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Public Translation Studies in the

ClassroomKaisa Koskinen

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aUniversity of Eastern Finland, Finland

Published online: 12 Feb 2014.

To cite this article:Kaisa Koskinen (2012) Public Translation Studies in the Classroom, The

Interpreter and Translator Trainer, 6:1, 1-20, DOI: 10.1080/13556509.2012.10798827

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The Interpreter and Translator Trainer 6(1), 2012, 1-20

ISSN: 1750-399X St. Jerome Publishing, Manchester

Public Translation Studies in the Classroom

Kaisa Koskinen

University of Eastern Finland, Finland

Abstract. This article describes a case study where students of

an MA-level research methods course were invited to engage

in a participatory learning experience in the spirit of critical

pedagogy. During the course, the matrix originally designed by

Michael Burawoy to describe the four fields of sociology (profes-

sional, critical, policy and public sociology) was presented andadapted to translation studies. The notion of public translation

studies was then used to enhance the students awareness of the

dialogic possibilities of research to engage with different publics.

This engagement was put into practice in a small-scale assign-

ment designed both to introduce fieldwork methods and to bring

the students lived experiences into the classroom for discussion

and debate. The framework of critical pedagogy and public

translation studies was found to offer many opportunities to resist

the marketization and commodification forces currently shaping

contemporary university education. It also offered an empowering

opportunity to create a more democratic and dialogic learning

environment.

Keywords.Public translation studies, Critical pedagogy, Participatory learn-

ing, Reflexivity, Ethics, Research methodology.

The classroom remains the most radical space of possibilityin the academy. (bell hooks 1994:12)

The past decade has been turbulent both in the professional field of translat-

ing and interpreting, as well as in academia. As translator trainers have been

trying to keep up with the industrialization of the translation markets and

the expanding professional profile and rapidly developing technologization

of the field, they have also had to find ways of coming to terms with the

marketization and neoliberal commodification of the university taking place

at least throughout the European Union, and very likely worldwide. These

developments unavoidably have an impact on the training and education we

deliver, whether or not we consciously take action to mitigate or accelerate

the effects of these changes.

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2 Public Translation Studies in the Classroom

This dual challenge for the translation scholar-cum-trainer experienced

both as a set of exogenic pressures from the professional field and as a

set of endogenic pressures from within academic governance forms the

landscape where the case described in this article came into being. Initially,

this undertaking was a question of my personal motivation. Turbulence in

the professional world made me reflect on whose side I was truly on if I

participated in supplying new labour to translation markets that seemed to

become more and more unstable, precarious and non-lucrative for graduates.

At the same time, I have had to rethink my role as a (translation) scholar in

the increasingly neo-liberal university: Will I accept the new requirements of

churning out research and bringing in funding money by proposing projects

that are standardized and easily convertible into milling refereed international

articles, or are there substantive reasons to resist this trend?Clearly, these questions are not specific to translation studies, but affect

everyone involved in any field of contemporary university education. Within

sociology I found a discourse that also made sense of my own experiences

in translation studies. In 2004, Michael Burawoy had called for more en-

gagement in public sociology. His matrix of sociology immediately seemed

applicable in translation studies too, and following his cue I coined the term

public translation studies (Koskinen 2010). Public translation studies refers

to research directed outside the university, and executed in a reflexive man-

ner and in dialogue with the community in question. At first, the notion ofpublic translation studies only functioned as a meaningful category for the

classification of a number of existing and emergent research projects and

towards which I could also redirect my own research activities. However,

I soon realized that my questions of motivation were not far removed from

my students state of mind.

My question, put bluntly, was: What is the point of being a trainer or an

academic? Translation students typically turn towards the practical profes-

sion. Their question is often: What is the point of conducting research? This,

in fact, was my question too, although we approached the question from twodifferent angles. My motivation issues were related to the increased pres-

sure on academics to engage in quantifiable research activity as opposed to

meaningful research that can improve our understanding of the world we live

in; students of translating and interpreting, on the other hand, eager to enter

the world translation studies aims to describe and understand, often tend to

see research as an unnecessary hindrance, certainly not as an opportunity to

develop skills that could support them in their life outside the university, let

alone as a meaningful undertaking in itself.

As students reach the MA level, where the requirements of independentresearch increase, particularly in the form of the MA dissertation, they also

tend to become increasingly anxious about their employment prospects

upon graduation. The notion of public translation studies had appealed to

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Kaisa Koskinen 3

me earlier because of its focus on pragmatic and down-to-earth research in

dialogue with the field, and its developmental, and even activist, emphasis

on improvingthat field. It now made sense to assume that it might well also

spark a positive response in my students. I thus decided to introduce the

matrix designed by Burawoy in the advanced research methodology course

for translation students. To summarize, my main reasons for including the

matrix were:

(1) to offer a model that can help us to make more sense of the field of

translation studies, given that the field often appears chaotic and con-

fusing, particularly to the novice researcher;

(2) to explicitly advance research agendas that reach out to extra-academic

audiences;

(3) to foster critical attitudes by introducing a model where reflexivity is

a central factor;

(4) to facilitate discussions about the various aims and motivating factors

for different researcher personalities, and

(5) to open up the issue of research ethics to questions of responsibility

and accountability beyond the academy.

