisation of a successful and convincing narrative is often a key factor for the expansion of a political cause (Baker, 2006b, pp. 21-22), particularly among those who are not familiar with it. Taking into account the great importance that narratives have played in recent research within Translation Studies (e.g. Boéri, 2008; Baker, 2010; Harding, 2012; Probirskaja, 2016; Jones, 2018; Fernández, 2020b) and beyond it (Engebretsen and Baker 2022), this special issue would also like to encourage the interaction between narratives and solidarity as a promising research path.   A list of potential research topics includes, but is not limited to, the following: -       Solidarity as a motivation for activist and volunteer translators and interpreters -       The emergence and development of solidarity campaigns thanks to translation -       Narratives of solidarity and translation: How is solidarity narrated? Which ‘frames of solidarity’ are constructed through translation? How are narratives of solidarity (e.g. in literature and the arts) translated? -       Conceptual and theoretical affinities between solidarity and translation -       Solidarity with/between migrants and the importance of translation/interpreting -       Solidarity, identity politics (e.g. LGBT+ groups, feminism, Black Lives Matter), and translation/interpreting -       Solidarity and translation projects for fundraising purposes -       Solidarity, translation, and interpreting in armed conflicts.   For more information, click here Deadline for abstracts: 1 March 2023

Note: due to popular request, we have changed the paper deadlines to give authors more time. The new date for paper submissions is 3 March 2023.  The European Association for Machine Translation (EAMT) invites everyone interested in machine translation and translation-related tools and resources ― developers, researchers, users, translation and localization professionals and managers ― to participate in this conference. Driven by the state of the art, the research community will demonstrate their cutting-edge research and results. Professional machine translation users will provide insight into successful MT implementation of machine translation (MT) in business scenarios as well as implementation scenarios involving large corporations, governments, or NGOs. Translation studies scholars and translation practitioners are also invited to share their first-hand MT experience, which will be addressed during a special track.Note that papers that have been archived in arXiv can be accepted for submission provided that they have not already been published elsewhere. For more information, click here

Guest EditorsLisha Xu (Beijing Jiaotong University) and David Johnston (Queen’s University Belfast) This special edition of JoSTrans looks at the issues involved in translating plays forperformance on a contemporary stage where practitioners and audiences alike areincreasingly sensitised to the representation of race, identity, gender, and sexuality. TheBlack Lives Matter and #MeToo movements have, in particular, coalesced around widersocial justice movements that have further galvanised, and in many ways drawn together,different sets of identitarian politics. At the heart of these politics, identity works in terms ofpromoting the recognition of difference, both of opportunity and of participatory parity,operating as a category of perception that acts as a heuristic springboard towards whatLinda Hamilton Krieger described over twenty-five years ago as “strategies for simplifyingthe perceptual environment and acting on less-than-perfect information” (1995, 1161). Forsome, this leads inevitably to the honing of critical theories of race and gender, and theirextension into the worldview of rapidly growing numbers of people. For others, we arewitnessing a maximalist politics which, in its tracing of its own history through differentsources of resistance across time and space, is increasingly impatient with any expression ofwhat are perceived as oppressive positions, irrespective of the timeframe in which suchpositions were taken. It is evident that we are living through a time of paradigm shift in terms of our relationshipsboth with each other as identity types and with the assumptions and dynamics of our past.Whether we think of these shifts as undergirded by processes of recouping or erasure, theyenshrine attitudes and responses that have radically changed the terrain of the arts ingeneral, and of the representational arts in particular. Moreover, their impact on newgenerations of trainee performers means that such changes in the specialised field oftheatre and performance are undoubtedly long-term.This special issue asks what this might mean for contemporary translation for performance.Translation for the stage is obviously a key concern here, but other modes and aspects ofpreparing for and experiencing performance might also be considered – surtitling,streaming, moving image, stand-up comedy, etc . We invite abstracts addressing either oneor more of the following questions, or picking up on any related concern: • What are the implications for translators working with texts from different placesand, particularly, different times, where radically different conceptions of genderand other perceived markers of identity are in operation?• What is the relationship between translation for performance and re-historicisingpractice?• To what extent might translated plays or other dramatic forms be able – or still beable - to offer a counter-current where mutually incompatible or contestatorypositions can be put forward simultaneously?• What are the implications for the space in which translation takes place if we regardthe assumptions of the receiving context as hardened into critical positions?• Is what we might think of as the more traditionally civic nature of the performanceevent changing to accommodate a more critical environment, and if so what mightthis mean in terms of the texts/performances we choose to translate?• To what extent does the elimination of cultural appropriation fall to the translator?Can such charges be obviated through solely production-based decisions, such asblind casting etc?• Can translations be used to challenge or confirm conceptions of what might bethought of as the ‘politically correct’?• Does the awareness of such political correctness on the part of the translator forperformance imply a necessary process of accommodation or can it drift into selfcensorship? Is there a readily discernible divide here?   Deadline for submission of proposals: 1 June 2023 For more information, click here

