Cover not available

Article In: Translation and Interpreting Studies: Online-First Articles

Beyond individual mastery

Translation expertise as collective, distributed enaction

ORCiD logo with link | University of Vienna
ORCiD logo with link | University of Vienna
ORCiD logo with link | University of Vienna
This content is being prepared for publication; it may be subject to changes.
Abstract
Research on expertise in translation studies has largely focused on the skills and performance of individual translators. However, a growing body of research demonstrates that translation practices are collaborative and embedded in complex socio-material environments. In this article, we outline how expertise research in translation studies can be enriched by adopting perspectives from socio-cognitive approaches and from research on distributed, team, and organizational expertise in other disciplines. Drawing on ethnographic data, we analyze how expertise is enacted, coordinated, and recognized across actors, artifacts, and organizational structures. The insights regarding the distributedness of translation expertise are summarized along five dimensions: (1) sharing identities, (2) acting as a social unit, (3) learning as a social unit, (4) interweaving material affordances, and (5) realigning processes. Thus, we aim to advance the conceptualization of translation expertise beyond notions of individual mastery and to open up new directions for empirical research.
Article outline
  • Introduction
  • Translation expertise research between the individual, the collective, and the environment
  • Distributed expertise
  • Data collection and analysis
  • Findings
    • Sharing identities
    • Acting as a social unit
    • Learning as a social unit
    • Interweaving material affordances
    • Realigning processes
  • Limitations
  • Conclusion
  • Acknowledgements
  • Note
  • Author queries
  • References
References (63)
References
Alves, Fabio, and Igor A. Lourenço da Silva. 2021. “Bridging paradigms to approach expertise in cognitive translation studies.” In New Frontiers in Translation Studies. Advances in Cognitive Translation Studies, ed. by Ricardo Muñoz Martín, Sanjun Sun, and Defeng Li, 89–108. Singapore: Springer. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Angrosino, Michael. 2007. Doing Ethnographic and Observational Research. Singapore: SAGE. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Argyris, Chris. 1999. On organizational learning. Oxford: Blackwell Publishing.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Arnoldi, Jacob. 2023. “The social distribution of the public recognition of expertise.” In The Oxford Handbook of Expertise and Democratic Politics, ed. by Gil Eyal and Thomas Medvetz, 513–529. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Barley, William C., Jeffrey W. Treem, and Paul M. Leonardi. 2020. “Experts at coordination: Examining the performance, production, and value of process expertise.” Journal of Communication 70(1): 60–89. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Baumann, Antonia. 2024. “Exploring ethnographic research as a team: Considerations and challenges.” Norway in Translation (NiT). [URL]
Baumann, Antonia, and Daniela Schlager. 2025. “Und dann begeisterst du dich doch dafür — Von Übersetzer:innen und ihrer Lernbereitschaft [And then you’re enthusiastic about it anyway — On translators and their willingess to learn].” UNIVERSITAS 11: 21–23.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Boh, Wai, Yuqing Ren, and Sara Kiesler. 2002. “Managing expertise in a distributed environment.” ICIS 2002 Proceedings 161: 173–181. [URL]
Böser, Ursula. 2016. “Interviews and focus groups.” In Researching Translation and Interpreting, ed. by Claudia V. Angelelli and Brian J. Baer, 236–246. London: Routledge.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Caldwell, Barrett S. 2005. “Analysis and modeling of information flow and distributed expertise in space-related operations.” Acta Astronautica 56(9–12): 996–1004. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Cordingley, Anthony, and Céline Frigau Manning, eds. 2016. Collaborative Translation: From the Renaissance to the Digital Age. London: Bloomsbury.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
da Silva, Igor A. Lourenço. 2021. “Translation, expert performance and cognition.” In The Routledge Handbook of Translation and Cognition, ed. by Fábio Alves and Arnt Lykke Jakobsen, 461–477. Abingdon: Routledge. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Davison, Claire. 2014. Translation as Collaboration: Virginia Woolf, Katherine Mansfield and S. S. Koteliansky. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