The case described in this article draws on the Methods in Translation

Studies course I taught for two successive years at the University of Tam-pere, Finland (in 2009 and 2010). During the course, the concept of public

translation studies was introduced, and students were also asked to attempt a

small-scale fieldwork experiment. This article reports my own reflections as

well as student feedback received on these efforts to respond to contemporary

moral and political challenges at a very practical level, trying to find ways

to link academia and the real world. The approach to teaching adopted is

political and overtly ethical;1 it is related to a particular pedagogical phi-

losophy known as critical pedagogy, or radical education, which aims at

empowering students by way of a dialogic and critical approach. The notionsof public sociology and public translation studies as well as critical pedagogy

are explained briefly in the following sections, followed by a discussion of

the actual case study.

1. Public translation studies

Public translation studies is a neologism coined by myself and based on

Michael Burawoys matrix of sociology. In his presidential address to the

American Sociological Association in 2004, Burawoy (2005) divided thefield of sociology into four subfields: professional, critical, policy and public

1Education is always and unavoidably political, but the moral and ideological underpin-

nings of curricula work are not always brought to the forefront in class.

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sociology. Each is characterized by a particular combination of audience (aca-

demic vs extra-academic) and type of knowledge (instrumental vs reflexive).

The resulting matrix of the four subfields is shown in Table 1.

Academic audience Extra-academic audience

Instrumental knowledge Professional Policy

Reflexive knowledge Critical Public

Table 1. Division of academic labour (Burawoy 2005)

According to Burawoy, these four subfields are antagonistically interdepend-

ent (2005:4). That is, their tasks and values are different, and tensions often

exist between them due to their different aims and ideologies, yet the fieldis not properly functional without all of them.Professional sociologyis the

scientific field of empirical and theoretical explorations, guided by scientific

norms and assessed by peer review. It is the source of tested methods, ac-

cumulated knowledge, orienting questions and conceptual frameworks from

the field, and thesine qua nonfor all other subfields (ibid.:10). However,

it runs the risk of becoming too rigid and too wrapped up in itself, focusing

on abstract empiricism or grand theorizing. Its values and research agendasabstract empiricism or grand theorizing. Its values and research agendasIts values and research agendas

thus need to be constantly re-examined and renewed by critical sociology,

the heart and the collective conscience of the discipline (ibid.:10-11).These two subfields professional sociology and critical sociology are

both rooted firmly within academia, address academic audiences, and do

not present a radical departure from other descriptions of the division of

academic labour. The other vertical axis of the matrix is more intriguing

because it is more controversial. It consists of two subfields, both addressing

extra-academic audiences.Policy sociologyis the pragmatic service sector,

providing research-based practical solutions to the problems of its clients

(agencies, organizations, corporations). Its more critical and self-reflexive

counterpart ispublic sociology, a dialogic and activist mode of engaging in

conversation with the communities outside academia and co-creating new

knowledge or development interventions together with extra-academic au-

diences. Burawoys main focus is public sociology. In fact, his paper is a

plea for more committed approaches, and he explicitly ties this commitment

to contemporary social reality and the need to reinforce the moral fibre

of sociology (ibid.:5). Public sociology can be practised in its traditional

form, one that used to be called popularizing, and Burawoy argues for a

continued need for that. At the same time it is clear that his main emphasisis on organicpublic sociologies, where the approach is more dialogic (e.g.

Burawoy 2004).

Burawoy first introduced his matrix to describe the state of affairs in

sociology in the United States. Although one needs to take into account the

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Kaisa Koskinen 5

local context, the matrix itself is in no way restricted either to the United

States or to sociology, and it has been applied to chart disciplines as disparate

as psychiatry, philosophy, international relations and law.2I have described

elsewhere in greater detail how the matrix could be applied in translation

studies (Koskinen 2010). Burawoy (2007) argues that in our times, when

everything is marketized and commodified, public sociology is particularly

necessary. I argue that public translation studies is equally important, and

that Burawoys schematic matrix can help us discern and appreciate the

various branches of research and researcher involvement, and render visible

the numerous efforts in public translation studies already taking place. The

matrix, as I have adapted it to translation studies, is shown in Table 2.

Academic audience Extra-academic audience

Instrumental

knowledge

Scientific TS3

Descriptions

Testing of hypotheses

Experimental methods

BRAIN

Pragmatic TS4

Tailor-made projects

Commissioned research

Reports

Policy papers

HANDS

Reflexive

knowledge

Critical TS

Critical analysis of an existing

theoretical framework

Locating gaps in TS

TS and ethics

TS and ideology

HEART

Public TS

Grassroots projects

Lived experiences

Engagement with the field

Action research

BODY

Table 2. The four fields of translation studies

2See http://burawoy.berkeley.edu/PS.Webpage/ps.applications.htm (accessed 9 Febru-See http://burawoy.berkeley.edu/PS.Webpage/ps.applications.htm (accessed 9 Febru-

ary 2012).3I use the term Scientific TS in Table 2 in order to avoid any confusion with the two

right-hand side matrix subfields related to the professional T/I community, with which the

researcher engages. The concept of professional translation studies might also be used to

denote a subfield that promotes guild issues related to translating, interpreting and T/Iresearch (cf. Smith 2008:344 on the four fields of psychiatry).4Similarly, I use the term Pragmatic TS to distinguish translation studies from sociology,

which is more directly involved with political processes and projects of social engineering.

