Distribution and translation
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Tong King Lee
Tong King Lee is Associate Professor of Translation at the University of Hong Kong. He is Luce-East Asia Fellow at the U.S. National Humanities Center (2020–2021); NAATI-Certified Translator (Australia); Chartered Linguist (Chartered Institute of Linguists, UK); and Specialist at the Hong Kong Council for the Accreditation of Academic and Vocational Qualifications. He is also the author of
Translation and Translanguaging (2019, with M. Baynham) andApplied Translation Studies (2018), and an associate editor of the Routledge journalTranslation Studies .
Abstract
Translation has traditionally been viewed as a branch of applied linguistics. This has changed drastically in recent decades, which have witnessed translation studies growing as a field beyond, and sometimes against, applied linguistics. This paper is an attempt to think translation back into applied linguistics by reconceptualizing translation through the notions of distributed language, semiotic repertoire, and assemblage. It argues that: (a) embedded within a larger textual-media ecology, translation is enacted through dialogical interaction among the persons, texts, technologies, platforms, institutions, and traditions operating within that ecology; (b) what we call translations are second-order constructs, or relatively stable formations of signs abstracted from the processual flux of translating on the first-order; (c) translation is not just about moving a work from one discrete language system across to another, but about distributing it through semiotic repertoires; (d) by orchestrating resources performatively, translations are not just interventions in the target language and culture, but are transformative of the entire translingual and multimodal space (discursive, interpretive, material) surrounding a work. The paper argues that distributed thinking helps us de-fetishize translation as an object of study and reimagine translators as partaking of a creative network of production alongside other human and non-human agents.
Funding source: Research Grants Council, HKSAR
Award Identifier / Grant number: General Research Fund/17602219
About the author
Tong King Lee is Associate Professor of Translation at the University of Hong Kong. He is Luce-East Asia Fellow at the U.S. National Humanities Center (2020–2021); NAATI-Certified Translator (Australia); Chartered Linguist (Chartered Institute of Linguists, UK); and Specialist at the Hong Kong Council for the Accreditation of Academic and Vocational Qualifications. He is also the author of Translation and Translanguaging (2019, with M. Baynham) and Applied Translation Studies (2018), and an associate editor of the Routledge journal Translation Studies.
Acknowledgements
This research was supported by a General Research Fund from the Research Grants Council of Hong Kong (Project Code: 17602219).
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© 2021 Walter de Gruyter GmbH, Berlin/Boston
Artikel in diesem Heft
- Frontmatter
- Research Articles
- Foreign language learning boredom: Conceptualization and measurement
- The production and perception of Turkish evidentiality markers by Turkish-German returnees
- Experiences and practices of English as a lingua franca communication in the international university: An integrative view of student voices
- The operating mechanisms of self-efficacy and peer feedback: An exploration of L2 young writers
- Critical autoethnographic narrative: Ideological contention, metacommentary and aesthetic labor in language education
- Response
- What’s hot and what’s not on the current CLIL research agenda: Weeding out the non-issues from the real issues. A response to Bruton (2019)
- Research Articles
- Distribution and translation
- The role of immersion learning in the acquisition and processing of L2 gender agreement
- Obituary
- Obituary: Jan Blommaert (1961–2021)
Artikel in diesem Heft
- Frontmatter
- Research Articles
- Foreign language learning boredom: Conceptualization and measurement
- The production and perception of Turkish evidentiality markers by Turkish-German returnees
- Experiences and practices of English as a lingua franca communication in the international university: An integrative view of student voices
- The operating mechanisms of self-efficacy and peer feedback: An exploration of L2 young writers
- Critical autoethnographic narrative: Ideological contention, metacommentary and aesthetic labor in language education
- Response
- What’s hot and what’s not on the current CLIL research agenda: Weeding out the non-issues from the real issues. A response to Bruton (2019)
- Research Articles
- Distribution and translation
- The role of immersion learning in the acquisition and processing of L2 gender agreement
- Obituary
- Obituary: Jan Blommaert (1961–2021)
