Collaborative Translation

Le livre est composé de trois parties : une préface établissant une typologie des rapports entre auteur et traducteur ; douze études de cas, confiée chacune à un universitaire spécialiste à la fois de traductologie et de l’auteur en question ; une anthologie composée d’une trentaine de documents (lettres, manuscrits révisés, témoignages) relatifs à ce type de collaboration.

This thesis presents a qualitative study on the processes of user-generated crowdsourced collaborative translation in Yeeyan, China’s largest online translation community. Collaborative translation is still a relatively emergent area of scholarship and research so far has focused mainly on audiovisual translation practice. Studies which focus on the co-production of written texts mostly provide only a fragmented picture and treat collaborative translation as a linear process. In this thesis, I examine the translation initiated and undertaken by two or more volunteer translators who collaboratively produce a translated text, focusing on how they interact with each other, who they are, why they participate, and what meanings they give to their behaviour. Adopting an ethnographic methodology, I have conducted longitudinal in-depth fieldwork in Yeeyan, using the methods of participant observation and interactive interview. Three types of data are collected: 1) fieldnotes; 2) the material resources archived on the Yeeyan website and the translation manuscripts; and 3) elicited interview data. After my preliminary thematic analysis, I undertake a micro-level discourse analysis, examining the participants’ behaviours, decision-making processes, emerging identity roles and perceptions on competence as they unfolded during the collaboration process. Primarily informed by Wenger’s “communities of practice” theory (CoP theory), the analysis reveals that Yeeyan is first a participatory media platform which provides Chinese readers with access to knowledge and information not available in their mother language, as well as allowing its users to play an active role in the production and circulation of the media content. More profoundly, Yeeyan is an online CoP where a crowd of translators from different professional and disciplinary backgrounds interact with each other regularly for the shared practices they are passionate about and for the shared enterprises they care for. The findings suggest that the process of collaborative translation in Yeeyan is de facto an experience of meaning negotiation. First, competence in a CoP is obtained through mutual recognition from other members as a result of their active and continuous participation. Second, meanings in Yeeyan are not static, but are dynamically negotiated between the participants, depending on the genre of the text being translated, which specialized expertise the translators possess, how competent they are in the Yeeyan community, and what meanings they intend to give to their behaviours individually and collectively. Third, a CoP like Yeeyan is also a complex social learning system which consists of multiple interrelated sub-communities. Yeeyan members’ endeavour to solve translation problems and thereby increase their competence also contributes to forming a shared history of learning. Beyond these findings, this thesis also makes broader methodological and theoretical contributions. It demonstrates how the use of an immersive ethnographic methodology, hitherto seldom applied in the TS field, can provide more holistic insights into translators’ interactions, translation manuscripts and the entire collaboration process. The use of CoP theory offers us a new perspective that explains collaborative translation as a social practice through which – and to which – the participants ascribe meanings in the process of translating and interacting.

This article examines the processes of online collaborative translation, focusing on the various roles the participants play through their mutual engagement. To enhance our understanding of collaborative translation, Yeeyan, the platform where it takes place, is theorized as a broad community of practice consisting of multiple sub-communities. Supported by Yeeyan's participatory mechanisms, the participants engaging in the collaborative translation actively perform specific roles. Drawing on ethnographic data collected from fieldwork in Yeeyan, a set of materials are analyzed in a holistic manner: online materials documenting Yeeyan's community structure, five Yeeyaners' profiles, parts of the translation manuscripts and two excerpts of the interactions between the participants. The analysis, premised on the theory of communities of practice, reveals that collaborative translation in online translation communities like Yeeyan is an experience of meaning negotiation through which the participants play a variety of roles at different stages as they engage in the shared practice.

KEYWORDS: Collaborative translation, translation process, communities of practice, meaning negotiation, identity roles, ethnography

The ethnographic approach to literary translation offers, undoubtedly, many avenues yet to be explored. If we can consider translation to be a perpetual search for a possibility, dialogic translation consists of waging with the 'other'-be they present physically and/or metaphysically-the battle for meaning. The n'zassa approach has no aim but to both reinforce the translator's visibility and build a trustworthy relationship with (trans)readers. I argue that every translation act is-or should be-based, to some extent, on a n'zassa approach, which sees translation practice as a collaborative activity, and its product, a collective construct wherein writers, translators and readers are Meaning Weavers. Each text carries an embryo of such an encounter, which stems from and results in mutual influences. With regard to the relation ethnography-translation, Buzelin (2004, 2005), Ferreira (2014, 2017) and Wolf 's (2000) discussions prove fundamental. I conclude that Adiaffi's n'zassa, read through the lens of Latour's (2008) ant, helps reduce information lost and gives the translator a type of immediate collective acceptance. It is only through dialogue between subjects and forms, between divergent and convergent choices in the practice of translation that one can strive for a real and inclusive knowledge economy.