In translation studies, partners also include private sector companies.

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The scientific subfield of translation studies is the core of the discipline

(according to Burawoy, its brain), and it includes research agendas such

as descriptive translation studies (with or without corpora), experimental

research, quantitative studies and the like. The task of critical translation

studies is to assess the scientific subfield, critically highlighting its shortcom-

ings. Feminist and postcolonial approaches are well-known examples of this

subfield. One can also include in this quadrant the more recently emerging

voices that argue against the Western domination of translation studies (e.g.

Tymoczko 2007; on critical translation studies, see also Koskinen 2004).

Whereas the two subfields mentioned above are concerned with aca-

demic audiences, the other two subfields reach out to audiences beyond the

university. We participate in pragmatic (or policy) translation studies when

we draft recommendations or sit on committees for improving particular

translation practices, when a community commissions us for a research

project that they need, or when we engage in other projects where the goals

are set by the commissioner. This is the hands-on subfield, where academic

research findings are brought in to inform the practices in the field. Public

translation studies is similarly engaged with extra-academic audiences, but

rather than serving commercial businesses or political leaders, this subfield

aims at direct contact with those involved in translating and interpreting at

the grassroots level, not with the decision-makers. Burawoys body metaphor

for this subfield indicates that research often entails an embodied immer-

sion in the activities, either as an observer or as an actual participant. Public

translation studies can include (and has indeed included), for example, the

following: workplace studies of translators in the new market economy; ac-

tion research aiming to improve and develop the existing situation; pressing

issues in contemporary society, such as migration; grassroots topics arising

from the community, such as non-professional community interpreting and

child language brokering; direct engagement with the field, dialogue and

co-construction of meaning. (For examples of activist approaches with clear

affinities with public translation studies see, for example, Bori and Maier

2010.5) The ethos of public translation studies is critical and empowering,and it is characterized by both an attempt to take translation studies research

back to the community and a simultaneous endeavour to bring knowledge

of the field back to the research community.

2. Critical pedagogy

Burawoys matrix, adapted to translation studies, has been used as a way of

introducing translation students to different researcher profiles and different

5One link between translation studies and public sociology is the French sociologist

Pierre Bourdieu, who has become a prominent figure in the sociology of translation and

who is considered the public sociologist par excellence by Burawoy (2004). In translation

studies, however, he is currently better known for his theoretical concepts.

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Kaisa Koskinen 7

moral and political attitudes towards doing research.6The educational uses

of this matrix, especially in view of emphasizing the public subfield, are

well aligned with the overall ethos of public sociology: Burawoy places the

training of future academic generations within the public subfield and also

reminds us that students are our first and captive audience (2005:7; see also

DeCesare 2009). Teaching public translation studies, then, is a way of doing

public translation studies.

Although Burawoy emphasizes thepublicrole of education, any form

of publicly funded and state-controlled education also necessarily entails a

strongpolicycomponent.7In discussions concerning translator training, two

concepts training and education often help clarify this division: training

denotes the servile and pragmatic policy attitude, while education implies

the upbringing of a new generation of critical, public academics (Kearns

2008; see also Freire 1998:4). The duality of the public and policy compo-

nents is, in fact, a core issue in todays translator-training institutions: if the

goals are set by the employers and officials alone, and academics react only

to the existing (technology- and economy-driven) demands set by the field,

then the training institution fails in its most fundamental task of educating

new generations to not only adapt to existing conditions, but also to research,

develop and improve them.

Seeing the translator educator first and foremost as a facilitator of inde-

pendent thinking has obvious affinities with critical pedagogy (also called

radical pedagogy, or progressive education). These affinities have been

spelled out by Burawoy, who lists prominent voices in critical pedagogy

such as Freire and bell hooks among his inspirations (Burawoy n.d.). The

source most often cited by proponents of critical pedagogy is Paolo Freire.

In his best-known work,Pedagogy of the Oppressed, he lays the foundation

of this pedagogical philosophy. According to Freire (1974/2005), critical

education is to be based on a problematizing approach, and understandings

are to be sought through democratic dialogue. This requires a critical and

reflexive approach, which provides a direct link to Burawoy and public

sociology. Critical pedagogy is not a fixed methodology but rather a looselabel for a group of pedagogical principles that include fostering the abil-

ities of critical thinking, personal growth and liberation, and participatory

methods and dialogue.8Becoming a professional should, according to Freire

(1998), never be seen as a matter of rote training and technicalities only.

