Article published In:
T&I pedagogy in dialogue with other disciplinesEdited by Sonia Colina and Claudia V. Angelelli
[Translation and Interpreting Studies 10:1] 2015
► pp. 8–32
Edited by Sonia Colina and Claudia V. Angelelli
[Translation and Interpreting Studies 10:1] 2015
► pp. 8–32
Occasioning translator competence
Moving beyond social constructivism toward a postmodern alternative to instructionism
For the past thirty years, as the translator’s profession has undergone a radical metamorphosis from a sort of bilingual craft to a highly technologized profession, translator education has been undergoing a comparatively slow evolution. From pervasive chalk-and-talk transmissionist practice just a few decades ago, the contemporary literature on translator education reveals a plethora of theoretical and practical approaches to the study and teaching of translation-related skills. In this article, the author reviews some key trends in this development within the translator education domain on the basis of his own evolution as a translator educator over the past three decades. A key focus will be placed on the role of epistemology, a mainstay of educational philosophy and learning theory, but a topic that he feels can help elucidate pedagogical practices of the past and guide the way toward ones better suited to educating translators today … and in the future.
Keywords: emergence, social constructivism, post-positivism, complexity theory
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