Multiple voices in the translation classroom : activities, tasks, and projects

Abstract

The main aim of this book is to provide teaching ideas that can be adapted to different learning environments and that can be used with different language combinations. The pedagogical approach and the activities, tasks and projects are based on Communicative. Humanistic and Socioconstructivist principles: the students are actively involved in their learning process by making decisions and interacting with each other in a classroom setting that is a discussion forum and hands-on workshop. Clear aims are specified for the activities, which move from the most rudimentary level of the word, to the more complicated issues of syntax and, finally, to those of cultural difference. Moreover, they attempt to synthesize various translation theories, not only those based on linguistics, but those derived from cultural studies as well. This volume will be of interest to translation teachers, to foreign language teachers who wish to include translation in their classes, to graduates and professional translators interested in becoming teachers, and also to administrators exploring the possibility of starting a new translation programme. Acknowledgments; This book is dedicated to the two people who first believed in my work, Phil Banks and Alan Duff. Special thanks also go to Mike Maudsley, Michele Pereira, Robin Rycroft and Suzanne Clack from the Escola d'Idiomes Moderns at the University of Barcelona, where it all began. I am also very grateful to all those who have read the manuscript and offered many useful comments: Eugene Nida, Lawrence Venuti, Sheila Waldeck, Martha Tennent, Rosa Tirado, Montse Catala, Maria Luz Celaya and Pilar Godayol. I would also like to express my thanks to the two anonymous reviewers of this volume for their advice, as well as to Xus Ugarte and Lucrecia Keim for the French and German versions of the activities. I am also indebted to the enthusiasm and generous collaboration of my students, and to the support of my colleagues at the Facultat de Ciencies Humanes, Traduccio i Documentacio at the University of Vic. My greatest debt is to my family, especially Josep Enric, Carlos, Juan and Fermin, for their encouragement and support, and for understanding about the time we could have spent together.