Event theme(s) : Areas for consideration : • The relationship between theory and creativity • Translation theories for the 21st Century: cultural studies; gender studies; cognitive studies • Translation and its relation with linguistics • Functional theories of translation • Postcolonial translation and identity • Domesticating and foreignizing texts • Descriptive translation studies approach: historical, social, political and ideological factors • Corpus-based translation studies

Description : The objective of the third postgraduate symposium, organized by the School of Literature and Creative Writing, is to explore the current relevance of theory to the practice of translation. There are theorists who maintain that a thorough grounding in translation theory provides translators with the means to select appropriate strategies and methods in their translation work. If this is the case, which of the current theoretical pronouncements on translation are most relevant to translation practice in today’s society? And if so, how? Since the integration of cultural and gender theories in the 20th Century and of cognitive theories in this century how has research in translation studies changed? How does learning translation theory develop a translator’s cognitive capacities? Or does theory merely describe practice? On the other hand many professional translators are still widely dismissive of theory and its application to real-life assignments; to what extent is there still a dichotomy between theory and practice?

Turning to translation in the future, what kind of theoretical knowledge is it necessary for translators to have in the modern day translation industry? The growing connections between theory and practice means that translation programmes have to balance theoretical and practical components in their translator training curricula. So is theory a tool for more effective training? Or, conversely, should translator training focus more on the development of practical translation skills such as text interpretation, composition, researching and editing?

Areas for consideration :

• The relationship between theory and creativity
• Translation theories for the 21st Century: cultural studies; gender studies; cognitive studies
• Translation and its relation with linguistics
• Functional theories of translation
• Postcolonial translation and identity
• Domesticating and foreignizing texts
• Descriptive translation studies approach: historical, social, political and ideological factors
• Corpus-based translation studies Abstracts

Keynote Speakers :
Deadline for submission of proposals : 2007-11-10
Registration deadline :
Contact details : Abstracts of max 300 words (with bibliographical references) for a 20 minute paper
should be sent to translation.theory@uea.ac.uk

Event website :