6The course on which the case study draws is described in more detail below.7I wish to thank Professor Outi Paloposki for bringing this duality of the policy and public

aspects of education to my attention.8Space constraints do not allow for a full exposition of Freires thinking nor its interna-

tional reception and adaptations to various local contexts. For a concise overview, see

the afterword by Tuukka Tomperi and Juha Suoranta in Freire (2005); for Freires own

rethinking of the pedagogy of the oppressed, see Freire (1994).

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Rather, education is fundamentally a matter of the formation of the self and

of creating a historical and ethical understanding of both society and our

own position(s) within it..

Some clarification is in order here. I am not arguing that the case course

described below was based on the ideology of critical pedagogy, nor that it

fully follows the basic tenets of this educational approach. Indeed, I only

encountered this pedagogical frameworkpost facto,in 2009, after the course

had already been designed and also taught once. At that point, I simply found

these ideas appealing and fitting to describe my own more intuitive and more

modest aspirations. Moreover, there is hardly a formal paradigm to follow;

critical pedagogy has taken many forms throughout the course of its history

and has been employed in different contexts (McLaren and Kincheloe 2007).

Its ethos, however, is very similar to public sociology in its empowering and

critical stance, and it can thus be used to support the attempt to bring public

translation studies into the classroom (Suoranta 2008).

In critical pedagogy, education is not disconnected from its social and

political roots. A crucial question for the educator is: Whose side are you

on? Do you side with the oppressor or the oppressed? (Suoranta 2005:11).

The aim is to foster a critical consciousness, educating students to become

empowered and critical agents. This requires the creation of a dialogic sphere

where the prevalent ideologies (including those espoused by the teacher or

the training institution) can be discussed and problematized, and collaborative

sharing and learning can take place. In the vocabulary of critical pedagogy,

dialogue relates to words, and word is a concept with two basic compo-

nents: reflection and action. Words without actions are verbalism, and words

without reflection lead to activism rather thanpraxis(Freire 1974/2005:95;

on the notion of dialogic education, see Freire ibid.:186-204). Activism

has become one of the key concepts in contemporary translation studies

(Bori and Maier 2010; for an overview see Tymoczko 2007:189-220). In

the translation studies classroom, discussions of various activist approaches

can easily deteriorate into empty and decontextualized debates about

whether it is right or wrong, for example, to womanhandle translationsin a feminist framework. The terminology of critical pedagogy allows for a

differentiation between (say) feminist activism and feminist praxis, direct-

ing attention to the theoretical basis and societal aspirations, not just their

surface manifestations. Clearly, this still remains on the level of verbalism

only. The next step is praxis, where the students and staff participate jointly.

This, I think, is still rare in translation studies, but not entirely unheard of.

An example of such a joint effort is ECOS, Translators and Interpreters for

Solidarity, founded in 1998 by University of Granada students and lecturers

(Bori and Maier 2010).An important aspect of critical pedagogy isZeitdiagnose, a critique of the

prevailing ideology (Suoranta 2007, Moisio and Suoranta 2006). However,

the aim is not only to describe and to critique, but also to take action, moving

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Kaisa Koskinen 9

from knowledge topraxis, that is, to a theoretically informed practice. This

is where critical pedagogy has obvious affinities with public sociology: it

has an empowering ethos that aims at changing those conditions that are

less than satisfactory.Zeitdiagnosealso functions as a reminder that critical

pedagogy or public sociology or public translation studies is not static.

In each social and historical context the framework needs to be developed

anew to respond to the needs of that particular time and place. I am not in

Paulo Freires rural Brazil of the 1950s, nor in the United States of bell hooks,

resistant to both women and to people of colour, nor am I a sociologist in

Burawoys America. My local context is the Finland of the early 21st century,

and my task is to train future translators and translation researchers within

that local context in the contemporary world where no-one can escape

the global forces giving shape to our local experiences (Cronin 2006). The

philosophy of critical pedagogy and of public translation studies needs to be

adapted to this reality by critically reflecting on local conditions.

Each era and each society has its own thematic universe, consisting of

life styles, practices, values, conceptions, hopes and developmental needs

(Freire 1974/2005:106). Teaching is based on identifying the most genera-

tive themes, ones that shed light on contemporary contradictions and can be

coded to teaching material usable for dialogic teaching (ibid.). For example, in

contemporary translation studies one such issue is non-professional subtitling.

This is a field many students find personally interesting, and some actively

participate in it. In the classroom one can generate discussions on copyright

issues in the digital era, professional vs non-professional translation, quality

issues, and the personal ethics of subtitlers with a cause, be it fansubbing for

ones favourite anime or subtitling political videos for Youtube.

3. The case study: The Methods in Translation Studies course

The course described in this article is an obligatory MA-level course for all

translation and interpreting students at the University of Tampere, Finland. It

is offered in the spring term, and is intended for 4th-year TS students who areabout to embark on their own MA dissertation project the following autumn.

