« Un département ancré sur le territoire et ouvert à l’international ». Communication à l’international, compétences interculturelles et marché du travail au sein du département Langues Étrangères Appliquées de Montbéliard

Author(s): Frédéric Spagnoli / Language(s): French Issue: Suppl./2016

This article focuses on the international strategy developed by the Department of Modern Applied Languages in Montbéliard (University of Franche-Comté, France). During classes, through professional networks and by fostering students’ international mobility, the strategy aims at enhancing students’ intercultural skills for them to fit better into an international job market.

Difficultés dans l’apprentissage de la traduction technique en contexte roumain

Author(s): Adriana Apostol,Carmen Dimcea,Cristina Ilinca / Language(s): French Issue: 05/2012

This paper is aimed at revealing some of the most recurrent difficulties that the process of learning technical translation poses to the Romanian students undertaking university courses/programs in specialised translation. It highlights the challenges that the translation of technical texts from French into Romanian and how these challenges were surmounted by the Romanian students.

Réflexions sur l’opportunité d’un cours de Traductions spécialisées au niveau licence en filière littéraire

Author(s): Florinela Șerbănică / Language(s): French Issue: 05/2012

In this paper, we propose a reflection on undergraduate specialised translation courses in the departments of language and literature. We examine the place of this subject within the curricula and its implications and we try to advance some proposals regarding its teaching.

The Phenomenon of “Faux Amis” in the Context of Linguistic Research: the State of Play after 2000 and Possible Challenges against the Background of Globalisation

Author(s): Adriana Ionescu / Language(s): English Issue: 05/2012

Compared to other lexical phenomena, “faux amis” have been less taken into consideration by the linguistic research of the past years. The fact that the category of false friends is still difficult to define is probably a reason for linguists to avoid this topic. At the same time, it is interesting to follow the never-ending debate regarding the inclusion or exclusion of certain words and word combinations in the category of “faux amis” and the present paper aims, among others, at analysing the way in which linguists define and develop glossaries of false friends. A further difficulty is – under certain circumstances – to draw the almost invisible line between the class “faux amis” and internationalisms; seen in the context of globalisation, internationalisms play an important role in linguistic research, while false friends tend to be disregarded. However, this article shows the close links as well as the relevant distinctions between the two classes and the arguments for developing research on the topic of false friends for didactic and scientific purposes.

Michel Ballard (éd.), Censure et traduction, Arras, Artois Presses Université, 2010

Author(s): Georgina Presecan / Language(s): French Issue: 05/2012

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Translationes, n° 3, numéro coordonné par Georgiana Lungu Badea et Alina Pelea, Timişoara, Editura Universității de Vest, 2011

Author(s): Cornelia Șuș / Language(s): French Issue: 05/2012

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Introduction

Author(s): Anna Jankowska,Olga Mastela,Łukasz Wiraszka / Language(s): English Issue: 42/2018

Wprowadzenie

Author(s): Anna Jankowska,Olga Mastela,Łukasz Wiraszka / Language(s): Polish Issue: 43/2019

Traducere, traducători, traductologie

Author(s): Constantin Frosin,Luminița Munteanu,Ion Monafu,Daniela Rogobete / Language(s): Romanian Issue: 01+02/2019

A collection of text about the implications and difficulties of the translation process.

A Portrait of the Writer as a Translator: Salman Rushdie and the Challenges of Post-colonial Translation

Author(s): Dana Crăciun / Language(s): English Issue: 32/2019

In a context where post-colonial translation has emerged as a strong interface between post-colonial studies and translation studies, the present paper examines the case of Salman Rushdie as a post-colonial translator. Drawing on concepts and ideas put forth by the two above-mentioned paradigms, the paper will argue that the strategies used by Rushdie in his attempts to write about the importance of redressing the balance of power and of resisting Orientalising practices are similar to those used by translators of post-colonial literature. The writing of post-colonial literature becomes an act of (re)translation, while translating post-colonial literature should aim at resisting domestication and at creating a target text that remains ‘foreign’ enough for the reader. While there is no doubt that through its post-colonial and global concerns Rushdie’s entire work fits this frame, the analysis will focus only on two works, Midnight’s Children and Two Years, Eight Months and Twenty-Eight Nights, since they seem to bracket Rushdie’s efforts in this respect.

