Translational phenomena in the news: Indirect translation as the rule

Lucile Davier
University of Geneva

Studies of news translation and indirect translation have challenged classical concepts of Translation Studies, but the two subfields have taken separate paths. This article applies Assis Rosa, Pięta, and Bueno Maia’s (2017b) classification of indirect translation to data collected via workplace studies conducted in two multilingual news agencies based in Switzerland and one monolingual broadcaster based in Canada. Illustrative examples are provided of the first six types of (in)direct translation in the classification. This typology allows for the inclusion of phenomena that may have been previously disregarded as translation, such as oral mediations and transfers from public-relations agencies to news agencies and other media outlets. However, news translation is a borderline case of translation that pushes Assis Rosa, Pięta, and Bueno Maia’s (2017b) classification to its limits because of the centrality of reported speech in news stories. Indirect translation seems to be able to bridge various subfields of Translation Studies.

Publication history

Date received: 15 August 2020

Date accepted: 20 July 2021

Published online: 28 July 2022

Table of contents

Hanna Pięta piqued my curiosity when she asked whether I would be interested in applying the concept of ‘indirect translation’ to the area of news translation. I had been content in my narrow subfield until then, despite – following the lead of Delabastita (1991) and Chesterman (2019) – silently lamenting the fragmentation of Translation Studies. When I read, in the call for papers for this issue, about the broader definition of indirect translation as a “translation of a translation” (Gambier 1994, 143), I was intrigued to see how it could apply to news translation. Is indirect translation one of those concepts “that in some way bridge[s] the gaps between the segments” of Translation Studies (Chesterman 2019, 15)?

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