Motivating the translation-development nexus: exploring cases from the African Continent

Abstract

Translation and interpreting phenomena in development contexts are shaped by local and global affordances and constraints. In order better to understand these phenomena as meaningful attempts to overcome language barriers or manage complex multilingualism, the authors present an interdisciplinary framework incorporating concepts from both development studies and translation studies. The authors argue that a development perspective allows translation scholars to study translation and interpreting practices that have so far been neglected by the discipline. Africa in particular presents many instances of informal or ad hoc language mediation that might be dismissed hastily as examples of unprofessional or inaccurate translation if one fails to account for the affordances and constraints that make them meaningful adaptations to local development tasks. To illustrate this point, the authors draw on different examples from conference interpreting, public service interpreting, and the informal economy in Africa, which they analyse using this interdisciplinary framework.