A scientometric review of research in Translation Studies in the twenty-first century

Xuelian Zhu and Vahid Aryadoust
Sichuan International Studies University | Nanyang Technological University

Abstract

The field of Translation Studies has expanded rapidly in the twenty-first century, largely due to the growing demand for translation and interpreting professionals. This study provides a scientometric review of Translation Studies to identify its developmental trends and patterns over the past two decades. Document co-citation analysis was conducted on 6007 journal articles published in the fifteen translation studies journals indexed in the Web of Science between January 2001 and December 2020. Twelve document co-citation analysis networks were generated and compared. Quantitative analyses, including temporal and structural metrics, confirmed the robustness and reliability of a network comprising ten discrete research clusters. A timeline view was generated to visualize how these clusters have evolved over time. Ten clusters were identified as major research subdomains in Translation Studies, namely translation competence, translation in conflict zones, translator training, collaborative translation, translation and society, language policy, post-editing and revision, media translation, the translation profession, and web localization. In addition, burst detection analysis identified the twenty most influential publications in this sample. Based on these findings, we discuss how the observed trends in each cluster contribute to further developments in Translation Studies. The implications for teaching, research, and theory are discussed and some methodological guidelines are proposed for future research.

Keywords:
Publication history
Table of contents

Translation has played an essential role in promoting trade, religion, and scholarship exchange between societies for centuries (Munday 2016). Partly due to this historical significance, Translation Studies (TS) emerged as an academic discipline in the second half of the twentieth century and continues to undergo changes in its paradigms, models, and methodologies (Van Doorslaer 2007, 223; Candel-Mora and Vargas-Sierra 2013, 318; Li 2015, 184; Munday 2016, 43). To delineate the scope and focal areas of TS, a number of scholars have attempted to identify historical and disciplinary movements in this field (Hatim and Munday 2004; Holmes [1988] 2004; Snell-Hornby 2006), although some of these attempts have been criticized for their parochial outlook. Notably, Holmes’s ([1988] 2004) tripartite model of descriptive, theoretical, and applied TS has been critiqued for its emphasis on text rather than translators (Chesterman 2009; Pym 2010). It has been argued that technological innovation and social development have driven TS beyond linguistics into the cultural, cognitive, and sociological research domains (Chesterman 2009, 2019).

Full-text access is restricted to subscribers. Log in to obtain additional credentials. For subscription information see Subscription & Price. Direct PDF access to this article can be purchased through our e-platform.

References

Albres, Neiva Aquino, and Cristina Broglia Feitosa de Lacerda
2013 “Interpretação educacional como campo de pesquisa: Estudo bibliométrico de publicações internacionais e suas marcas no campo nacional [Educational interpreting as a research field: Bibliometric study of international publications and their brands in the national field].” Cadernos de Tradução 1 (31): 179–204. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Angelelli, Claudia V.
2004aRevisiting the Interpreter’s Role: A Study of Conference, Court, and Medical Interpreters in Canada, Mexico, and the United States. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
2004bMedical Interpreting and Cross-Cultural Communication. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Aryadoust, Vahid
2020 “A Review of Comprehension Subskills: A Scientometrics Perspective.” System 88: 102180. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Aryadoust, Vahid, Hannah Ann Hui Tan, and Li Ying Ng
2019 “A Scientometric Review of Rasch Measurement: The Rise and Progress of a Specialty.” Frontiers in Psychology 10: 2197. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Baker, Mona
