Research
Our research explores current developments and challenges in translation as a social, cognitive and technologically situated practice. We examine how translation is shaped by interactions between people, technologies and organisations, focusing on practices, processes and networks as well as translation expertise and project management.
See our publications for an overview of our published research.
Topics
Our research covers a broad range of topics related to non-literary translation and its social, cognitive and technological dimensions. We study translation processes and practices, notions and norms, actors and artefacts in different settings in and beyond the translation industry. Our research considers both individual actors and larger social units, such as teams, organisations and networks. Key topics include agency, cognition, cooperation, and the role of technology. Currently, we are focusing on translation expertise and feedback, translators' personal goals, and sociotechnical conceptualisations of digital translation practices.
Methods
A key methodological focus of our research is the study of translation in context through ethnographic field and workplace research, particularly virtual and focused ethnography. We use a range of qualitative methods including participant observation, semi-structured interviews and focus groups. For data analysis, we draw on approaches such as qualitative content analysis, thematic analysis and social network analysis. Our engagement with field research has also contributed to methodological exchange within the discipline, including the organisation of the first dedicated conference on field research in translation and interpreting studies and the publication of an edited volume.
Theoretical approach
Our research draws on sociocognitive approaches that understand translation as an activity shaped by the interplay of cognitive and social processes. We view cognition as embodied, embedded, extended, enacted, and affective (4EA), and draw on situated and distributed cognition to examine how thinking and acting emerge through interactions with people, environments, tools, and technologies. These perspectives are combined with sociological, practice-theoretical, sociotechnical, organisational and ergonomic approaches. Our work draws on concepts and frameworks such as extended translation, translator studies, network research, (distributed) agency and expertise, while remaining open to new, particularly interdisciplinary, perspectives that offer new insights into phenomena in the translation field.
