Unlocking the potential of translation for FLT

Abstract

The paper proposes unlocking the potential of translation for foreign language teaching (FLT) by seeking to create synergies with the related discipline of translation science (TS). This aim is in keeping with the guidelines for language teaching provided in the Common European Framework of Languages, which introduced a model of communicative competences including communicative language competences as those which enable a person to act by drawing on specific linguistic means. First, an overview of the changing status of translation in FLT is presented – from its being considered a fundamental teaching method and basic skill in the Grammar-Translation Method, to its being all but outlawed in more recent communicative and task-based approaches, to its final rehabilitation in recent decades. It is then shown that, in the development of FLT, the parallel evolution of TS somehow failed to be acknowledged and, consequently, the opportunity to create valuable synergies between the two disciplines was missed. Following the stance of authors who have advocated the use of translation in FLT, it is argued that translation can effectively supplement the development of the four traditional language skills and, moreover, that some of the insights developed by TS can effectively be integrated into FLT as strategies aimed at enhancing leaners’ cross-cultural communicative competences. To this purpose, selected insights from TS (e.g. the functional approach and the skopos theory, the cultureme model, the theory of memes) are discussed and their potential for creating synergies with FLT are explored. Finally, the paper discusses the omnipresence of different forms of translation and interpreting in contemporary societies and shows that this naturally and logically calls for a systematic inclusion of translation in FLT.

Current Practices in Translation and L2 Learning in Higher Education: Lessons Learned

“…Colourful examples were given to stimulate debate and reflection on the basis that translation implies understanding, interpreting and communicating (Carreres et al, 2018, p. 17). For instance, students were presented with a picture of professional contexts where they had to interpret adequately who was who: who was the doctor or the nurse, depending on the colour of the scrubs they were wearing, where they stood, or even based on our own preconceptions of gender, and the spatial disposition in our own cultures (for research on the cultureme model as an aid in L2 teaching, see Kocbek (2014)). • Non-fictional work Is that a fish in your ear?…”

The Role of Pedagogical Translation on The Development of Intercultural Communicative Competence in Language Teaching

“…(Fois, 2020, 562) Naimushin (2002 claims that translation could be considered as the fifth skill alongside the other four in a foreign language class. The potential of translation activities to develop foreign language skills (Camphell, 2002;Elorza, 2008;Beaven &Alvarez 2004;Kocbek, 2014) is mostly ignored by foreign language teachers. Nevertheless translation-based learning should be an asset to contribute to develop the intercultural communicative competence (Byram& Zarrate, 1996;Byram & Flemming ;, Byram, Nichols & Stevens, 2001Byram, Gribkova &Starkey, 2002;Zarrate, 2003;M Byram, P Holmes & N Savvides ,2013;Byram, 2012), which is a milieu to encounter the "other" and the "self".…”

“…Nevertheless, Naimushin (2002) claims that translation could be considered as the fifth skill alongside the other four in a foreign language class. The potential of translation activities to develop foreign language skills (Camphell, 2002;Elorza, 2008;Beaven &Alvarez 2004;Kocbek, 2014) is mostly ignored by foreign language teachers. The researcher in this paper intends to undo the negligence of translation activities in foreign language teaching and to analyse the effects of translation studies as a strategy that could be used in SLA (Second Language Acquisition) as a key factor in order to apprehend the skills necessary in a learning directed to the achievement of an intercultural communicative competence which requires mutual understanding and awareness of not only the culture of the self but also the others.…”