ed. 1998Routledge Encyclopedia of Translation Studies. London: Routledge.Google Scholar
2006Translation and Conflict: A Narrative Account. Abingdon: Routledge. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Bielsa, Esperança, and Susan Bassnett
2009Translation in Global News. New York: Routledge.Google Scholar
Brandes, Ulrik
2001 “A Faster Algorithm for Betweenness Centrality.” The Journal of Mathematical Sociology 25 (2): 163–177. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Canagarajah, A. Suresh
2013Critical Academic Writing and Multilingual Students. Michigan: University of Michigan Press.Google Scholar
Candel-Mora, Miguel A., and Chelo Vargas-Sierra
2013 “An Analysis of Research Production in Corpus Linguistics Applied to Translation.” Procedia – Social and Behavioral Sciences 95: 317–324. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Chen, Chaomei
2003Mapping Scientific Frontiers: The Quest for Knowledge Visualization. London: Springer. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
2016CiteSpace: A Practical Guide for Mapping Scientific Literature. Oxford: Nova Science Publishers.Google Scholar
2017 “Science Mapping: A Systematic Review of the Literature.” Journal of Data and Information Science 2 (2): 1–40. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Chen, Chaomei, Rachael Dubin, and Timothy Schultz
2014 “Science Mapping.” In Encyclopedia of Information Science and Technology, 3rd ed., edited by Mehdi Khosrow-Pour, vol. 6: 4171–4184. Hershey: IGI Global. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Chen, Chaomei, Fidelia Ibekwe-SanJuan, and Jianhua Hou
2010 “The Structure and Dynamics of Cocitation Clusters: A Multiple-Perspective Cocitation Analysis.” Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology 61 (7): 1386–1409. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Chen, Chaomei, and Min Song
2019 “Visualizing a Field of Research: A Methodology of Systematic Scientometric Reviews.” Plos One 14 (10): e0223994. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Chesterman, Andrew
2009 “The Name and Nature of Translator Studies.” In Translation Studies: Focus on the Translator, edited by Helle V. Dam and Karen Korning Zethsen, special issue of HERMES 42: 13–22.Google Scholar
2019 “Consilience or Fragmentation in Translation Studies Today?Slovo.ru: Baltic Accent 10 (1): 9–20.Google Scholar
Cronin, Michael
2003Translation and Globalization. Abingdon: Routledge.Google Scholar
De Bellis, Nicola
2014 “History and Evolution of (Biblio)Metrics.” In Beyond Bibliometrics: Harnessing Multidimensional Indicators of Scholarly Impact, edited by Blaise Cronin and Cassidy R. Sugimoto, 23–44. Cambridge: MIT Press.Google Scholar
Egghe, Leo
2006 “Theory and Practise of the g-Index.” Scientometrics 69 (1): 131–152. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Englund Dimitrova, Birgitta
2005Expertise and Explicitation in the Translation Process. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Fortunato, Santo, and Marc Barthélemy
2007 “Resolution Limit in Community Detection.” Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 104 (1): 36–41. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Franco Aixelá, Javier
2001–2021BITRA: Bibliography of Interpreting and Translation. https://​aplicacionesua​.cpd​.ua​.es​/tra​_int​/usu​/buscar​.asp​?idioma​=en
Freeman, Linton C.
1977 “A Set of Measures of Centrality Based on Betweenness.” Sociometry 40 (1): 35–41. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Gambier, Yves, and Luc van Doorslaer
eds. 2004–2021Translation Studies Bibliography (TSB). John Benjamins. https://​www​.benjamins​.com​/online​/tsb/
Garfield, Eugene
1965 “Can Citation Indexing Be Automated?” In Statistical Association Methods for Mechanised Documentation: Symposium Proceedings, Washington 1964, edited by Mary E. Stevens, Vincent E. Giuliano, and Laurence B. Heilprin, 189–192. Washington: National Bureau of Standards.Google Scholar
Gentzler, Edwin
2008Translation and Identity in the Americas: New Directions in Translation Theory. Abingdon: Routledge.Google Scholar
Gerges, Mina
2015Paradigms in Social Media Studies. MA thesis. Uppsala University.
