Baker discusses 'the cultural turn' in translation studies and its consequences for the status of linguistics within the translation discipline. The author sees the impact of cultural studies mainly in the fact that it adds a strong political dimension to the object of study. Her paper provides answers to the question as to whether cultural studies can dislodge linguistics as the discipline which most informs the study of translation and whether linguistics is really as unproductive as it is presented by some opponents of this paradigm.