Towards a Re-Definition of Government Interpreters' Agency Against a Backdrop of Sociopolitical and Cultural Evolution

The sociopolitical and cultural evolution as a result of the Reform and Opening up in 1978, facilitated not least by the inexorable juggernaut of globalization and technological advancement, has revolutionized the way China engages domestically and interacts with the outside world. The need for more proactive diplomacy and open engagement witnessed the institutionalization of the interpreter-mediated premier's press conferences. Such a discursive event provides a vital platform for China to articulate its discourse and rebrand its image in tandem with the profound changes signaled by the Dengist reform. This chapter investigates critically how political press conference interpreting and interpreters' agency in China are impacted in relation to such dramatic transformations. It is revealed that, while interpreters are confronted with seemingly conflicting expectations, in actual practice they are often able to negotiate a way as highly competent interpreting professionals with the additional missions of advancing China's global engagement and safeguarding China's national interests.

When Cultural Evolution Calls for Translation Revolution

Given the massive changes that Brazil has undergone in the past century, particularly in distancing itself linguistically from its former colonizer, this study is an attempt to determine the role of translation in the country's cultural evolution. Translational approaches have developed along opposing poles: on the one hand, a strong resistance to incorporating orally-driven alterations in the written language, while on the other, a slow, halting movement toward convergence of the two, and both approaches are charged with political and ideological intentionality. Publishing houses, editors and translators are gatekeepers and agents whose activities provide a glimpse into the mechanism of national linguistic identity, either contributing to or resisting the myth of a homogenized Portuguese language.

The Strata of Subcultural Translation

This study proposes a new understanding of cultural evolution through translations embedded in subcultures. The underlying argument is that translation does not evenly and equally affect all social strata in a given culture, but there are selective (inclusive and exclusive) mechanisms that diversify a culture into several usually competing sub-groups. Evolution through translation takes place in parallel and very different sub-streams as subcultures. To make this understanding possible, however, some taken-for-granted notions should be revisited in translation studies (TS) and some gaps should be filled before subcultural translation can be framed. This study proposes an analytic whole in which a momentum of change in history leads to a reacquisition of disposition in cultural subjects, ultimately shaping a form of capital realized as semiotic/lingual translation. To explain this process, Foucault's historical discontinuity, Ricoeur's narrative identity, and Bourdieu's capital are incorporated.

Gender, Translation, and Censorship

After the “cultural turn” in the 1980s, translation was redefined as a cultural transfer rather than a linguistic transposition. Key translation concepts were revised, including equivalence, correction, and fidelity. Feminist approaches to translation emerged, for example, the recovery of texts lost in patriarchy. Following the death of Franco and the transition to democracy, Spain initiated a cultural expansion. The advent of the Franco regime after the civil war (1936-1939) resulted in years of cultural involution and the abolition of rights for women attained during the Spanish Second Republic (1931-1939). Severe censoring prevented the publication of literature—both native and foreign (through translation)—that contradicted the principles of the dictatorship. This chapter will examine the link between gender, translation, and censorship, materialised in Radclyffe Hall's The Well of Loneliness (1928), the first English novel to tackle lesbianism and transgenderism, an example of translation in cultural evolution.

Cultural Evolution, Memes, and Proper Names

Based on the theory of cultural evolution and memetics, this paper examines the procedures of translation of proper names as memes. Firstly, it proposes an overview of contemporary theories of cultural translation, including the theory of cultural evolution. Secondly, on the basis of the above-mentioned theoretical framework of cultural evolution and the use of the proper name, the central aim of this paper is to analyze the role of memes in translation. Lastly, after presenting and categorizing the proper names as realia words and memes, this paper will verify the (un)translatability of proper names from a multilingual point of view (French, English and Slovene) and illustrate the use of some translation procedures for the rendition of proper names as cultural memes.

Intercultural Communication Challenge

A leader in community interpreting, Australia provides professional interpreting services within its public health system. Healthcare interpreters face various challenges for a variety of reasons, including cultural differences. Existing research on healthcare interpreting focuses on differences between a mainstream culture of healthcare professionals and ethnically diverse cultures of migrant patients. Interpreters are widely regarded as bicultural professionals able to provide cultural information on behalf of patients as necessary or whenever healthcare professionals ask for it. However, research on healthcare interpreting in a globalized era should consider the changing nature of culture. The question of whether the interpreter should be a cultural broker remains controversial. Based on an ethnographic study of healthcare interpreters at a public hospital in Australia, this chapter aims to survey how multiple perspectives on cultural evolution affect healthcare interpreting.

The Interpreter as a Cultural Agent

The interpreters' cultural role has evolved significantly over time. Understanding the profession's history is necessary to understand its cultural evolution. Prior to professionalization, history portrayed interpreters as intercultural agents who held power as essential players, working as cultural and linguistic mediators. With the advent of conference interpreting in the Nuremberg Trials, a new professional image reflected the primary role of the interpreter as a linguistic medium. Due to the more interactive communicative activities involved, dialogue interpreting reflected a broader cultural role. This chapter discusses how the cultural role of the interpreter evolved over time, and within specializations. It gives an overview of the evolution of the cultural role in historic interpreting, conference interpreting, community interpreting, and in the medical interpreting specialization.

Exploring Agency in Translation

This chapter explores the work and impact of Remzi Bengi and Yasar Nabi Nayir, two significant figures in the realm of culture planning and cultural exchange during the early Republican Period in Turkey. Bengi was an editor and the owner of Remzi Publishing House, a renowned publishing house, whilst Yasar Nabi Nayir, also an editor and publisher, was the proprietor of the journal Varlik and the Varlik Publishing House. This chapter argues that, in light of their significant contributions to publishing and translation activities of the period in question and their pioneering roles in the development of new culture repertoires and the cultural evolution of the same period, they should not be seen simply as editors and publishers but also as idea-makers, culture entrepreneurs and, indeed, “carriers” of life images.

Cultural Evolution and Cultural Translation

In the early 20th century, Chinese communities in the then-Malay and Singapore began to take shape. The sudden shift of living conditions, especially the sociopolitical atmosphere, uprooted these migrated Chinese who had to adapt to new cultural realities of their host lands. This article argues for the cultural dimensions of Chinese overseas, particularly those in Malaysia and Singapore, as an object of translation studies, since these Chinese overseas have already shown a uniquely evolved culture that is different from that in China. Linguistic displacement in the same language is a reflection of cultural discrepancy resulted from cultural evolution, and cultural divergence innately calls for the intervention of cultural translation. This paper is expected to garner fruitful insights into the cultural translation between two geographically and culturally different Chinese communities.

Cultural Change and Cultural Mediation in the Translation of Culture-Specific Lexis

This chapter looks at the cultural mediator role of translation trainees dealing with culture-specific lexis. Translators need to be able to make connections between and across the cultures they are dealing with, and to negotiate and overcome any differences, conveying the message of the source text to the target readers with optimum effect. Five translation classes which placed emphasis on optimal relevance in translation were provided to 10 undergraduate students learning translation in Seoul, South Korea. The chapter highlights the significant role translation of culture-specific lexis can play in forming and developing learners' identities as mediators between source and target text cultures, no doubt an important role in light of cultural change in an era of globalization which calls for culture or cultures to be viewed from a multifaceted and diverse perspective.