Gile, Daniel
1994 “Opening up in Interpretation Studies.” In Translation Studies: An Interdiscipline: Selected Papers from the Translation Studies Congress, Vienna 1992, edited by Mary Snell-Hornby, Franz Pöchhacker, and Klaus Kaindl, 149–158. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
2000 “The History of Research into Conference Interpreting: A Scientometric Approach.” Target 12 (2): 297–321. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
2005 “Citation Patterns in the T&I Didactics Literature.” Forum 3 (2): 85–103. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
2015 “Analyzing Translation Studies with Scientometric Data: From CIRIN to Citation Analysis.” In Rovira-Esteva, Orero, and Aixelá (2015, 240–248). DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Grbic, Nadja
2007 “Where Do We Come from? What Are We? Where Are We Going? A Biblio-Metrical Analysis of Writing and Research on Sign Language and Interpreting.” The Sign Language Translator and Interpreter 1 (1): 15–51.Google Scholar
Grbić, Nadja
2013 “Bibliometrics.” In Handbook of Translation Studies, vol. 4, edited by Yves Gambier and Luc van Doorslaer, 20–24. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Grbić, Nadja, and Sonja Pöllabauer
2008a “Counting What Counts: Research on Community Interpreting in German-Speaking Countries – A Scientometric Study.” Target 20 (2): 297–332. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
2008b “To Count or Not to Count: Scientometrics as a Methodological Tool for Investigating Research on Translation and Interpreting.” Translation and Interpreting Studies 3 (1/2): 87–146. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
2008c “An Author-Centred Scientometric Analysis of Daniel Gile’s Œuvre.” In Efforts and Models in Interpreting and Translation Research: A Tribute to Daniel Gile, edited by Gyde Hansen, Andrew Chesterman, and Heidrun Gerzymisch-Arbogast, 3–24. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Gustafsson, Mika, Michael Hörnquist, and Anna Lombardi
2006 “Comparison and Validation of Community Structures in Complex Networks.” Physica A: Statistical Mechanics and its Applications 367: 559–576. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Hatim, Basil, and Jeremy Munday
2004Translation: An Advanced Resource Book. Abingdon: Routledge. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Hervais-Adelman, Alexis, and Laura Babcock
2020 “The Neurobiology of Simultaneous Interpreting: Where Extreme Language Control and Cognitive Control Intersect.” In Interpreting: A Window into Bilingual Processing, edited by Yanping Dong and Ping Li, special issue of Bilingualism: Language and Cognition 23 (4): 740–751. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Holmes, James
(1988) 2004 “The Name and Nature of Translation Studies.” In The Translation Studies Reader, 2nd ed., edited by Lawrence Venuti, 180–192. Abingdon: Routledge.Google Scholar
Kelly, Dorothy
2005A Handbook for Translator Trainers: A Guide to Reflective Practice. Manchester: St. Jerome.Google Scholar
Kiraly, Donald
2000A Social Constructivist Approach to Translator Education: Empowerment from Theory to Practice. Manchester: St. Jerome.Google Scholar
Kleinberg, Jon
2003 “Bursty and Hierarchical Structure in Streams.” Data Mining and Knowledge Discovery 7 (4): 373–397. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Koskinen, Kaisa
2014Translating Institutions: An Ethnographic Study of EU Translation. Abingdon: Routledge. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Kuhn, Thomas
1970The Structure of Scientific Revolutions. 2nd ed. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Latour, Bruno
1987Science in Action: How to Follow Scientists and Engineers through Society. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
Leydesdorff, Loet
2007 “Betweenness Centrality as an Indicator of the Interdisciplinarity of Scientific Journals.” Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology 58 (9): 1303–1319. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Li, Xiangdong
2015 “International Visibility of Mainland China Translation Studies Community: A Scientometric Study.” In Rovira-Esteva, Orero, and Aixelá (2015, 183–204). DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Lim, Mei Hui, and Vahid Aryadoust
2021 “A Scientometric Review of Research Trends in Computer-assisted Language Learning Research (1977–2020).” Computer Assisted Language Learning: 1–16. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Liu, Yanhua, and Guangwei Hu
2021 “Mapping the Field of English for Specific Purposes (1980–2018): A Co-Citation Analysis.” English for Specific Purposes 61: 97–116. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Luque Martínez, Teodoro
1995 “Líneas de investigación y bases de datos para la investigación [Lines of research and databases for research].” Investigaciones Europeas de Dirección y Economía de la Empresa [European Research on Business Management and Economics] 1 (2): 35–50.Google Scholar
Martín-Martín, Alberto, Enrique Orduna-Malea, Mike Thelwall, and Emilio Delgado López-Cózar
2018 “Google Scholar, Web of Science, and Scopus: A Systematic Comparison of Citations in 252 Subject Categories.” Journal of Informetrics 12 (4): 1160–1177. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Mead, Peter
2001 “Doctoral Work on Interpretation: A Supervisee’s Perspective.” In Getting Started in Interpreting Research: Methodological Reflections, Personal Accounts and Advice for Beginners, edited by Daniel Gile, Helle V. Dam, Friedel Dubslaff, and Bodil Martinsen, 121–143. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Mongeon, Philippe, and Adèle Paul-Hus
2016 “The Journal Coverage of Web of Science and Scopus: A Comparative Analysis.” Scientometrics 106 (1): 213–228. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Morris, Steven A., and Betsy van der Veer Martens
2008 “Mapping Research Specialties.” Annual Review of Information Science and Technology 42 (1): 213–295. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Munday, Jeremy
2016Introducing Translation Studies: Theories and Applications. 4th ed. Abingdon: Routledge. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Newman, Mark. E. J.
