Description
Book SynopsisThe notion of systems has helped revolutionize translation studies since the 1970s. As a key part of many descriptive approaches, it has broken with the prescriptive focus on what translation should be, encouraging researchers to ask what translation does in specific cultural settings. From his privileged position as a direct participant in these developments, Theo Hermans explains how contemporary descriptive approaches came about, what the basic ideas were, and how those ideas have evolved over time. His discussion addresses the fundamental problems of translation norms, equivalence, polysystems and social systems, covering not only the work of Levý, Holmes, Even-Zohar, Toury, Lefevere, Lambert, Van Leuven-Zwart, Dhulst and others, but also giving special attention to recent contributions derived from Pierre Bourdieu and Niklas Luhmann. An added focus on practical questions of how to investigate translation (problems of definition, description, assessment of readerships, etc.) makes this book essential reading for graduate students and indeed any researchers in the field. Hermans' account of descriptive translation studies is both informed and critical. At the same time, he demonstrates the strength of the basic concepts, which have shown considerable vitality in their evolution and adaptation to the debates of the present day.
Trade Review... combines the most careful and informed scholarship with an ability to convey a personal enthusiasm for the subject. (Val Morgan, New Comparison) ... this is a text that is as philosophically lucid as it is honest. (Candace Seguinot, TTR)
Table of ContentsPreamble: Mann's Fate
1. An Invisible College
Names
Invisible Colleges
Manipulation College?
2. Lines of Approach
'Diagnostic rather than hortatory'
Decisions, Shifts, Metatexts
A Disciplinary Utopia
3. Points of Orientation
4. Undefining Translation
5. Describing Translation
First Attempts
Transemes?
Real Readers
Checklists
Comparative Practice
6. Working with Norms
Decisions and Norms
Toury's Norms
Chesterman's Norms
Norm Theory
Studying Norms
7. Beyond Norms
Laws?
Translation as Index
Equivalence?
Historicizing Theory
8. Into Systems
Polysystem's Sources
Polysystem's Terms
Polysystems in Action
Polysystem's Limitations
9. More Systems?
Mass Communication Maps
System, Ideology and Poetics
Translation as Field and Habitus
10. Translation as System
Expectations Structure
Translation as a Social System
Self-reference and Description
11. Criticisms
12. Perspectives
