Practice Orientation in the Teaching of LSP Translation

The issue of translator training has become one of FIT’s principal concerns, as it touches fundamental aspects of the future of the field of translation generally, and of LSP translation in particular. Quality assurance in connection with translation studies is not something that is built up over night. I have long been concerned with the problem of how to integrate into the students’ workload texts which not just reflect but rather challenge the different kinds of requirements demanded by their future employers. The POSI project — PraxisOrientierte Studieninhalte für die Ausbildung von Übersetzern und Dolmetschern – is approaching the same problem from a different angle, namely by focusing on the market’s need for qualified translators, and defining qualified as including not just the actual translating abilities, but indeed abilities to manage the entire translation process with all its extra-textual aspects. Theoretically I lean on Christiane Nord and the functionalist model of translation in my didactic approach to translator training.

The article is two sided: a)it is a report on a three-year research project involving the introduction of real external translation assignments into the curriculum of LSP translation studies, and b) it is a didactic reflection on this kind of practical orientation, on what we are able to achieve, how and why it is so vital to enlarge the scope of teaching translation in this direction.