Each year approximately 50 students enrol. The size of the group imposes

some logistical limitations on the course design. While it would be nice to

have a classroom where all students can have an equal opportunity to express

their views, it is also a known fact that in a large group setting discussions are

often dominated by a few outspoken students while others may be hesitant to

contribute anything. One strategy that has worked rather effectively in this

setting is to emphasize roundtable discussions and brainstorming sessions

in small groups of 4-6 students, allowing students first to discuss and debatean issue amongst themselves before the views and opinions developed in the

groups are shared with the entire class. Group work also contributes to the

democratization of discussions. Accustomed to granting a lead role to the

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teacher, students tend to direct all their comments to the teacher rather than

one another, and they may also expect the teacher to validate any comments

first before properly paying attention to each others views. Group work

eliminates the teacher entirely from the discussions, allowing the students

to listen to one another.

In the local terminology, this is a lecture course because of the large

size of the group, but also because it is not a practical translation course,

nor a research seminar where students are required to produce a research

project of their own. Critical pedagogy, similar to many other contemporary

pedagogies emphasizing empowerment and based on constructivist ideolo-

gies of learning, often views lectures with suspicion.9They are perceived

as a monologic and hierarchical means of transmitting information for the

students to passively receive following Freire, bell hooks calls lectures thebanking system of education10(1992/1994:40; see also hooks 2010:44).

My own view is somewhat different. First, in formal education the hier-

archy is unavoidably there. As long as we stay within the institutional walls

of an educational setting, even the most radical critical pedagogue cannot

escape the fact that only one person is the teacher and all others are not, that

one person is paid by the institution to teach and then to assess, and the role

of the others is to display their learning outcomes in ways specified either

by the institution or the teacher (see also hooks 2010:56). This is not to be

understood as the teacher always assuming the upper hand. On the contrary,

precisely because the hierarchy remains, it is the task of the teacher to work

against it, minimizing its effects. One way to do so is to expose ones own

vulnerabilities. Rather than posing as the omniscient deliverer of known

truths, the lecturer can also indicate the gaps in her own knowledge, and

reflect on her own perspective on the topic, embracing weaknesses as well

as strengths (see also Tymoczko 2007:1-3). Personal stories and anecdotes

may be particularly useful (hooks 2010:49-58). The anxieties of an aspiring

scholar can be greatly alleviated by the teachers honest descriptions of notonly the successes but also the misfortunes and even failures of her own

research projects.

Second, a lecture need not necessarily adopt a monologic format.

The narrative relationship between the teacher and the students (Freire

1974/2005:75) does not need to imply seeing students as empty vessels to

be filled by rote learning. In addition to the traditional end-of-lecture ques-

tions, there are numerous ways to engage the group. Some of these more

9Many thanks to the anonymous reviewer for making me aware of the need to expand

upon how lectures were understood in this course context, and how the question of as-

sessment was dealt with.10The original wording is concepo bancria da educao (Freire 2005:ch. 2).

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Kaisa Koskinen 11

interactive methods are described below and have been used throughout the

course. The third, and to me the most important issue is the moral task of the

more senior member in the room to provide scaffolding for the more novice

members by allowing them to benefit from his or her longer engagement

with the field. Lecture, understood in this way, is not a method for transmit-

ting ready-made patterns of thinking but a way of providing some basic

components to be worked on together. In order to develop, critical thinking

requires wide knowledge and an understanding of what others have already

discovered and thought. In a way, the banking system is indeed a necessary

first step. Also, the public face of research (and the same can be said of the

critical and pragmatic subfields) presupposes a good grasp of the scientific

subfield, since it is a motor for all others (DeCesare 2009:195).

The methods course has long existed in the curriculum in different shapes

and forms, but the case described in this article consists of two subsequent

iterations of it as taught by the author (in spring 2009 and spring 2010).11The

official description of the course objectives at that time was as follows:

The students should be made familiar with the basic tenets and

viewpoints of the major research paradigms in translation studies,

and should be able to critically assess the usability of the typical

methods used in these paradigms in the framework of their own pro

gradu (MA) dissertation. (University of Tampere Curriculum 2009-

2011; my translation)12

It is necessary to contextualize this course within the contemporary Finn-

ish translator training model. In Finland, all translation students receive a

professional education, and translation studies is a core component of their

degree. In other words, unlike some other countries, there are no separate

professional MAs, and all students are required to write a theoretical disserta-

tion in translation studies as part of their degree. Training both in translation

and in translation studies begins at BA level. Before being admitted to the

MA programme, students will therefore already be familiar with the historyof translation studies, and they will have also already completed their first,

small-scale research project (BA dissertation). This is thus notan introduction

to translation studies, but an advanced requirement with special emphasis on

the methodological aspects of doingtranslation (and interpreting) research.

11The Burawoy matrix has been introduced by the author before and since at other uni-

versities in various countries, within other course contexts, at both BA (where it did not

really function effectively) and PhD levels (where students seem to be most receptive to

reconsidering the field of translation studies in this way). To keep this article coherent,

these other contexts have been excluded from the discussion.12The original Finnish text runs as follows: Opiskelija tuntee keskeisten knnstieteel-

listen tutkimussuuntausten perusteesit ja -lhtkohdat ja kykenee kriittisesti arvioimaan

suuntausten mukaisissa tutkimuksissa kytettvien menetelmien kyttkelpoisuutta oman

pro gradu -tyns kannalta.