N'zassa: de l'approche collaborative à la traduction vers une construction collective

Résumé:

L'approche ethnographique à la traduction offre, sans aucun doute, de nombreuses pistes à explorer. Si l'on considère la traduction comme une perpétuelle quête de possibilité, la traduction dialogique consiste donc à engager avec l'autre-puisse celui-ci être présent physiquement et/ou métaphysiquement-la bataille du sens. L'approche n'zassa vise non seulement à renforcer la visibilité du traducteur mais à construire une relation de confiance avec les translecteurs. Je défends que tout acte traductif est-ou devrait être-à certains égards, mené à partir d'une approche n'zassa qui voit en la pratique traductive une activité collaborative et son pro-duit, une construction collective à laquelle les écrivains, les traducteurs et les lecteurs prennent part en tant que tisseurs de sens. Chaque texte porte ainsi un foetus de cette rencontre qui découle et se somme par des influences mutuelles. Pour ce qui concerne la relation ethnographie-traduction, les travaux de Buzelin (2004, 2005), Ferreira (2014, 2017) et ceux de Wolf (2000) ont été fondamentaux. Je conclus que le n'zassa adiaffien lu à travers le prisme de la tar permet de réduire la perte d'informations permettant au traducteur de jouir d'une forme d'acceptation collective spontanée. Ce n'est qu'à travers le dialogue entre sujets et formes, entre choix divergents et/ou convergents opérés au cours du processus de traduction que l'on peut espérer une économie de savoir réelle et inclusive.

The initial objective of the present study was to identify the most and the least frequent error types in Google Translate (GT) raw outputs and the crowd(sourced) post-edited versions according to Vilar et al.’s (2006) typology. The second objective was to compare the results of error analysis between both outputs in order to address the significance of the decrease in the number of errors in post-edited texts. To this end, four English sports news texts were uploaded on Google Translator Toolkit (GTT), which is an online collaborative environment for post-editing the automatic translations rendered by GT. Subsequently, eleven M.A. students of translation studies which were categorized as unprofessional translators were invited to the online environment via email to modify the machine translations. Results of the error analysis revealed that the two categories of Incorrect Words and Unknown Words were respectively the most and the least frequent error types in both outputs. The study also showed less than fifty percent decrease in the number of errors in post-edited texts. However, some effective factors for improving the quality of crowd(sourced) post-edited outputs and the applicability of GTT were investigated based on the collected literature, an online interview with participants and the researchers’ own observations.

The scholarship on collaborative translation has considered an ever-increasing number of methods by which we might alleviate some of the inveterate predicaments of solo translation, most often relating to online crowdsourcing and digital and socio-digital affordances in the translation process (Alfer 2017; Cerezo 2017; Cole et al. 2016; Cordingley and Frigau Manning 2017; David 2017; Jiménez-Crespo 2017; Park 2015; Puzio et al. 2013; Puzio, Keyes and and Jiménez 2016). This article, however, is dedicated to various aspects of the micro-sociology of collaborative translation in a primarily offline community, a form of sociality that involves its own built-in affordances and particular obstacles. Bringing these to light in an auto-ethnographic way, it draws from the author’s participant observations of a collaborative translation into English of the German-language novel In deinen Worten (In Your Words) by Zafer Şenocak. As is the case in any signature literary aesthetics, Şenocak’s writing comprises manifold idiosyncratic phrases and neologisms, as well as archaic terms, which in this case reference his own transnational, multilingual background in complex symbolic, political, and practical ways. An analysis of the experience highlights the role of certain translation-resistant moments, dubbed ‘Zaferisms’ by the translation team, which provoked challenges in the process and as a result were a primary means by which the team became a truly “collaborative” community of practice. This article will focus on the multilingual, social negotiation that took place around these terms and based on this will propose a general method for bilingual team translation, one which faces up to the problems of literary translation in a collaborative and socially hermeneutic way.

http://www.archivescontemporaines.com/books/9782813003089

Résumé :
Cette contribution se propose d’examiner les cas borderline, c’est-à-dire les phénomènes qui s’apparentent à l’autotraduction sans en constituer des cas typiques. Au-delà d’une définition classique (et basique) de l’autotraduction, nous serons amenés à réfléchir à ce qu’est l’autotraduction et à ce qu’elle n’est pas. Deux phénomènes seront examinés plus particulièrement. D’abord la traduction collaborative qui met en relation un traducteur et un écrivain fortement impliqué dans le processus, constituant ainsi une zone grise entre traduction collaborative et autotraduction. En second lieu, nous établirons une distinction entre l’écriture simultanée (un écrivain bilingue produit, en même temps, deux œuvres distinctes dans deux langues) et l’autotraduction à proprement parler, où nous voyons quant à nous une manifestation de l’écriture consécutive.

