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Article published In:
Target
Vol. 9:2 (1997) ► pp.287–317

How Comparable Can 'Comparable Corpora' Be?

| University of Birmingham & UMIST
The development of a coherent methodology for corpus-based work in translation studies is essential for the evolution of this newfield of research into a fully-fledged paradigm within the discipline. The design of a monolingual, multi-source-language comparable corpus of English as a resource for the systematic study of the nature of translated text can be regarded as an important step towards the development of such a methodology. This paper deals with a crucial and problematic aspect of the design of a monolingual comparable corpus, namely the achievement of an adequate level of comparability between its translational and non-translational components.
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.The Design of the English Comparable Corpus (ECC)
    • 2.1.Initial Definition of Comparable Corpus
    • 2.2Corpus Typology and Classification of the ECC
    • 2.3.The Theoretical and Practical Motivation for the TEC Design
    • 2.4.The Identification of the Text Categories of TEC
    • 2.5.Selecting Suitable Texts for TEC
      • 2.5.1.Selection Criteria
      • 2.5.2.Selection Procedures
      • 2.5.3.Copyright Permissions
      • 2.5.4.The Acquisition of Texts for TEC
      • 2.5.5.From a Printed or Electronic Text to a TEC Text
      • 2.5.6.The File Structure of TEC
      • 2.5.7.The Extra-Textual Attributes of TEC Texts
        • TRANSLATOR(S)
        • TRANSLATION
        • TRANSLATION PROCESS
        • SOURCE TEXT
    • 2.6.Design of NON-TEC
      • 2.6.1.The Dimensions of Comparability
      • 2.6.2.Selection, Acquisition and Markup of NON-TEC Texts
      • 2.6.3.The File Structure of NON-TEC
      • 2.6.4.The Extra-Textual Attributes of NON-TEC Texts
  • 3.Evaluation of Comparability in the Design of ECC
  • 4.Use of the English Comparable Corpus
  • Notes
  • References
Published online: 1 January 1997
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/target.9.2.05lav
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