Two decades of Swedish empirical process- oriented research on translation and interpreting Birgitta Englund Dimitrova, Stockholm University Presentation at TREC seminar, Barcelona, June 2013

Period 1, Beginning the beguine Several projects start (Englund Dimitrova, Jonasson, Williams) Data collection – TAPs, keystroke logging, recorded interpreting Data analysis – how to make sense of the data??

Semantic change in translation Englund Dimitrova Initial research question (rephrased and simplified): How is the translator’s semantic representation of the source text reflected in the target text? Russian>Swedish Participants with different experience of translation: professionals, translation students, language students TAPs, keystroke logging (Scriptlog), video recordings (not analysed), retrospective interviews (not analysed)

Development of translation competence over time Englund Dimitrova, from 1997 Azbel Schmidt Russian-Swedish Translation students, doing translation tasks that were part of their training; re-recorded 4 years after finishing their training TAPs, keystroke logging (Scriptlog)

Translation ability and translatorial competence - development of translation competence over time Kerstin Jonasson French-Swedish Professional translators, translation students TAPs Intended as a combined cross-sectional and longitudinal study, but is in effect a cross-sectional comparison between professional translators and translation students Published analyses of participants’ textual awareness

Processes in simultaneous interpreting Sarah Williams (deceased 1996) Audio recordings of professional interpreters and of students in conference interpreter training over time English> Swedish Connecting theories from Second Language Acquisition with interpreting studies

Period 2, Increasing the pace: analysing data and networking 3 PhD students join their projects to the research environment (Azbel Schmidt 1997, Künzli 1997/1999, Norberg 1999) Dedicated PhD seminar for (general) Translation Studies Englund Dimitrova member of EXPERTISE network from 2000

Project Semantic change in translation (Englund Dimitrova) develops in two directions Focuses on one type of ”semantic change”, explicitations Compares also more general similarities and differences in the translation process of participants with different translation experience, with a special focus on self-revisions

Publication of papers from international symposium on interpreting, 2000, Benjamins

Period 3, Fruit ripening – and some new sprouts Three doctoral dissertations published One monograph published Künzli has new project on other-revision (French>Swedish, French>German, TAPs), Master’s Thesis in bilingualism on process and product in simultaneous interpreting (Tiselius 2007)

2003 Ulf Norberg dissertation Prof. translators with long vs short experience TAPs Two different skopoi; German > Swedish Results: –Differences in attitude in process –Short experience > even better target texts! –Substantial individual differences in process

2003 Künzli dissertation Prof. translators vs translation students French>German, French>Swedish, technical text TAPs Results: –Experience and language combination influence choice of translation strategies –Conflict between verbalized and actual translation principle in students’ processes /

2005 Azbel Schmidt dissertation Longitudinal study of translation students in training and after 4 years Russian>Swedish TAPs, ScriptLog Results: –Individual conceptual frame remains during training –Writing skills in TL of importance for translation process and performance

2005 Englund Dimitrova Prof. translators, translation students, language students Russian> Swedish TAPs, ScriptLog Cross-sectional comparison of process of participants with different experience Elaborates method for combined process and product analysis

Period 4, The new sprouts PhD thesis to be submitted, any moment now, June 2013…. Tiselius Experience and Expertise in Conference Interpreting. An investigation of Swedish conference interpreters MA thesis 2010 on text types in the translation process (Raphael Sannholm) MA thesis 2011 on idioms and fixed phrases in the translation process (Tanja Leirvåg)

And also… A continued interest in different research methods, e.g. retrospection (Englund Dimitrova & Tiselius) A continued interest in relating the process to the product (Englund Dimitrova)

And another publication (surprise, surprise…)

Taking stock and looking ahead - some characteristics of Swedish process-oriented research Mostly individual projects, designed and carried out by the resp. researcher Most have a combined process and product perspective, incl. analysis of textual aspects; Recurrent topics: –experience and expertise in the translation and interpreting process, studied both cross-sectionally and longitudinally; –Revision (both self-revision and other-revision) important focus for some projects; Also studies of the cognitive processes of interpreting. Methods include think-aloud-protocols, retrospection, keystroke logging and audio recordings (of interpreting);

Three years from now? Elisabet Tiselius will have results from her planned study on naïve translation, children as interpreters Birgitta Englund Dimitrova will have results from her project The translator’s individual space: a combined process and product study of translators working into their TL from more than one SL, linking elements of textual translator style to elements of their process profile

A bibliography of Swedish empirical process-oriented research can be found under Bibliographies at

Thank you!