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Corpus-based translation research emerged in the late 1990s as a new area of research in the discipline of translation studies. It is informed by a specific area of linguistics known as corpus linguistics which involves the analysis of large corpora of authentic running text by means of computer software. Within linguistics, this methodology has revolutionised lexicographic practices and methods of language teaching. In translation studies this kind of research involves using computerised corpora to study translated text, not in terms of its equivalence to source texts, but as a valid object of study in its own right. Corpus-based research in translation is concerned with revealing both the universal and the specific features of translation, through the interplay of theoretical constructs and hypotheses, variety of data, novel descriptive categories and a rigorous, flexible methodology, which can be applied to inductive and deductive research, as well as product-and process-oriented studies. In this article an overview is given of the research that has led to the formation of a new subdiscipline in translation studies, called Corpus-based Translation Studies or CTS. I also demonstrate how CTS tools and techniques can be used for the analysis of general and literary translations and therefore also for Bible translations.

Translation has played a major role alongside original literature in each of the South African languages in aiding the construction of their cultural and literary identities. Because ofapartheid(literally, ‘apartness’), Afrikaans carried a political burden and literary authors in this language were considered the protectors of Afrikaner cultural and national identity. After outlining the historical origins and the consolidation of apartheid, this paper charts the emergence of aversetliteratuur(‘protest literature’) movement among disillusioned Afrikaans authors during the apartheid era. Growing censorship and the first banning of an Afrikaans novel under the 1974 Publications and Entertainment Act led to translation and self-translation (into English) being used as a tool of resistance by Afrikaans writers against the ideology of apartheid. The paper moves on to explore the effects of apartheid-imposed conflict on other authors such as South African authors writing in English. It then focuses on the ideological agenda informing the language policy-makers’ and Africanists’ selection of books to be translated into African languages, as part of the government’s attempts to promote mother tongue education in African schools and thus perpetuate the segregation of black South Africans. The concluding section discusses how changes in political life since 1990 have influenced the use of translation in South African literature.

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