Call for papers for Syn-Thèses 15: Intermedial Crossovers in Audiovisual and Interactive Arts Guest Editors: Loukia Kostopoulou (Aristotle University of Thessaloniki) & Maria-Ilia Katsaridou (Ionian University) Art expresses and highlights social problems; it is usually the case that filmmakers are influenced by other artists or media and these influences are reflected in their work. Bruhn and Gjelsvik (2008) stress the affinities of cinema with other media: “As cinema shares its basic material with photography (the exposure of an image on photographic film) it has sometimes been described as a mechanical, direct reproduction of reality, but early cinema borrowed heavily from traditional performing arts”. Moreover, the authors underline the influence of narrative forms such as literature—and more specifically the novel—on the structure of narrative cinema. Avant-garde artists have drawn heavily on the structure of literary texts, imitating parts of their structure in the filmic text. This imitation could take the form of incorporating chapters in the film with the respective intertitle which informs the audience about the theme of the chapter. By replicating some of the functions of literary texts in cinema, the filmmakers managed to create a distancing effect on the audience. Other important media such music, opera, architecture, photography and painting (ibid.) and, most recently, digital media, have highly influenced the medium of film throughout the years and led to the conception of cinema as a mixed medium. Cinema also becomes more interactive, influenced by videogames and other interactive media, creating new ways to engage and immerse audiences. Intermedial studies stem from an interest in “interaesthetic” phenomena (Bruhn and Gjelsvik 2018). The concept has a closer connection with aesthetics and “the idea of ‘sister arts’” (Pethö 2018). Pethö, drawing on the Renaissance concept of paragone, Lessing’s famous Laocoön essay (1767), and the Wagnerian ideal of Gesamtkunstwerk (1849)—that is, a total work of art—explains that this rivalry between different art forms is one of the precursors of intermediality. The idea of the mixing of art forms was also a necessary criterion for the so-called historical avant-gardes of the beginning of the twentieth century since it helped them “achieve the highest artistic and political/spiritual goals” (Bürger 1984, quoted in Bruhn and Gjelsvik 2018). As a matter of fact, avant-garde artists proclaimed that this mixing of art forms would be very beneficial for the advancement of art and thus were fervent in engaging in intermedial experiments (Kostopoulou 2023). In the forthcoming issue of the journal Syn-Thèses, we propose to address issues of intermediality in audiovisual and interactive contexts. The following questions could be addressed: - Theoretical issues of intermediality in audiovisual and interactive arts - Synchronic and diachronic perspectives on intermediality - Literary and theatrical influences on audiovisual and interactive media - Media transformation and intermediality in audiovisual arts (cinema, television, animation, documentary film etc.) - Media transformation and intermediality in interactive arts (videogames, interactive theater etc.) - Experimentation and intermedial practices in avant-garde art - The role of the spectator   Submission of abstracts: Please submit an abstract of 500 words and a short bio note (100 words) to both editors by April 30th, 2023. Submission of articles: October 15th, 2023, Loukia Kostopoulou (lkostop@frl.auth.gr) and Maria-Ilia Katsaridou (mkatsaridou@gmail.com). Language: French, English, Greek Editorial standards: https://ejournals.lib.auth.gr/syn-theses/about/submissions#authorGuidelines    Syn-Thèses is a yearly, international, refereed academic e-journal, published by the School of French at Aristotle University of Thessaloniki. A former print publication, from 2008 to2012, Syn-Thèses aspires to publish eminent quality papers in the fields of Linguistics, Literature and Translation. 