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It has to cater for different research aspirations, and it is thus necessarily an

overview of various methods. The focus is theoretical, with some hands-on

methods practice. As the explicit aim of this requirement is to support the

up-coming dissertation project, the orientation towards research methods in

translation studies is practical and pragmatic. Rather than just explaining and

describing different theoretical approaches, emphasis is placed on describing

howresearch is conducted to find answers to the research questions posed

within these different approaches, and what kinds of questions are seen as

relevant and answerable in each approach. Within this broad framework,

I included two aspects related to public translation studies on this course:

first, a lecture on public translation studies and the four fields of research,

and second, a small fieldwork experiment aligned with the ethos of public

translation studies. Burawoys matrix (as applied to TS) was presented in the

lecture to create a general framework for assessing and understanding the

various methods and research questions available for differently motivated

scholars and students. The matrix was introduced together, and in compari-

son with other, more traditional divisions (the well-known general binaries

of pure/applied and qualitative/quantitative, as well as the more TS-specific

liberal arts paradigm/empirical studies paradigm division).

In the first part of the lecture, the matrix was explained in a traditional,

monologic manner (that is, providing the basic scaffolding), but the latter part

of the lecture took the form of a brainstorming session. Since the Burawoy

matrix does not present a standard way of looking at translation studies

research, there is no set list of research projects for each quadrant. Rather, it

was the task of the entire class to see whether we could come up with such

listings. The class was divided into several small groups, and the task of each

group was to select a research topic, and then to generate potential research

projects that would appropriately be classed in each quadrant. For instance,

one group would innovate ways of researching court interpreting from pro-

fessional, critical, policy and public viewpoints. Another one would do the

same for fansubs. These brainstorming sessions had a number of benefits. On

the one hand, the successes and difficulties in completing the assigned taskillustrated the usability of the matrix, while revealing its potential problem

areas and incompatibilities with certain topics, as well as overlaps between

the four fields. At the same time, the students were exposed to a great var-

iety of research proposals jointly generated by their peers, thereby sparking

numerous ideas for their own dissertation topics later.

The metatheoretical lecture on the matrix was followed by a more practice-

oriented lecture describing the basic tenets of observation and fieldwork, again

with the idea of providing scaffolding before sending the students out to try

their own hand at fieldwork. Ethnographic methods are not easy to report, nor

are relevant skills easy to transfer. Furthermore, MA dissertations based on

fieldwork are neither very common in Finland nor extremely well-known to

the students. In fact, in spite of their previous theory courses and exposure to

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Kaisa Koskinen 13

a number of research traditions, a surprising number of students begin their

methods course convinced that the only acceptable model for a dissertation in

translation studies is a linguistic comparative analysis of a source and target

text. It is precisely for this reason that it is extremely useful to incorporate some

hands-on experience of ethnographic observation in the course content.

In addition to its pragmatic usefulness, a fieldwork experiment can easily

be harnessed to advance the aims related to public translation studies. In the

two successive years under examination, the experiment was designed in two

different ways. In 2010, one of the goals was to discuss the mixed roles of

the participant and the observer, along with their ethical repercussions, while

in 2009, the emphasis was placed on the role of the physical surroundings in

ethnographic analysis. In 2009, the task (to be completed in small groups)

was to venture out of the classroom to observe translation students and their

natural habitat in order to locate places and material artefacts significant

to their community. In other words, the students were asked to open their

ethnographic eye and to observe themselves and their peers in the familiar

corridors and cafeterias and to analyze messages and visual stimuli, such as

bulletin boards and official signage on the walls. The findings of each group

were then brought back to the classroom, and their potential and limitations

as research data were discussed. I had looked forward to at least one of the

groups deciding to observe another group while completing this assignment,

but unfortunately this did not happen. Had it occurred, it would have intro-

duced yet another perspective on the question of research roles, emic and

etic views and the blurred insider-outsider divisions.

It should be noted that the students were not assessed on their classroom

discussions. Their findings were neither judged nor graded, nor were their

nascent abilities in fieldwork. This is a crucial factor: if one wishes to engage

students and create a dialogic learning environment, then students need to

be able to feel free. Creating a learning community is a joint effort, where

each contribution can be seen as a gift from the student to the community

(hooks 1994:8). Many teachers devoted to radical pedagogy continuously

assess their students in the classroom (hooks 1994:157). I have found that

this does not work very well for me. For one thing, it has a stifling effect on

student contribution, and in a large group it is also near-impossible for me

to keep track of all students in a fair manner. In my classroom, such activity

may at most be used to give bonus points to active students who regularly

contribute, but a shy or self-conscious student is not penalized for not tak-

ing an equally active or leading role.13Therefore, on this particular course,

13The interactive computer platform was used only marginally on this course to storeand retrieve materials. Interactive functions were not tapped into at all. On other courses,

where such resources have been more extensively used, it has been clearly beneficial for

some students who have much to contribute but who do not feel confident enough to

take the classroom floor.

