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Article published In: Target
Vol. 28:1 (2016) ► pp.87–109

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On translation policy

 | University of Texas Rio Grande Valley
Published online: 10 May 2016
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https://doi.org/10.1075/target.28.1.04gon
The term translation policy has become problematic for the field of Translation Studies because it has meant so many things to so many authors that it threatens to lose some of its efficacy (see Meylaerts, Reine. 2011a. “Translation Policy.” In Handbook of Translation Studies, vol. 21, ed. by Yves Gambier, and Luc van Doorslaer, 163–168. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar). In light of this, the concept of translation policy should be developed so that it will be broad enough to account for diverse phenomena in different places with multiple agents, while retaining specific parameters that make the concept methodologically useful. This article will consider insights from Translation Studies and from other fields, especially from the field of Language Policy, in order to develop such a concept of translation policy. To illustrate how the understanding of translation policy that will be proposed may be used in a descriptive paradigm, the article will present translation policy in Scotland’s local government as a case study.
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.Defining translation policy
  • 3.Translation policy in Scotland’s local governments
    • 3.1The languages of Scotland
    • 3.2The local government domain
    • 3.3Translation policy as management, practice, and beliefs
      • 3.3.1Translation policy as found through translation management
      • 3.3.2Translation policy as found through translation practice
      • 3.3.3Translation policy as found through translation beliefs
  • 4.Conclusion
  • Acknowledgement
  • Notes
  • References
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