On 26 and 27 June 2023, Universidade Católica Portuguesa will host the international conference "Translation and the News: state of the art, dialogues, reflections".  The fundamental aim of the event is to enquire into the various intersections that can arise from putting journalism and translation studies in dialogue, thus contributing to the development of a subarea of both translation and journalism studies which has still room to explore. Journalistic translation opens up new research avenues concerning both news and translation. However, while translation studies’ scholars have initiated a discussion around translation practices in the news, journalism studies have not yet addressed the relevance of translation as a key practice in news writing.  Deadline for proposals: 10 March 2023 For more information, click here

Schematically, translation studies acknowledges that a text can be translated from one language into another but tends to see source and target texts as stable entities, while in textual scholarship, texts are understood to take many forms, but the different textual manifestations are usually studied only within one language. In recent years, however, we have seen interdisciplinary approaches that go beyond the source text–target text pair in the case of translation studies and cross linguistic borders when it comes to textual scholarship. For example, thematic journal issues have explored multilingualism and translation from the point of view of textual scholarship (Dillen, Macé, and van Hulle eds. 2012), combined genetic criticism with translation (Durand-Bogaert ed. 2014), and laid out the foundations for genetic translation studies (Cordingley and Montini eds. 2015). Translation can also be seen as a means for bringing out different interpretations of a text and as an intertwined part of writing (Reynolds ed. 2019). Similarly, studies on closely related themes, such as multilingual writing, self-translation, collaborative translation, retranslation, indirect translation, pseudotranslation, backtranslation, and adaptation, may equally provide insights into the complex geneses and networks of dependence that lie behind texts that have manifestations in several languages (Gambier 1994; Bistué 2013). Studies on these kinds of themes often draw on archival resources, as archival material can provide information on translating, translations, and translators (Kujamäki 2018; Cordingley and Hersant eds. 2021). Interdisciplinary studies that put translation studies and textual scholarship (as well as neighboring fields such as literary studies and book history) into dialogue bring to the fore questions of text, transmission and translation – that is, they address trextuality by discussing how texts take different forms through transmission and by highlighting the role of translation in it. To foster such interdisciplinary dialogue, this conference invites proposals on topics that engage with the concepts of text, transmission, and/or translation, as well as proposals that address the potential of archival resources in the study of these and related themes. Potential topics for proposals include but are not limited to: textual scholarship and scholarly editing of translated and multilingual texts, translations of critical editions; textual critics as translators, translators as textual critics; genetic translation studies; multilingual writing, self-translation, collaborative translation, editorial processes of translation; retranslation, indirect translation, pseudotranslation, backtranslation, adaptation; diachronic and synchronic perspectives on text, transmission, and/or translation; translator and author archives, manuscript studies; textual theory, questions of multimodality, materiality, digital texts; theoretical and methodological reflections on interdisciplinary studies relating to trextuality. Deadline for submissions: 27 Feb 2023 For more information, click here