DeChurch, Leslie A., and Jessica R. Mesmer-Magnus. 2010. “The cognitive underpinnings of effective teamwork: A meta-analysis.” The Journal of Applied Psychology 95(1): 32–53. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Dragsted, Barbara. 2006. “Computer-aided translation as a distributed cognitive task.” Pragmatics & Cognition 14(2): 443–464. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Dresing, Thorsten, and Thorsten Pehl. 2018. Praxisbuch Interview, Transkription & Analyse. Anleitungen und Regelsysteme für qualitativ Forschende [Practical Guide Interview, Transcript & Analysis. Instructions and Rule Systems for Qualitative Researchers]. 8th ed. Marburg: Eigenverlag. [URL]
Eccles, David W., and Gershon Tenenbaum. 2004. “Why an expert team is more than a team of experts: A social-cognitive conceptualization of team coordination and communication in sport.” Journal of Sport and Exercise Psychology 26(4): 542–560. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
En, Michael, and Boka En. 2019. “‘Coming out’ … as a translator? Expertise, identities and knowledge practices in an LGBTIQ* migrant community translation project.” Translation Studies 12(2): 213–230. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Enfield, N. J. and Paul Kockelman, eds. 2017. Distributed Agency. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Engeström, Yrjö, and David Middleton. 1998. “Introduction: Studying work as mindful practice.” In Cognition and Communication at Work, ed. by Yrjö Engeström and David Middleton, 1–14, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Enright, Eimear, David Kirk, and Doune Macdonald. 2020. “Expertise, neoliberal governmentality and the outsourcing of health and physical education.” Discourse: Studies in the Cultural Politics of Education 41(2): 206–222. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Ericsson, K. Anders, and Neil Charness. 1994. “Expert performance: Its structure and acquisition.” American Psychologist 49(8): 725–747. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Gibson, James J. 1977. “The theory of affordances.” In Perceiving, acting, and knowing: Toward an ecological psychology, ed. by Robert Shaw and John D. Bransford, 67–82. Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Goffmann, Erving. 1956. The Presentation of Self in Everyday Life. Edinburgh: University of Edinburgh, Social Sciences Research Centre.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Helfferich, Cornelia. 2022. “Leitfaden- und Experteninterviews.” In Handbuch Methoden der empirischen Sozialforschung, ed. by Nina Baur and Jörg Blasius, 875–892. Wiesbaden: Springer. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Hirvonen, Maija. 2024. “Shared cognition in the translation process: Information processing and meaning production as interactive accomplishments.” Translation Studies 18(1): 61–82. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Hutchins, Edwin. 1995. “How a cockpit remembers its speeds.” Cognitive Science 19(3): 265–288. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. 2006. “The distributed cognition perspective on human interaction.” In Roots of Human Sociality: Culture, Cognition and Interaction, ed. by Nick J. Enfield and Stephen C. Levinson, 375–398. Abingdon: Routledge. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Jahn, Michelle A., and Barrett S. Caldwell. 2018. “Developing distributed expertise coordination models of diabetes care teams.” Proceedings of the Human Factors and Ergonomics Society Annual Meeting 62(1): 556–560. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Jakobsen, Arnt Lykke. 2026. “Cognitive processes in translation.” In International Encyclopedia of Language and Linguistics, 3rd ed., ed. by Hilary Nesi and Petar Milin, 208–212. Elsevier. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Jamoussi, Rafik, Kais Khadim, Aladin Al Zahran, and Mohammed Alaqad. 2025. “Profiling professional identity among translation students: A binational study.” Translation & Interpreting 17(1): 73–93. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Korhonen, Annamari, and Maija Hirvonen. 2021. “Joint creative process in translation: Socially distributed cognition in two production contexts.” Cognitive Linguistic Studies 8(2): 251–276. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Kuckartz, Udo, and Stefan Rädiker. 2022. Qualitative Inhaltsanalyse: Methoden, Praxis, Computerunterstützung [Qualitative Content Analysis: Methods, Practice, Computer Support]. 5th ed. Weinheim, Basel: Beltz Juventa.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Lévy, Pierre. 1999. Collective Intelligence: Mankind’s Emerging World in Cyberspace, trans. by Robert Bononno. Cambridge, MA: Perseus Books.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Marín García, Álvaro. 2017. Theoretical hedging: The scope of knowledge in translation process research. Unpublished Ph.D. dissertation. Kent, OH: Kent State University.