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grading was based on written assignments.

In 2010, the fieldwork task was even more directly connected to public

translation studies, and also to critical pedagogy. The 2010 task was inspired

by Michael Cronins notion of urban spaces as primarily translation spaces

(2006:68), that is, multilingualism leading to ubiquitous translating and in-

terpreting in the everyday life of the city. The students were asked to observe

these kinds of translational spaces in their own life for a week or two and to

identify and report on a potential research question. In other words, they were

asked to reflect critically on their own thematic universe. Students reported

a number of interesting grassroots projects related to their studies, work or

hobbies. A sampling of the diversity of research topics identified includes

the following: non-professional interpreting and cultural translation by the

teachers and immigrant pupils in the classroom; multilingual communicationin an international student choir; child language brokering in a sports club;

the clash of professional ethics and work requirements caused by ad-hoc

interpreting tasks in summer jobs; and translating and interpreting practices

in multilingual workplaces. These diverse themes were discussed in class,

working dialogically to problematize the generative themes identified by the

participants (Freire 1974/2005).

As this indicative list already illustrates, the task not only supports an

awakening to various contemporary social issues from a (public) translation

studies perspective but it also, significantly and in the spirit of critical peda-gogy, brings the students extensive pool of experiences into the classroom;

it further allows them to relate their academic knowledge to their extracur-

ricular activities, thus enriching the learning experience for all involved, and

creating a truly participatory learning environment. Embedding the task in the

students own lives and personal experiences, and adding an emotional ele-

ment to the task in so doing, also creates possibilities for embodied learning

and helps to bridge the gap between academia and real life. The personal

and affective nature of the task brings to light a number of moral and ethic-

al issues. Although the students were not required to actually carry out theproposed research project while on this course, the project still functioned

as a test case against which to measure the practicalities of research, and to

contemplate issues of research ethics, individual moral dilemmas and po-

tential role conflicts. Furthermore, for some students this practical fieldwork

experiment has indeed been transformed into an MA dissertation topic.

4. Student responses

Different researcher personalities are attracted to different research models.The same applies to students. The value of the Burawoy matrix is that it is

non-judgemental. Since the flourishing of any discipline requires all four

fields, they are all equally valid, while also interdependent. Any choice of

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Kaisa Koskinen 15

field is thus acceptable, and all personalities equally necessary. A number

of students each year are pragmatically oriented, and they may find strictly

academic research questions uninteresting or irrelevant. For them, the explicit

emphasis on extra-academic audiences may open new avenues for directing

their research projects meaningfully. For some, especially those students who

already have an activist orientation in their personal lives, public translation

studies offers a motivating framework. Still others may find it more mean-

ingful to work within the policy field, for example in the form of improving

the business process of a translation company.

I have not elicited formal feedback on the matrix (nor on my attempts to

create a dialogic learning community in the classroom). However, in their

final essays several students of the 2010 course14volunteered feedback by

commenting on my use of the model for education purposes. Their comments(translation and emphasis mine) show that the matrix did indeed achieve the

goals I had set, at least for some students. First, it helped them appreciate

the richness of research questions and approaches available for translation

studies students:

For me [the matrix is] the most meaningful way of grasping the

field of translation studies this model opened my eyes to new kinds

of research questions, and I may also have found my thesis topic.

(Student L)

I had not met this division before, and I was surprised to see how

much it widened my understandingof what translation studies is.

(Student Ki)

Moreover, the matrix has provided students with an impetus for self-

reflexive work on understanding their own personality as researchers.

Thinking about the kind of research a student would most like to support

through his or her own efforts is but one step away from the wider moral andethical questions of the societal aims and goals of research on a larger scale.

Together with an explicit emphasis on public translation studies, the matrix

helps students to advance from passive recipients and consumers of academic

research into seeing themselves as active producers of that knowledge in their

role of junior members of the translation studies community. Clearly, such a

transformation does not occur overnight, but the following extracts from the

students final essays indicate that this process is well underway:

I like this box model because it allows you to contemplate your ownresearcher personality and the aims of your research. (Student Ka)

14In 2009 they had a different final assignment which did not include an essay.

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This matrix is a good basis for pondering which of the four subfields

I would like to contribute towith my own research. (Student E)

Third, the final essays also indicate that an explicit emphasis on reflexive

and critical reappraisal of both ones own theoretical foundations and meth-odological choices, as well as those proposed by others helps in directing

students to adopt the same critical attitude. Refreshingly, this attitude was

also extended to the very model that was used in the classroom to promote

this kind of thinking:

Burawoys division of four fields as applied by Koskinen is, nev-

ertheless, just a theoretical tool for grasping reality that is in itself

borderless. Similar to all theorizing, using it also brings in the risk

of adapting the users understanding of the reality into one that fitsin with the boxes provided by the model. (Student E)

The point raised by this student the importance of not blindly accepting

a model designed by others is also raised by Burawoy. He reminds us that

in different locales and in different fields, the matrix may need to be adapted:

This four-fold division of sociological knowledge is but an analytical

scheme. Its concrete expressions vary sharply by country, and by location

in the hierarchical system of global knowledge production (Burawoy, n.d.;

bold in the original).In hindsight, it is somewhat surprising that throughout the two years of

the course there was no direct negative feedback. Although not everyone

overtly commented on Burawoy later (the essay did not in any way require

it), neither in their assignment nor otherwise15did anyone openly criticize

the dialogic methods or the potentially political content.