The first edition of the Lisbon Spring School in Translation Studies will take place in the Portuguese capital between 13 and 18 March 2023, aiming, above all, to open space for the sharing of ideas, methodologies and good practices about/in the field of Translation Studies (TE). The breadth of the event's guiding topic - "Translation is a many-splendored thing" - was purposely defined: on the one hand, to do justice to the nature of TE as an interdiscipline; on the other, to encourage the participation of (and learn from) young researchers and students working on TE, regardless of the object of study, school of thought, language(s) and/or country of origin. As an international event, Spring School will feature lectures by scholars affiliated to national and international institutions, paper presentation sessions (by PhD students and early career researchers), poster presentation sessions (by MA students) and workshops on translation, including also a cultural programme. The event will take place at the Universidade Católica Portuguesa and the Universidade Nova de Lisboa. Deadline for proposals: 20 Jan For more information, click here

Presentday organisation of the world in terms of globalisation inevitably involves the condition ofmutual co-implication among all inhabitants over the planet (attested by the current pandemic and increase offamine in Africa caused by the Ukraine war). We are now in all 8 billion. We propose here to read the signsof total interconnection, of total interdependency: hence semiotics of globalisation. Specifically, we proposeto read these signs from the perspective of what has been tagged “semioethics”, where “ethics” is understoodin Emmanuel Levinas’s sense of the term: that is, as “intrigue”, “entanglement”: reference is to the conditionjust mentioned of “mutual co-implication”, of “reciprocal involvement”. The primary concern is that lifeover the entire planet, today under severe threat, be granted the possibility to continue and flourish. This workshop welcomes proposals that focus on any of the topics outlined, whether directly orindirectly, developing aspects and implications, thus contributing to a more comprehensive understandingand exemplification of the issues at stake Deadline for proposals: 6 Feb For more information, click here

Language boundaries are not transparent; from translation to migration studies, we know that they cannotbe crossed without sacrifice and a complex negotiation of gains. Yet we routinely compare stylistic featuresin different languages in fields such as comparative literature, translation, literary multilingualism andtranslingualism, world and postcolonial literature, or the study of international literary movements.Whenever a work is translated, or a writer is a user of multiple languages, or one writer is influenced byreading another’s work in a foreign language (and sometimes, perhaps, in translation), and in several othersettings, questions of stylistic transfer become both relevant and essential. Outside of translation studies, there has been little attempt to account for the nature, effects and limitationsof such stylistic osmosis. When do stylistic features developed in one language cross into another? Whathappens when they do? To what extent do they remain the same in another linguistic context? What are thelimitations to recreating stylistic characteristics of a text in another language? How can this phenomenon bestudied systematically beyond translation studies and what existing theoretical approaches can help clarifythe processes involved? How will accounting for them affect the discipline? This conference offers a venue to discuss cross-lingual stylistic transfer as an approach to understandingcrucial aspects of today’s globalised literary market. It will address the question of stylistic border crossingsin four sections: (1) translation, (2) influence, (3) multilingualism and (4) theoretical approaches.We now invite papers on this theme. Papers may address (but are not limited to) such questions as: • Case studies of attempts to recreate style across languages, or other situations of transfer of stylisticcharacteristics from one language to another• What is style and to what extent is it bound to a language?• Do approaches to stylistic transfer developed in translation studies apply in other literary contexts,and how?• The (ir)relevance of cross-lingual stylistics, and of style as a concept, in today’s literary studies• Possible transfer mechanisms and settings• Linguistic and stylometrical approaches• Transfer of style in and via translation• Stylistic stereotypes as an influence on other cultures• Bilateral transfer situations   Deadline for submissions: 31 Jan For more information, click here

The European Association for Machine Translation (EAMT) invites everyone interested in machine translation and translation-related tools and resources ― developers, researchers, users, translation and localization professionals and managers ― to participate in this conference. Driven by the state of the art, the research community will demonstrate their cutting-edge research and results. Professional machine translation users will provide insight into successful MT implementation of machine translation (MT) in business scenarios as well as implementation scenarios involving large corporations, governments, or NGOs. Translation studies scholars and translation practitioners are also invited to share their first-hand MT experience, which will be addressed during a special track. Deadline for submissions: 10 February 2023 For more information, click here