2006 “Modularity and Community Structure in Networks.” Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 103 (23): 8577–8582. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Nouraey, Peyman, and Amin Karimnia
2015 “The Map of Translation Studies in Modern Iran: An Empirical Investigation.” Asia Pacific Translation and Intercultural Studies 2 (2): 123–138. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Olohan, Maeve
2004Introducing Corpora in Translation Studies. Abingdon: Routledge. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Pfeffer, Jeffrey
1993 “Barriers to the Advance of Organizational Science: Paradigm Development as a Dependent Variable.” Academy of Management Review 18 (4): 599–620. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Piller, Ingrid
2016Linguistic Diversity and Social Justice: An Introduction to Applied Sociolinguistics. Oxford: Oxford University Press. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Pöchhacker, Franz
2004Introducing Interpreting Studies. London: Routledge. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
2009 “Issues in Interpreting Studies.” In Routledge Companion to Translation Studies, edited by Jeremy Munday, 128–150. Abingdon: Routledge.Google Scholar
Pym, Anthony
2010Exploring Translation Theories. Abingdon: Routledge.Google Scholar
Rousseeuw, Peter J.
1987 “Silhouettes: A Graphical Aid to the Interpretation and Validation of Cluster Analysis.” Journal of Computational and Applied Mathematics 20: 53–65. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Rovira-Esteva, Sara, Javier Franco Aixelá, and Christian Olalla-Soler
2019 “Citation Patterns in Translation Studies: A Format-Dependent Bibliometric Analysis.” Translation and Interpreting 11 (1): 147–171. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Rovira-Esteva, Sara, Raúl Coré, Ana Lopo, and Montserrat Varona
2013–2021RETI: Translation Studies Journals: Quality Indicators. Department of Translation and Interpreting & East Asian Studies, Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona. http://​www​.uab​.cat​/libraries​/reti
Rovira-Esteva, Sara, and Pilar Orero
2011 “A Contrastive Analysis of the Main Benchmarking Tools for Research Assessment in Translation and Interpreting: The Spanish Approach.” Perspectives 19 (3): 233–251. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Rovira-Esteva, Sara, Pilar Orero, and Javier Franco Aixelá
eds. 2015Bibliometric and Bibliographical Research in Translation Studies, special issue of Perspectives 23 (2).Google Scholar
Šajkevič, Anatolij J. A.
1992 “Bibliometric Analysis of Index Translationum .” Meta 37 (1): 67–96. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Saldanha, Gabriela, and Sharon O’Brien
2013Research Methodologies in Translation Studies. Manchester: St. Jerome.Google Scholar
Sánchez, Amador Durán, María de la Cruz Del Río Rama, and José Álvarez García
2017 “Bibliometric Analysis of Publications on Wine Tourism in the Databases Scopus and WoS.” European Research on Management and Business Economics 23 (1): 8–15. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Schneider, Jesper W.
