Session Information
99 ERC SES 04 A, Ignite Talks
Ignite Talks Session
Contribution
This study seeks to contribute to the emerging post-positivist discourse in translation studies by challenging currently prevalent approaches towards translator competence development from a post-structuralist complex systems perspective. If translation studies curricula of higher education institutions (HEIs) were focused on a broader development of the mindset necessary for the reality-yet-to-come, instead of the development of predefined sets of translator skills and capabilities, then future translators would be better equipped for contexts characterised as a VUCA world (Bennis and Nanus 2003) – the world of volatility, uncertainty, complexity and ambiguity. However, currently, translator education is based on translator competence models that are linear, structured and mainly focused on know-how rather than on knowledge (Hébrard 2013) due to various factors: they are grounded on constructivist theories, translator education is market-orientated, technologies evolve faster than our theories, and HEIs are slow in change.
Among diverse professional landscapes, translators are an indicative example of competence development as subject to the technological advancement and overall future uncertainty. Firstly, translation, both as a discipline and a profession, has a long history of being subject to the implications of technological developments and this dates back to the Georgetown-IBM experiment in 1954 aimed at machine translation (MT) research. Secondly, handling uncertainty is an inherent part of translators’ work (i.e., navigating the challenges to produce accurate and contextually appropriate translations), thus, competence development for uncertain professional working environments is at the core of translator competence. And yet, due to the prevalence of neural MT and LLM-based technologies, many graduates need to upskill already right after they have completed their studies. Therefore, the underlying research question raised in this study is how future uncertainty could be incorporated into translator education. To address that, this study aims to re-conceptualise the notion of translator competence based on the post-structuralist complex systems approach by defining competence development as a complex system.
What has the theoretical background of complex systems theories to offer to the European educational domain? Competence development in the European Higher Education Area has occupied the focus of many international debates on curricula, assessment and education in general (European Commission 2019, OECD 2017). Throughout Europe, the focus on competence assessment has been shifting from mere measurement of pre-defined sets of skills to the evaluation of much more complex abilities that are ingrained in real-world contexts (Koeppen et al. 2008). As major educational domains keep moving beyond the long-standing linear, hierarchical and top-down attitudes towards learning and teaching, the understanding of the new dynamics of education can benefit from complexity-informed approach (Biesta 2020), which is increasingly more apparent across many disciplines and professions (Byrne and Callaghan 2014).
Concequently, this complexity-informed standpoint also reflects an ontological turn that is underway in the current paradigm of translator education and HE in general. It calls for viewing students “as persons, not merely knowers” (Barnett 2004), or in a post-modern sense, insists upon a shift from what learners develop or acquire to who they become (Dall‘Alba and Barnacle 2007). As the understanding of what kind of knowledge and competencies are necessary for daily life and employment is rapidly changing (The World Economic forum 2020), and the focus is shifted towards the unpredictability of what learners may need to be able to do in the future (Markauskaite et al. 2022), translator education is expected to undertake a transformative role first and foremost by equipping future translators with the disposition to reflect on becoming and being a translator in this era of digital technologies and rapid change rather than focusing on the mere acquisition of translation skills and capabilities.
Method
The design of this study relies on qualitative research methodology implemented in two steps: (1) concept mapping of complex systems literature, and (2) thematic analysis of literature on translator competence development. Firstly, literature review is carried out shedding light on studies addressing complex systems in the field of educational sciences (Davis and Sumara 2008, Mason 2008, Jacobson 2020, etc.) and translation studies (Kiraly‘s (2015) model of translator competence as a co-emergent phenomenon, Massey‘s (2019) co-emergent learning, Marais and Meylaerts’ (2022) emergentist approach towards translation, etc.). This part of the research intends to provide a concept map (Novak 1995) of the underlying qualities of a complex system that will serve as the basis for the conceptual model of translator competence as a complex system. Secondly, thematic analysis (Braun and Clarke 2021) is performed, focused on the exploration of (1) documents which serve as guidelines for translation study programmes across the EU (competence frameworks, ISO standards, etc.), and (2) currently existing translator competence models (PACTE group (2003), Göpferich (2009), EMT (2009, 2016, 2022)). The major objective of this part of the study is to both identify the major constituents of translator competence and to depict their dynamics by organising them into a model of translator competence as a complex system, based on the concept map carried out in the first part of the study.
