Book review. Dialog als Prinzip. Für eine emanzipatorische Praxis und Didaktik des Dolmetschens (Translationswissenschaft 6). Tübingen: Narr-Francke-Attempto, 2011. 184 Seiten ISBN 978-3-8233-6561-7 €39
Table of contents
Dialog als Prinzip is the sixth volume in a German book series Translationswissenschaft (published by Narr and edited by Klaus Kaindl and Franz Pöchhacker) and the first monograph in this series to focus specifically on interpreting didactics. Translationswissenschaft presents publications on a wide range of innovative topics and approaches in translation studies (TS). Dialog als Prinzip is very much in line with this overall focus of the series: it takes a novel stance on modern translation didactics, specifically interpreting didactics. One primary objective of the book, as indicated in the blurb, is to demonstrate how elements gleaned from theatre pedagogy can be incorporated into modern translation didactics and be applied to interpreter training. The combination of TS concepts with ideas from theatre pedagogy makes the book highly interdisciplinary. The author, in fact, pleads for an “integrative approach,” which should not be limited to simply “adding” the findings of different disciplines to TS, but instead focus on merging extra-disciplinary concepts with TS (54–55). She argues that elements of theatre pedagogy allow students to develop greater flexibility, the ability to accept and make best use of criticism, as well as expressiveness, and ultimately help to produce self-confident, responsible translators/interpreters who are able to take well-founded decisions in a variety of interpreting situations (55).
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