2006 “Concept Symbols Revisited: Naming Clusters by Parsing and Filtering of Noun Phrases from Citation Contexts of Concept Symbols.” Scientometrics 68 (3): 573–593. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
2009 “Mapping of Cross-Reference Activity Between Journals by Use of Multidimensional Unfolding: Implications for Mapping Studies.” In Proceedings of ISSI 2009 – the 12th International Conference on Scientometrics and Informetrics, edited by Birger Larsen and Jacqueline Leta, 443–454. Rio de Janiero: BIREME/PAHO/WHO and Federal University of Rio de Janeiro.Google Scholar
Seidlhofer, Barbara
2011Understanding English as a Lingua Franca. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Shibata, Naoki, Yuya Kajikawa, and Katsumori Matsushima
2007 “Topological Analysis of Citation Networks to Discover the Future Core Articles.” Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology 58 (6): 872–882. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Small, Henry
1980 “Co-citation Context Analysis and the Structure of Paradigms.” Journal of Documentation 36 (3): 183–196. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
1986 “The Synthesis of Specialty Narratives from Co-Citation Clusters.” Journal of the American Society for information Science 37 (3): 97–110. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
2003 “Paradigms, Citations, and Maps of Science: A Personal History.” Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology 54 (5): 394–399. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Snell-Hornby, Mary
2006The Turns of Translation Studies: New Paradigms or Shifting Viewpoints? Amsterdam: John Benjamins. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
2010 “The Turns of Translation Studies.” In Handbook of Translation Studies, vol. 1, edited by Gambier, Yves, and Luc van Doorslaer: 366–370. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Toury, Gideon
1995Descriptive Translation Studies – And Beyond. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Trujillo, Caleb M., and Tammy M. Long
2018 “Document Co-Citation Analysis to Enhance Transdisciplinary Research.” Science Advances 4 (1): e1701130. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Tymoczko, Maria
2007Enlarging Translation, Empowering Translators. Manchester: St. Jerome.Google Scholar
Van Doorslaer, Luc
2007 “Risking Conceptual Maps: Mapping as a Keywords-Related Tool Underlying the Online Translation Studies Bibliography .” In The Metalanguage of Translation, edited by Yves Gambier and Luc van Doorslaer, special issue of Target 19 (2): 217–233. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Van Doorslaer, Luc, and Yves Gambier
2015 “Measuring Relationships in Translation Studies: On Affiliations and Keyword Frequencies in the Translation Studies Bibliography.” In Rovira-Esteva, Orero, and Aixelá (2015, 305–319). DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Van Leeuwen, Thed
2010 “Does Steering on Publication Behavior, by Stimulating the Publishing in High Impact Journals, Influences Impact Scores?” In Book of Abstracts of Eleventh International Conference on Science and Technology Indicators, Leiden 2010, prepared by Suze van der Luijt, 288–290. Leiden.Google Scholar
Venuti, Lawrence
1998The Scandals of Translation: Towards an Ethics of Difference. New York: Taylor & Francis. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
2008The Translator’s Invisibility: A History of Translation. 2nd ed. Abingdon: Routledge.Google Scholar
White, Howard D., and Belver C. Griffith
1981 “Author Cocitation: A Literature Measure of Intellectual Structure.” Journal of the American Society for Information Science 32 (3): 163–171. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
White, Howard D., and Katherine W. McCain
1998 “Visualizing a Discipline: An Author Co-Citation Analysis of Information Science, 1972–1995.” Journal of the American Society for Information Science 49 (4): 327–355.Google Scholar
Wolf, Michaela, and Alexandra Fukari
eds. 2007Constructing a Sociology of Translation. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Zanettin, Federico, Gabriela Saldanha, and Sue-Ann Harding
2015 “Sketching Landscapes in Translation Studies: A Bibliographic Study.” In Rovira-Esteva, Orero, and Aixelá (2015, 161–182). DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Zhang, Meifang, Hanting Pan, Xi Chen, and Tian Luo
2015 “Mapping Discourse Analysis in Translation Studies via Bibliometrics: A Survey of Journal Publications.” In Rovira-Esteva, Orero, and Aixelá (2015, 223–239). DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Zitt, Michel, Suzy Ramanana-Rahary, and Elise Bassecoulard
2005 “Relativity of Citation Performance and Excellence Measures: From Cross-Field to Cross-Scale Effects of Field-Normalisation.” Scientometrics 63 (2): 373–401. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Zuckerman, Harriet
1987 “Citation Analysis and the Complex Problem of Intellectual Influence.” Scientometrics 12 (5–6): 329–338. DOI logoGoogle Scholar