Expected Outcomes
This study sheds light on how complex systems approach could be adopted in translator education as a means to address future uncertainty by redefining competence development. As literature review suggests, the epistemology of complexity thinking expands translator educators‘ views of competence acquisition and encourages them to break free from linearity, reductionism and expectations of predictability, and lean on to openness, self-organisation and emergence (Lewin (1993), Holland (1998), Cilliers (2002)). The study reasons that even though currently existing translator competence models recognise the multi-faceted nature of translation and the manifold skills it requires, they tend to undermine their complexity by merely focusing on sets of translation skills and capabilities, which, as indicated by thematic analysis, often are assessed as the major learning outcomes, such as language proficiency, cultural and technical competencies, interpersonal, communication and project management skills, etc. In addition, the concept map, which was built based on the literature review of a post-structuralist complexity-informed learning approach, identified the underlying components which could assumably constitute the complex system of translator competence. The concept map includes essential concepts of complex systems that revolve around uncertainty, such as systems agents, interactions, systems levels, emergence, non-linearity, feedback loops, dynamic behaviour, self-organisation, resilience, and adaptability. The major outcome of this study – a model of translator competence as a complex system – is yet to be built. The model is intended to re-arrange the identified constituents of translator competence around the uncertainty-related concepts of the conceptual complexity map. The overall conclusions of this study also shed light on the onto-epistemological shift in translation studies that is waiting to dawn and certain epistemic fluency and inner epistemic resourcefulness (Markauskaite and Goodyear 2017) which may be crucial for the reality-yet-to-come not only among the graduates of translation studies but among students of almost any study programme.
References
Barnett, R. 2004. Learning for an Unknown Future. Higher Education Research & Development 23 (3): 247–260. Bennis, W., Nanus, B. 2003. Leaders: Strategies for Taking Charge. New York: Harper Business. Biesta, G. 2020. Educational research: An unorthodox introduction. London: Bloomsbury. Braun, V., Clarke, V. 2021. Thematic Analysis. A Practical Guide. London: Sage Publications. Byrne, D., Callaghan, G. 2014. Complexity theory and the social sciences (2nd ed.). Routledge. Cilliers, P. 2002. Complexity and Postmodernism: Understanding Complex Systems. London: Routledge. Dall’Alba, G., Barnacle, R. 2007. An Ontological Turn for Higher Education. Studies in Higher Education 32 (6): 679–691. doi:10.1080/03075070701685130. Davis, B., Sumara, D. 2008. Complexity and Education. Inquiries into Learning, Teaching, and Research. New York: Routledge. European Commission. 2019. Key Competences for Lifelong Learning. European Union. European Master‘s in Translation (EMT). 2022. Translator Competence Framework. Directorate-General for Translation, Brussels. Accessed March 14, 2023. https://commission.europa.eu/news/updated-version-emt-competence-framework-now-available-2022-10-21_en Göpferich, S. 2009. Towards a model of translation competence and its acquisition: the longitudinal study TransComp. Copenhagen studies in language: 11-37. Jacobson, M. 2020. Complexity Conceptual Perspectives for Research About Educational Complex Systems. The Journal of Experimental Education, 88:3, 375-381. Kiraly, D. 2015. Occasioning Translator Competence: Moving Beyond Social Constructivism Toward a Postmodern Alternative to Instructionism. Translation and Interpreting Studies, 10(1): 8-32. Koeppen, K., Hartig, J., Klieme, E., Leutner, D. 2008. Current Issues in Competence Modelling and Assessment. Journal of Psychology, Vol. 216(2): 61–73. Marais, K., Meylaerts, R. 2022. Exploring the Implications of Complexity Thinking for Translation Studies. New York: Routledge. Markauskaite, L., Goodyear, P. 2017. Epistemic Fluency and Professional Education Innovation, Knowledgeable Action and Actionable Knowledge. Dordrecht: Springer. Mason, M. (ed). 2008. Complexity theory and the Philosophy of Education. Oxford: Wiley Blackwell. Massey, G., 2019. The Bigger Picture: Experiential Learning from the Classroom to the Organisation. In Don, K., Massey, G. (eds) Towards authentic experiential learning in translator education, Cambridge Scholars Publishing. Novak, J. D. 1995. Concept mapping: A strategy for organizing knowledge. In S. M. Glynn & R. e. a. Duit (Eds.), Learning science in the schools: Research reforming practice, 229-245. New York: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, Inc. OECD. 2017. Global competency for an inclusive world. Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development. PACTE. 2003. Building a Translation Competence Model. In Alves, F. (ed.) Triangulating Translation: Perspectives in Process Oriented Research, Amsterdam: John Benjamins. The World Economic Forum. 2020. Schools of the future. Defining new models of education for the fourth industrial revolution. World Economic Forum. http://www3.weforum. org/docs/WEF_Schools_of_the_Future_Report_2019.pdf.
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