Mots Clefs : autotraduction, traduction collaborative, processus de création, écriture consécutive, écriture simultanée

Abstract :

This paper aims to examine borderline cases, i.e. practices having to do with self-translation without constituting typical cases of it. Beyond a classical (and indeed basic) definition of self-translation, we will consider what self-translation is – and what it is not. We will focus on two practices in particular. First, we will examine collaborative translation involving a translator and a fully engaged author, thus creating a grey zone between collaborative translation and self-translation. Second, we will distinguish between simultaneous writing (a bilingual author writing, at the same time, two distinct works in two different languages) and self-translation proper, which to us is rather an instance of onsecutive writing.

Keywords : self-translation, collaborative translation, creative process, simultaneous writing, consecutive writing

A produção poética em língua italiana de Giuseppe Ungaretti entre os anos 1919 e 1952 conhece, em 1954, com o apoio do também poeta Jean Lescure, sua versão em língua francesa intitulada Les Cinq Livres. Refletindo principalmente sobre a função de prefácio na edição francesa e observando os documentos atualmente acessíveis do seu processo de criação como o rascunho datiloscrito da obra, as cartas trocadas entre Ungaretti e Lescure e o diário que fala da experiência tradutória vivida por Jean Lescure, este estudo (re)percorre e analisa os mecanismos e os critérios utilizados para a elaboração dessas apresentações e alguns aspectos peculiares de uma tradução feita a quatro mãos.

Palavras-chave: Processos de criação; Tradução; Prefácio, Ungaretti; Lescure.

This study aims to analyse the creative process of literary collaboration and, more specifically, of collaborative translation from the theoretical and methodological perspective of genetic criticism applied to translation studies (genetic translation studies). Saint-John Perse's poem Amers (1956) was translated into English by the American translator and literary scholar Wallace Fowlie in 1957. The manuscripts of this translation, which present the main focus of this article, are kept in the archive of the Saint-John Perse Foundation in Aix-en-Provence (France), and reveal the genesis of a collaborative translation: Wallace Fowlie's manuscript is paralleled by the work of an unofficial translator, John Marshall, whose manuscript appears to be the closest to the inal version. Both manuscripts show the handwritten suggestions, corrections, and variants of the poet himself. Spanning the various stages of the writing process from which the generation of this collaborative translation progressively emerges, the two manuscripts show a fascinating interaction that reveals Saint-John Perse's poetic art.

« "Uku kuarasy sẽmba koty : là-bas, du côté du soleil levant". Les Martyrs du Japon expliqués en langue guarani par un cacique prédicateur (Réductions jésuites du Paraguay, XVIIIe siècle) », Séminaire d'Histoire des Mondes Ibériques et Ibéro-Américains organisé par François Godicheau (UT2J – FRAMESPA), Toulouse, Univesité Toulouse Jean Jaurès, 25 février 2019

« Un long Moyen Âge amérindien ? Interroger les récits exemplaires traduits en guarani dans les missions jésuites du Paraguay (XIIIe – XVIIIe siècles) », Séminaire Interroger sa source dans les Études Ibériques, Ibéro-américaines et Romanes, organisé par Émilie Cadez et Shems Kasmi (UT2J – CEIIBA), Toulouse, Université Toulouse Jean Jaurès, 1er février 2019

“El bestiario hispano-guaraní de las misiones jesuíticas del Paraguay (1609-1768). ¿Un reto traductológico al margen del hispanismo?”, École Doctorale thématique Nouveaux chemins de l’hispanisme organisée par Louise Bénat-Tachot (Sorbonne Université – CLEA), Pierre Civil (Université Sorbonne Nouvelle – LECEMO) et Pilar Martínez-Vasseur (Université de Nantes – CRINI), Madrid, Casa de Velázquez, 16-17 octobre 2018

“De falsos dioses y divinas fieras: panteón grecorromano, bestiario medieval y traducción de relatos ejemplares (exempla) al guaraní en las misiones jesuíticas del Paraguay”, symposium Dios(es) y diablo(s). La traducción de conceptos cristianos e indígenas en textos religiosos de las Américas organisé par Sabine Dedenbach-Salazar Saénz et Katja Hanss, 56eme ICA, Salamanque, Université de Salamanque, 20 juillet 2018

“¿Un punto ciego para la historia de la traducción en Hispanoamérica? El guaraní en las misiones jesuíticas del Paraguay y su relevancia para la cultura letrada rioplatense”, symposium Traducción y mediación transcultural como matrices para la comprensión del discurso e identidad de Hispanoamérica organisé par Catherine Poupeney-Hart et Roberto Viereck Salinas, 56eme ICA, Salamanque, Université de Salamanque, 17 juillet 2018