Humanities Fiction: Translation and ‘Transplanetarity’ in Ted Chiang’s “The Story of Your Life” and Denis Villeneuve’s Arrival

Author(s): BRAN NICOL / Language(s): English Issue: 32/2019

One of the more interesting science fiction movies of recent years, at least to Humanities academics, is Denis Villeneuve’s 2016 alien-invasion movie, Arrival. It is a film which not only features a Professor of Linguistics as its heroine, but the plot of which is organised around the critical global importance of a multi-million dollar translation project. This essay compares the film with the original novella upon which it was based – Ted Chiang’s “Story of Your Life” (1998) – to examine the role translation plays in both, with the aim of placing this in the context of the crisis in the Humanities which has marked universities over the last few years, and can be linked to a more general crisis in liberal values. While founded upon a time-honoured science fiction scenario the movie also clearly articulates the sense of global peril which is typical of much of the cultural production of our current times, manifested in fears about ecological catastrophe, terrorist attacks, and the anthropocene, etc. Another of its crisis-points is also ‘very 2016’: its ability to use science fiction tropes to express an anxiety about how liberal values are in danger of being overtaken by a self-interested, forceful, intolerant kind of politics. Arrival is as much a work of ‘hu-fi’ as it is ‘sci-fi’, that is, ‘Humanities fiction’, a film which uses Chiang’s original novella to convey a message about the restorative potential of ‘Humanities values’ in the face of a new global threat.

A drama of selves: Investigating teacher identity development from dialogical and complexity perspectives

Author(s): Alastair Henry / Language(s): English Issue: 2/2019

Identity is of increasing interest in teacher education. Crucial for resilience, the development of a coherent professional identity has been characterized as emerging from tensions between multiple and sometimes conflicting conceptions of what it means to be someone who teaches (Akkerman & Meijer, 2011). While light is being shed on these often antagonistic relations, less is known about the dynamics of identity formation and transformation. Providing a contribution to work on language teacher identity, in this single case study Hermans’ (2008) concept of the dialogical self is combined with complexity principles in an investigation of changes in the emerging professional identity of a pre-service English teacher during a practicum. Drawing on intra- and inter-personal data, experiences of learning to become a person who teaches English are conceptualized as a drama that is played out between different and sometimes unaligned selves. Analyses show how this inner drama maps onto the landscape of an emerging teacher identity, how tensions can be understood systemically, and how a teacher identity system can have a signature dynamic.

“This language still motivates me!” Advanced language students and their L2 motivation

Author(s): Anne Huhtala,Anta Kursiša,Marjo Vesalainen / Language(s): English Issue: 2/2019

The article focuses on written narratives of 51 Finnish university students who study German, Swedish or French as their major or one of their minors at an advanced level. The study aims to find what keeps these students motivated to study their L2. The data have been analyzed using analysis of narratives (Polkinghorne, 1995). Dörnyei’s (2009a, 2009b, 2014) L2 motivational self system (L2MSS), built around the concepts of ideal L2 self, ought-to L2 self and L2 learning experience, is used as the theoretical framework. The results indicate that perceived social pressure (ought-to L2 self) may be important when the study decision is made, but its importance diminishes during the studies. Instead, a future L2-related vision (ideal L2 self) as well as peers, teachers, course contents, and learning atmosphere (L2 learning experience) become increasingly important during the studies. The role of the emotional dimension of possible selves seems to be central in developing and preserving study motivation. At the end of the article, some implications of the results for higher education programs of languages other than English (LOTEs) are presented.

Questionnaire instrumentation for strategic vocabulary learning in the Swedish as a second language learning context

Author(s): Richard LaBontee / Language(s): English Issue: 2/2019

This article reports on the final round of piloting for a questionnaire instrument created and designed with the intention of collecting self-report data on adult, beginner Swedish L2 learners’ use of vocabulary learning strategies. The Swedish Vocabulary Learning Strategy Survey (SVLSS) version 1.2 is distributed to 182 participants studying Swedish at institutes of higher learning in Sweden. The collected data set is subject to exploratory factor analysis to explore initial interpretations of the underlying constructs of the instrument, and analyzed for content validity and internal consistency. Readability and accessibility of the instrument is also addressed. Initial findings and interpretations are used to guide the development of a preliminary VLS taxonomy for the SVLSS, as well as suggest and perform revisions that will result in the SVLSS 2.0.

