The Impact of Translation Strategies on Second Language Writing

This paper seeks to demonstrate the importance of translation strategies as informed by Translation Studies in the foreign language (FL) classroom. The current study aims to map how translation, as perceived in Translation Studies, can be beneficial for students’ writing skills in the FL classroom. It focuses on undergraduate students in three French Composition classes: a control class in fall 2014, a second control class in fall 2015, and an experimental class in spring 2016, and explores how the students’ writing in the latter class improved after being exposed to translation strategies, such as explicitation, amplification, modulation, and approaches, such as Skopos theory. To determine whether translation strategies enable students to improve naturalness in L2 writing, their compositions and summaries were error coded using Kobayashi/Rinnert’s (1992) method of awkward form and wrong lexical choice, McCarthy’s collocation search, and Owen’s (1988) native speaker input. Statistical analyses were also performed. Results show that translation strategies are a useful tool to help students understand the foreign language and write more naturally.

Berufsrelevante L2-Schreibkompetenz fördern durch Fordern

This article outlines approaches on how to support writing skills and text competence when teaching German as a foreign language. The main question is whether and how dealing in detail with one’s own mistakes and actively analysing one’s own writing process can contribute to improving writing skills in teaching German as a foreign language. Reflections which were written down during the 2013/14 winter and 2016 summer semester at the University of Graz by students studying German as a foreign language, level C1, serve as basis for this article. These reflections refer to texts gathered within one semester respectively. They address subjects relevant to the daily life of a translator in training, such as economics, law, culture, medicine and technology. During this period of reflection, students addressed the question of whether their approach to writing texts has changed in the course of one semester. In addition, they were asked to focus on which mistakes were made repeatedly and to which error category they belonged. Furthermore, they examined the areas in which they feel that they have personally improved and see their strengths. This article aims to demonstrate to what extent this teaching approach succeeded.

Texte für verschiedene Zielgruppen mehrsprachig verfassen

Currently, European universities find themselves in processes of internationalisation. This internationalisation affects the internationality of the student body as well as teaching staff and researchers, the curricula, the way of organising study programmes and the level of academic writing. Writing pedagogy has to consider diverse parameters of (genre) expectations, writing traditions, scientific cultures, the multilingual background of the different players etc. and has to find ways to make students fit for academic writing in internationalised contexts, that is to help them develop multilingual academic writing skills. The International Writing Centre at Goettingen University has established a programme of workshops and writing tutoring named MultiConText that takes these factors into account. This paper explains this programme, and gives teachers of academic writing impulses on how to put into action a writing pedagogy that responds to the needs of multilingual students who write academically in an internationalised context. To illustrate this, three different tasks which foster multilingual academic writing skills will be presented with recommendations on how to implement them in writing classes.

Das (verhinderte) Potential der Mehrsprachigkeit

This paper introduces the results of a series of writing workshops about “Mehrsprachig Schreiben” [Multilingual Writing], which took place at the University of Vienna between 2015 and 2017. The article poses the question, how individual, multilingual potentials can be used productively and creatively for the development and enhancements of academic literacies in the tertiary education sector. First it focuses on the linguistic landscapes at Austrian Universities such as the handling of multilingualism in this context, as well as it concerns the framing conditions and challenges of academic writing per se, before it shows the terms of the writing workshops and the methodical and didactical approach in connection with the concept of a multilingual process orientated writing didactic. On the basis of an exercise example (“Meine Sprachen und ich” [My languages and I]) it is responding in the end to the concrete challenges of multilingual academic writing at “German speaking” universities.

Die Internationalisierung der Hochschulen und der Umgang mit Mehrsprachigkeit in Studium und Lehre

Due to internationalization in higher education, English is gaining in importance as the language of teaching and learning (LoTL) in European institutions of higher education. Against this background, the question arises of how English can be used for teaching and learning without disadvantaging researchers, teachers and students by forcing them to use a second or foreign language for their cognitive-academic development and, at the same time, neglecting to assist them in developing individual translingual practices from which they could benefit. This article outlines the repertoire of translingual competencies and practices that have been observed in plurilinguals. For these competencies and practices, a range of terms has been coined, such as translanguaging, co-languaging, code-mixing and code-meshing, some of which are vague or overlap and therefore will be clarified in this article. In addition, a translation-studies perspective will be introduced into the current discourse on translingual practices. Based on this clarification, didactical measures will be outlined by means of which “English-plus multilingualism” (van der Walt 2013: 12) can be fostered in higher education on the part of both teachers and students.

Dominant-language Use in Foreign-language Academic Writing Processes

The present pilot study compares the use of the native language during foreign- language writing processes of two students enrolled in a Translation degree program to that of two students enrolled in an English Language and Literature degree program who had not received training in translation or interpreting. Across a range of sub-processes of source-based academic writing, native language use was found to be more frequent in the Translation students’ than in the English students’ think-aloud protocols. Possible relationships between the participants’ patterns of language use and their academic socialization are discussed, as well as the potential that native language use in foreign-language academic writing processes can have to help students improve their foreign-language texts.

TEACHING LEGAL TRANSLATION – A CASE STUDY OF MAKING STUDENTS AWARE OF TRANSLATION RISKS RESULTING FROM PLURICENTRISM

This article examines the phenomenon of pluricentrism in language for legal purposes. The purpose of the research is to discuss the coexistence of different language varieties resulting from the existence of pluricentric languages in a legal context, and how this can affect translation decisions. The research focuses on English and German. The authors apply the comparative method to identify differences and similarities in legal terminology, in order to develop the resulting didactic implications for legal translation courses. The methods used in the article encompass: the analysis of comparable texts, the terminological analysis of research material (comparative law methodology), the theory of skopos, and an analysis of the relevant literature. The research material mostly consisted of civil law documents of countries where the languages under discussion are spoken. The research hypothesis is that if a given language is an official language in more than one country, the legal languages are not uniform and vary in respect to national legal language variants (similar to general language), and consequently there is a risk of making an error. Thus the students of translation studies must be made aware of the resultant differences in order to solve translation problems more efficiently and to reduce the number of errors in specialised translation. The analysis of the source text through the prism of terminology should be related to the legal system of the country concerned. Students of translation courses should be aware of the semantic differences between legal terms in order to find proper equivalents.

A new narrative about sustainability or a sustainable narrative?

The aim of this paper is to deepen the knowledge about legitimation practices in a political-economic text, namely, the consolidated government accounts. In particular the study is focused on how contested and conflicting rationalities and values are negotiated and legitimized in consolidated accounts before and after Agenda 2030 was signed. A discourse legitimation approach is used (van Leeuwen 2007, 2008) to study Swedish consolidated government accounts. The report is considered exemplary and the goals are ambitious. Since the introduction of Agenda 2030, the ultimate goals of SOEs have been rephrased and the value configurations developed. The text becomes more political and other values than economic values gain status. This shift is legitimized by references to international commitments, that should act as role models, implying that they are morally good companies contributing to a better world. The Swedish government is constructed as the responsible parent who ensures progress. Hence, the global goals and Agenda 2030 are legitimized but they in turn legitimize state ownership and the government as an active owner of companies.