Extended translation: Socio-cognitive translation processes in the workplace

The project studies the cognitive aspects of the translation process while taking account of the technological and social embeddedness of the translators involved in their real working environments. The primary objective of the research is to expand the established tradition of experimental translation process research with an ethnographic approach in order to boost the ecological validity of findings and extend the process research object. An extension of the research object of this nature presents translation as a socio-cognitive, embodied interaction between people and artefacts. To achieve this, the research will focus both on the situative cognitive processes found in the translation process and on the interaction between translators and those actors and artefacts relevant to a translation project.

The research is being conducted in the form of a multi-case study using participative observation and interviews with (1) two freelance translators, (2) one translation agency, (3) a translation department in a public sector company, and (4) a technical communication department in a technology company and its external translation agency. The qualitative analysis of the data is supplemented by the development and use of appropriate process and network visualisations.