Arabic language-learning strategy preferences among undergraduate students

Author(s): Hezi Y. Brosh / Language(s): English Issue: 2/2019

This study elicited Arabic students’ perceptions regarding their language-learning strategy preferences (LLSPs). A sample of 120 undergraduate Arabic students participated. Data were collected through a questionnaire and interviews. The findings reveal that students tend to adopt a holistic view of the learning task and relate it to real-life, personal experience. Participants selected interaction with the teacher, speaking, and flashcards as their most preferred application-directed learning strategies. These selections demonstrate that Arabic students desire to be proactive in order to make the language more concrete for them, to enhance their performance, and to develop language skills that will last a lifetime. Whereas advanced level participants preferred interaction with the teacher, speaking, flashcards, and working individually, beginner level participants preferred learning grammar and group work. The empirical evidence from this study could have implications regarding theoretical models of effective Arabic language instruction, Arabic teacher education programs, and curriculum development.

Promoting EFL students’ accuracy and fluency through interactive practice activities

Author(s): Kim McDonough,Masatoshi Sato / Language(s): English Issue: 2/2019

This study examined the effectiveness of interactive activities at facilitating EFL students’ production of English relative clauses. Thirty-seven EFL learners in Chile carried out interactive activities designed to elicit relative clauses. Pre- and posttests were used to examine whether carrying out the activities facilitated the students’ production of relative clauses. All interactions were audio-recorded and the transcripts were analyzed to determine how accurately and fluently the students produced relative clauses before, during, and after the practice activities. Whereas accuracy was defined as errors involving relative clause formation, fluency was operationalized in terms of the number of pauses, false starts, and self-corrections that occurred within relative clauses. The results showed that the students produced significantly more accurate relative clauses on the posttest; however, their production of dysfluencies remained unchanged. Implications for the use of interactive activities are discussed.

Metalinguistic knowledge about the native language and language transfer in gender assignment

Author(s): Jan Vanhove / Language(s): English Issue: 2/2019

Whereas Standard Dutch only distinguishes between two adnominal grammatical genders, substandard varieties of Belgian Dutch distinguish between three such genders. German, too, distinguishes between three genders. Nevertheless, when assigning gender to German nouns with Dutch cognates, speakers of Belgian Dutch are strongly influenced by Standard Dutch gender but to a much lesser degree (if at all) by substandard gender. On the hypothesis that a lack of metalinguistic knowledge about L1 substandard gender decreases its use as a source for transfer, I experimentally manipulated the metalinguistic knowledge about L1 substandard gender of 45 speakers of substandard Belgian Dutch varieties. I then assessed how strongly this manipulation affected the participants’ reliance on substandard gender distinctions when they assigned gender to L2 German nouns with Dutch cognates. Results confirm the strong influence of Standard Dutch, hint at a weak influence of substandard Dutch, and show no appreciable effect of the experimental manipulation.

Review of Policy and politics in global primary English; Author: Janet Enever; Publisher: Oxford University Press, 2018; ISBN: 9780194200547; Pages: 196

Author(s): Joanna Rokita-Jaśkow / Language(s): English Issue: 2/2019

Review of English-medium instruction and pronunciation: Exposure and skills development; Author: Karin Richter; Publisher: Multilingual Matters, 2019; ISBN: 9781788922456; Pages: 202

Author(s): Mirosław Pawlak / Language(s): English Issue: 2/2019

“Palabras que no tienen una correspondencia exacta”: La voz de los traductores principiantes

Author(s): Marisa Presas / Language(s): Spanish Issue: 04/2011

It seems obvious that expert translators, whether self-taught or formally trained, work on the basis of some theoretical notions and are capable of voicing them explicitly. What may not seem so obvious is that novice translators also have some theoretical bases. Nonetheless, empirical studies show that even novice subjects can formulate certain principles that they have applied when translating. From a different perspective descriptive studies try to identify in translated texts which standards have been used by the translators. Both kinds of studies show that translators often make their decisions intuitively but based on some theoretical knowledge. In the social sciences and psychology this kind of knowledge is referred to as implicit theories or subjective theories. My paper will present the results of a preliminary qualitative analysis of work from my own translation students. The notional framework for this analysis draws from precursors in both descriptive and cognitive approaches to translation. It also draws from a model of implicit theories of translation that has been developed from models in the fields of pedagogy and cognitive psychology. The results may not be taken as solid proof, but they partially confirm our assumptions about the content, nature and function of the implicit theories of novice translators.