Lacruz, Isabel and Jääskeläinen, Riitta (eds) (2018). Innovation and Expansion in Translation Process Research. Amsterdam/Philadelphia: John Benjamins (American Translators Association Scholarly Monograph Series, XVIII), pp. 302, €95/$143. ISBN: 978 9027231956.

In the past decades, there has been a clear shift in language and linguistics research: formalism has given way to cognitivism, thereby connecting language to its contexts of use and also to its users. It is no wonder that – language being at the core of translation and interpreting – such a shift has also been witnessed in Translation Studies (TS), particularly in Translation Process Research (TPR). This trend is clearly reflected in Innovation and Expansion in Translation Process Reseach, a publication from the American Translators Association that gathers selected papers from the panel “New Directions on Cognitive and Empirical Tranlsation Research” delivered at the 2015 International Association for Translation and Intercultural Studies (IATIS) Congress held in Brazil as well as invited papers.

The variety of topics and applied methodologies in the twelve articles reflects how TPR has greatly evolved. This is summarised very well in Chapter 1 by Jääskeläinen and Lacruz. In Chapter 2, Angelone discusses how to best approach problems in translation by examining both the product and the process involved. In Chapter 3, Shreve, Angelone and Lacruz debate how the concept of expertise could be better suited than the concept of competence to conduct research on and describe the cognitive and psychological value of translation.

Talking about the psychological value of translation means connecting research into the translation process to translators themselves. While this has been done before, the work in this book focuses on aspects not traditionally investigated, like the physiopsychological aspects of translators, such as affect and emotions. Several chapters in the book successfully do so. In Chapter 4, using eye movement, keylogging and translation product data, Hvelplund and Dragsted explore the differences and similarities that can be observed when specialised translators translate texts that belong and do not belong to their genre of specialisation. Their study demonstrates how triangulation of methods is a rigorous way of obtaining data. In Chapter 5, Hubscher-Davidson investigates whether there is a link between tolerance of ambiguity, emotional intelligence and job satisfaction using validated tools developed by psychologists. The use of such tools (e.g. the TEIQue developed by Petrides (2009)) strengthens the results in areas not previously studied in TS. In Chapter 6, Rojo and Ramos Caro examine how different types of feedback – negative or positive – influence creativity and accuracy in translation for students and professional translators, thereby giving empirical weight to discussing how providing feedback to professional translators – which they seldom get – could be beneficial. In Chapter 7, Haro-Soler analyses the perceptions of students about self-efficacy and explores how increasing self-efficacy improves the students’ abilities and confidence. This is another area previously untapped in TS.

A book on TPR would not be complete without discussing machine translation (MT). Therefore, it is no surprise that there are three chapters related to this topic. Chapter 8, by Schwartz, gives a precise and concise history of MT without forgetting to analyse the place for both machines and humans in MT usage. In Chapter 9, Michael et al. examine empirically how MT can be used to enhance translation training with undergraduate students. The results show that students benefit from using MT (even when the MT output is poor) as it helps them extract information from texts. In Chapter 10, Lacruz reviews the post-editing model developed by Lacruz et al. (2012) and proposes that early post-editing differs from later post-editing. In early post-editing, editors require more time to identify segments that require editing than those that do not. In late-editing, editors identify the type of corrections needed.

The last two chapters of the book focus on cognition and editing. In Chapter 11, Law and Kruger explore the reading behaviour of professional editors and non-editors – who are not translators – when they read a text for comprehension or for editing purposes, expanding the scope of research beyond translators to include other agents. Kruger et al., in Chapter 12, conduct a very innovative empirical study that uses mixed methods (EEG, eye-tracking and self-reporting) to assess how best to use subtitles on the screen. What makes these studies particularly valuable is the breadth and depth of tools and methodologies used as well as the aspects explored and participants recruited.

Innovation and Expansion in Translation Process Reseach aims to “reflect on the expanding scope of TPR; the innovation and advances in terms of methodologies and the expansion of research topics and questions, and the recent increase in research efforts by reaching out to adjacent fields of research” (5). This is exactly what it does, being accessible to and relevant for both students, professionals and researchers in TS. As TPR is a recent research field in TS, some of the results in the book are not as robust as they could be. The empirical work needs to be further investigated to ensure the robustness of the findings; for instance, studies must be replicated, the number of participants increased and the variety of participants recruited expanded. However, this book is a welcome addition to the expanding literature on TPR: it demonstrates innovative ways of conducting research in TPR and raises the profile of the field.

References

Sarah Berthaud
Galway International Hotel School, Galway-Mayo Institute of Technology
E-mail: sarah.berthaud@gmit.ie