There are a number of possible explanations for this. First, my own

engagement with critical pedagogy may not have been that deep, and my

approach was thus not considered that radical by the students (the pedagogi-

cal ideology was also not overtly discussed in class). This is most likely thecase, especially given that the course design was first developed intuitively,

and only later did I encounter the pedagogical writings that seemed to cor-

respond to my own thinking. Second, many students were probably already

familiar with a similar pedagogical approach, as another course on translators

business skills was running parallel to this one and based on similar think-

ing (see Abdallah 2011 for a discussion of that course). Third, the university

system in Finland is still far less commercialized and thus also less politicized

than in many other countries, so that radical pedagogy is probably not con-

sidered as political in Finland as it is elsewhere. Fourth, obviously, it may

15The department also has a systematic, anonymous feedback option for every course

taught.

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Kaisa Koskinen 17

have been the case that not everyone enjoyed the participatory methods or

saw any relevance in discussing Burawoys ideas, but these students might

have considered it unwise to openly criticize the teacher. This is also highly

likely, and admittedly one could also argue that the lack of open criticism

effectively proves the limits of the learning community we were able to create

together; it was not democratic enough to accommodate open disagreement

over content and teaching methods. Fifth, one also needs to acknowledge

that although the aim of this approach was to foster critical attitudes, not all

students were willing to come along on the adventure of critical thinking

(hooks 2010:43). They took the compulsory course to fulfil the necessary

requirements, listened to the lectures, participated in the discussions, com-

pleted the assignments, and then simply moved on. And that is also just fine.

If critical thinking is about first learning the who, what, when, where, andhow of things (this is where the teacher can provide scaffolding) and then

utilizing that knowledge in a manner that enables you to determine what

matters most (hooks 2010:9), it is not for the teacher to decide what matters

most for the student.

5. Conclusions

Dividing the field of translation studies along the same axes that Michael

Burawoy employs for describing the field of sociology, i.e. reflexivity andtype of audience, has some clear benefits for the classroom. Taking research

explicitly, both in theory and in practice, beyond the academic context sup-

ports the aim of educating reflective and active students who will not only

be able to apply their university education in their future work but will also

possess the capabilities to work towards improving and developing that work

and their society (praxis).

For me as a teacher, the notion of public translation studies functions as

a useful rubric under which to discuss a number of developments in transla-

tion studies that I find relevant in the contemporary world. Personally, thisemphasis also functions as a modest counterweight to the commodified uni-

versity in which we now work. For the students, I hope the notion of public

translation studies offers an empowering avenue to bring their experiences

to the classroom, creating a more democratic and dialogic learning environ-

ment. As Michael Burawoy reminds us, [i]n reality, students do not come

to our lecture halls as blank slates, but overflowing with lived experience

(2004:26). Tapping into this lived experience can enrich our learning tre-

mendously. The case course described in this article includes only a short

introduction to public translation studies. Combining the goals of criticalpedagogy and public translation studies offers a number of opportunities

beyond the scope that was possible to achieve within the framework and

aims of this particular course. In a recent special issue of ITT(Baker and

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Maier 2011), the editors lament the relative absence of ethics in our cur-

ricula. The contributors report numerous practical examples of how ethical

aspects can be included, and many of those reports can easily be identified

as sharing the ethos of critical pedagogy and/or public translation studies.

This is a welcome development, and the cases reported in that volume offer

numerous opportunities for expanding the role of public translation studies

in the curriculum. In addition to alerting our students to the ethical dilem-

mas they are likely to encounter throughout their career, it is also of outmost

importance that we educators take a critical look at our own role and the

ideologies we support or resist in our work. The course on translation studies

methodology has, I believe, increased the reflexivity of both the students and

the teacher, and the co-constructed understanding of a number of societal

translational issues in our current thematic universe was more extensive and

more balanced than the one I alone would have been able to construct in a

more teacher-centred framework.

Critical pedagogy and public translation studies both aim, in the end,

at social change, not merely personal and motivational change. While the

inclusion of these aspects may increase the motivation of the teacher and/or

the students, it would be complacent to settle only for the gains in personal

motivation. It remains to be seen whether this small endeavour will have

any effect on praxis. Considering the scale of the case, I am somewhat opti-

mistic. Talking about public translation studies has set in motion a number

of interesting projects within the field of public translation studies, both for

myself and for some of the students who have participated in the course. We

hope these will build momentum gradually and lead to a more significant

impact on the field.

University of Eastern Finland, Philosophical Faculty, School of Humanities,

Foreign Languages and Translation Studies, P.O. Box 111, FI-80101 Joensuu,

Finland. [email protected]

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