Lecturer in French and Spanish with Translation

University of Portsmouth - School of Languages and Area Studies

Epstein, B. J.

Translating Expressive Language in Children’s Literature

Problems and Solutions

Oxford, Bern, Berlin, Bruxelles, Frankfurt am Main, New York, Wien, 2012. XII, 269 pp., num. tables and graphs

hb. ISBN 978-3-0343-0796-3
CHF 87.00 / €* 71.40 / €** 73.40 / € 66.70 / £ 60.00 / US-$ 93.95

JubilaTIon 25
AUSIT Biennial Conference

December 1-3, 2012
Macquarie University, Sydney, Australia

Call for Papers:

Submission Deadline for abstracts: 6 April, 2012

2012 marks the 25th anniversary of the Australian Institute of
Interpreters and Translators Incorporated (AUSIT). Over the past 25
years, AUSIT has made a significant contribution to improving the
professional practice of translating and interpreting in Australia. On
the occasion of this biennial conference, we aim to celebrate those
achievements and build on the successes of the past.

Proposals for individual papers, workshops and posters are invited from
both translation and interpreting scholars and practising translators
and interpreters. Abstracts should be 250 words for individual papers
and posters and 500 words for workshops. Presentations on all aspects of
translation and interpreting studies are welcome. However, priority will
be given to papers that address the following themes which focus on
drawing inspiration from the past for a brighter future in T & I:

• Innovative practice in translation and interpreting
• Innovative pedagogies for translator and interpreter education
• Innovative practices in the assessment of translators and interpreters
• Innovations in the implementation of language policy for improved
service provision
• Innovations in research trends in translation and interpreting studies

Call for Papers: Word and Text – A Journal of Literary Studies and

Linguistics, II, 2 (2012)
 

THE PLACE OF TRANSLATION

`A language is a place' Elias Canetti once noted, thus intimating that languages are anchored in a bounded space, determined by the place(s) they inhabit. If language is place, one may suggest that place is also language. This apparently natural equation is necessarily complicated and questioned through translation. Crossing the territories of languages is inherent to the task of the translator as experiences must be communicated in other languages, transplanted and ultimately `displaced'.
Drawing on the notion that translation is a practice carrying both ethical and aesthetic imperatives, this special thematic issue invites contributions which explore the role of translation and the function of translators particularly in relation to the notion of `place'. How are the singularities attached to "place" (i.e. supposedly `essential' and idiosyncratic notions linked to the identification of one's territory, space, city, origins, roots, identity) imported, adopted, adapted, appropriated and reconfigured as they cross boundaries and trespass cultural and linguistic borders? Is translation somewhat limited to superficial and media-fuelled representation of place(s) copied uncritically? Does translation remove (`displace') the particularities of place in order to conform to the homogeneous discourse of a uniform global world or, on the contrary, do certain translation practices insist on remarking the existence of `difference' through place? Does translation simply neutralize and `re-place', or does it negotiate alternatives? Do utopian, hybrid, nostalgized, idealized, nonexistent (`placeless') places (ultimately, what kind of places?) emerge through translation?
Prompting critics to engage with the trans-disciplinary paradigm which underlies the field of translation studies, the issue seeks contributions that will broaden our understanding of the relation between translation and place through a variety of critical and cultural frameworks, also applied to language, discourse and literature, that have shaped our contemporary academic agendas (translation theories, post-modernism, post-colonialism, feminism, diaspora, globalization studies, place studies etc.).

CENTER FOR RESEARCH IN TRANSLATION AND TRANSCULTURAL COMMUNICATION ENGLISH/FRENCH - FRENCH/ENGLISH
CALL FOR PAPERS AND /OR TALKS

The Issue of Discursive Coherence: Translation and Homogenisation

Palimpsestes 26 / Conference: 12-13 October 2012

Recreating the balance of a literary text in translation means that the discursive space be taken into account as a whole and that the issue of homogenisation, which affects any translative process, be addressed. How do we translate texts that are based on a principle of plurality, dispersion or rupture? Does the translative process heighten or lessen such stylistic and narrative traits? What about Lawrence Venuti’s heterogenising approach which is meant to reduce the ethnocentrism prevalent in translation?

 
On a linguistic level, the contacts between languages in areas and countries where bilingualism prevails could be examined, as could the instances when different age groups or social classes interact. John Lyons’s “fiction of homogeneity” relative to speakers of the same linguistic community could be looked at in relation to the manner in which it manifests itself in translation and in the critique of translation. Moreover, it would also be interesting to test the well-documented principle of homogeneity of the English language, in which, we are told, an inanimate subject and an animate predicate do not fare well together as compared to what takes place in the French language.

 
On a socio-critical level, the possible editorial reasons behind such textual and stylistic homogenising could be a further matter of investigation. In what ways, for instance, do the audiences and markets aimed at by the publishers or editors commissioning translations influence the process of homogenisation? Does the separation of audiences (young readers, high brow audience, mainstream audience, and so on) lead to retranslations or competing translations of the same texts? What happens when one author’s oeuvre is translated by different translators, both diachronically and synchronically?

Finally, on a socio-historic level, it might be useful to investigate the ways in which translations and transcultural transfers generate a rather homogeneous—or on the contrary heterogeneous—vision of other/foreign cultures.


Proposals (a half-page summary in English or French) plus a short CV should be sent, by 15th April 2012 at the latest to:

Christine Raguet Pascale Sardin
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