Martin, Lee, and Colin Dixon. 2024. “Reenvisioning adaptive expertise as a distributed phenomenon.” Mind, Culture, and Activity 31(1): 1–20. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Milošević, Jelena, and Hanna Risku. 2020. “Situated translation and the ethnographic study of translation workplaces: Translation scholars as outsiders, consultants and passionate participants.” Linguistica Antverpiensia, New Series: Themes in Translation Studies 191: 111–131. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Muñoz Martín, Ricardo. 2014. “Situating translation expertise: A review with a sketch of a construct.” In The Development of Translation Competence: Theories and Methodologies from Psycholinguistics and Cognitive Science, ed. by John W. Schwieter and Aline Ferreira, 2–56. Newcastle upon Tyne: Cambridge Scholars.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Nicolini, Davide, Bjørn E. Mørk, Jasmina Masovic, and Ole Hanseth. 2017. “Expertise as trans-situated: The case of TAVI.” In Skillful Performance: Enacting Capabilities, Knowledge, Competence, and Expertise in Organizations, ed. by Jörgen Sandberg, Linda Rouleau, Ann Langley, and Haridimos Tsoukas, 27–49. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Orlikowski, Wanda J. 2002. “Knowing in practice: Enacting a collective capability in distributed organizing.” Organization Science 13(3): 249–273. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Paletz, Susannah B. F., Kevin H. Kim, Christian D. Schunn, Irene Tollinger, and Alonso Vera. 2013. “Reuse and recycle: The development of adaptive expertise, routine expertise, and novelty in a large research team.” Applied Cognitive Psychology 27(4): 415–428. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Pfadenhauer, Michaela, and Volker Dieringer. 2019. “Professionalität als institutionalisierte Kompetenzdarstellungskompetenz. Kritik der Kritik des inszenierungstheoretischen Ansatzes in der Supervisionsforschung” [Professionalism as Institutionalised Competence Presentation Competence. Critique of the Staging Theory Approach in Supervision Research]. In Handbuch Professionssoziologie, ed. by Christiane Schnell and Michaela Pfadenhauer, 1–21. Wiesbaden: Springer. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Pole, Chris, and Sam Hillyard. 2016. Doing Fieldwork. Los Angeles: SAGE. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Risku, Hanna, and Regina Rogl. 2021. “Translation and situated, embodied, distributed, embedded and extended cognition.” In The Routledge Handbook of Translation and Cognition, ed. by Fabio Alves and Arnt Lykke Jakobsen, 478–499. London: Routledge. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. 2022. “Praxis and process meet halfway: The convergence of sociological and cognitive approaches in translation studies.” Translation & Interpreting 14(2): 32–49. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Risku, Hanna, and Daniela Schlager. 2022. “Epistemologies of translation expertise: Notions in research and praxis.” In Contesting Epistemologies in Cognitive Translation and Interpreting Studies, ed. by Sandra L. Halverson and Álvaro Marín García, 11–31. London: Routledge. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Robbins, Philip, and Murat Aydede. 2009. “A short primer on situated cognition.” In The Cambridge Handbook of Situated Cognition, ed. by Philip Robbins and Murat Aydede, 3–10. New York: Cambridge University Press. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Salo, Pia, Outi Veivo, and Leena Salmi. 2020. “Building pre-professional identity during translator education — Experiences from the multilingual translation workshop at the University of Turku.” Hermes 601: 97–110. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Sannholm, Raphael, and Hanna Risku. 2024. “Situated minds and distributed systems in translation.” Target. International Journal of Translation Studies 36(2): 159–183. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Schlager, Daniela, and Hanna Risku. 2023. “Contextualising translation expertise: Lived practice and social construction.” Translation, Cognition & Behavior 6(2): 231–252. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. 2024. “What does it take to be a good in-house translator? Constructs of expertise in the workplace.” JoSTrans 421: 2–19. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Sela-Sheffy, Rakefet. 2023. “What does it take to be a professional translator? Identity as a resource.” In Professions and Proficiency, ed. by Johannes Glückler, Christopher Winch, and Anna Mateja Punstein, 89–111. Cham: Springer. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Senge, Peter M. 1990. The Fifth Discipline: The Art and Practice of the Learning Organization. 1st ed. New York: Doubleday Currency.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Shreve, Gregory. 2020. “Professional translator development from an expertise perspective.” In The Bloomsbury Companion to Language Industry Studies, ed. by Erik Angelone, Maureen Ehrensberger-Dow, and Gary Massey, 153–177. London: Bloomsbury. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Smith, Vicki. 2001. “Ethnographies of work and the work of ethnographers.” In Handbook of Ethnography, ed. by Paul Atkinson, Amanda Coffey, Sara Delamont, John Lofland, and Lyn Lofland, 220–233. London: SAGE. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Sonesh, Shirley C., Christina Lacerenza, Shannon Marlow, and Eduardo Salas. 2018. “What makes an expert team? A decade of research.” In The Cambridge Handbook of Expertise and Expert Performance, 2nd ed., ed. by K. Anders Ericcson, Robert R. Hoffman, Aaron Kozbelt, and A. Mark Williams, 506–531. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Swallow, Veronica, Trish Smith, Nicholas J. A. Webb, et al. 2015. “Distributed expertise: Qualitative study of a British network of multidisciplinary teams supporting parents of children with chronic kidney disease.” Child: Care, Health and Development 41(1): 67–75. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Tucker-Raymond, Eli, Michael Cassidy, and Gillian Puttick. 2021. “Science teachers can teach computational thinking through distributed expertise.” Computers & Education 1731, 104284. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Williamson, Kellie, and Rochelle Cox. 2014. “Distributed cognition in sports teams: Explaining successful and expert performance.” Educational Philosophy and Theory 46(6): 640–654. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Zimmerman, Heather Toomey, Suzanne Reeve, and Philip Bell. 2008. “Distributed expertise in a science center: Social and intellectual role-taking by families.” Journal of Museum Education 33(2): 143–152. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Zwischenberger, Cornelia, and Alexa Alfer, eds. 2023. Translaboration in Analogue and Digital Practice: Labour, Power, Ethics, 1st ed. Berlin: Frank & Timme. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Mobile Menu Logo with link to supplementary files background Layer 1 prag Twitter_Logo_Blue