T-Rex in Action:
Assessing the impact of translation upon
non-English academic discourses
Karen Bennett, University of Lisbon Centre for English Studies
[email protected]
“…. a powerful carnivore gobbling up the
other denizens of the academic linguistic
grazing grounds” (Swales, ‘English as
Tyrannosaurus Rex, 1997)
↓


ousting of other languages by English in international
academic settings
“loss of specialized registers in otherwise healthy languages”
Linguistic imperialism:
landmarks
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1992: Phillipson, R. Linguistic Imperialism. Oxford: Oxford
University Press;
1994: Pennycook, A. The Cultural Politics of English as an
International Language. Essex: Longman;
1999: Canagarajah, A. S. Resisting Linguistic Imperialism in
English Teaching. Oxford: OUP; Press.
2002: Canagarajah, A. S. A Geopolitics of Academic Writing.
Pittsburgh, PA: University of Pittsburgh Press.
2004: Tardy, C. ‘The role of English in scientific
communication: Lingua franca or Tyrannosaurus Rex?’ In
Journal of English for Academic Purposes 3: 247-269.
Aims:

Describe how the process of linguistic
imperialism is being manifested in Portugal:
I. Academic discourse in Portugal
II. The changing discourse of History

Open the subject up to discussion involving
other languages and cultures
A different discourse?
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Taste for ‘copiousness’
(general ‘wordiness’ and
redundancy);
Preference for high-flown
erudite register (complex
syntax; lexical abstraction,
etc);
Propensity for indirectness
(main idea often
embedded, adorned or
deferred at all ranks);
Presence of literary devices
and rhetorical features.
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Clarity, economy and
precision;
Straightforward syntax;
Clearly-defined lexis, with
preference for concrete
terms over abstractions;
Structured rational argument
supported by evidence;
Avoidance of ‘dubious
persuasive techniques’ and
figurative language.
I. Academic Discourse in Portugal
1)
2)
3)
Corpus of Portuguese Academic Texts
Review of Portuguese Academic Style
Manuals
Survey of Portuguese Researchers
Academic Discourses in Portugal
1)
2)
3)
The ‘modern’ style: ‘windowpane prose’ identical to EAD in all respects; prevalent in
more ‘scientific’ subjects;
The ‘traditional’ style: ornate, rhetorical,
‘literary’; prevalent in humanities subjects
and many social sciences;
The ‘postmodern’ style: modelled on
poststructuralist discourse; prevalent in ‘arty’
subjects and some humanities writing
50
40
30
20
10
0
0
-1
-2
-3
-4
Graph 1. Variance Factor (%): Complete corpus (word count)
50
40
30
20
10
0
0
-1
-2
-3
-4
Graph 2. Variance Factor (%): Humanities and Social Science texts
(word count)
Enquanto a Europa se desenvolve até a era quatrocentista, à
beira do oceano mas sem que a sua vida por ele seja penetrada
e sem que por ele se aventure, ao redor do Índico as diferentes
populações vão-se interligando pelas vias marítimas e as suas
economias não dispensam tais conexões longínquas de
navegação; o complexo europeu é predominantemente
mediterrâneo e não se abre a poente, onde é meramente
costeiro: a África setentrional liga-se ao complexo
mediterrâneo, a ocidental permanence mole de terra firme sem
respiração marinha; em contraste, o Oriente afro-asiático é
oceânico.
Extract 1. Vitorino Magalhães Godinho, ‘O oceano Índico de 3000
a.C. até o século XVII’ in Ensaios, Vol. I. Lisbon, 1968.
E, ainda antes de avançarmos, seja-nos permitido relevar, por um
lado, a dimensão do modo de vida dos que não só em Lisboa,
como no Porto e em outras cidades e vilas litorâneas, se
dedicavam aos serviços da fretagem naval, bem como ao
transporte de encomendas e ao comércio marítimo, a ponto de
uma outra carta régia, também de 1414, para evitar burocracias
excessivas, aceitar como prova dos direitos alfandegários o
juramento dos mestres do navios reinóis e dos mercadores que
fretassem navios estrangeiros; por outro, registe-se a já crónica
dependência nacional em relação ao trigo de fora,
designadamente ao do Noroeste Europeu e do Mediterráneo.
Extract 2. João Marinho dos Santos (1993). Reproduced with the
kind permission of the author.
As Ordens Militares existiram em toda a
Cristandade e não apenas na Terra Santa. Em parte, a
sua implantação na Península deve-se à necessidade
de aplicar o conceito de cruzada, no âmbito das
alterações que marcaram a organização social na
viragem do 1º para o 2º milénio.
Neste trabalho partimos da concepção
pluralista da cruzada, que a define como uma forma
particular de guerra santa cristã, penitencial, associada
à peregrinação, mas que se manifesta em diversos
espaços. Assim, é definida pelas suas origens e
características e não pelo seu destino – Jerusalém.
Extract 3. Paula Pinto Costa (2007). Reproduced
with the kind permission of the author.
Hybrid text
(Schäffner & Adab, 1995: 325)
“A hybrid
text is a text that results from a translational process. It
shows features that somehow seem ‘out of place‘ / ‘strange’ /
‘unusual’ for the receiving culture, i.e. target culture. These
features, however, are not the result of a lack of translational
competence or examples of ‘translationese’, but they are
evidence of conscious and deliberate decisions by the translator.
Although the text is not yet fully established in the target culture
(because it does not conform to established norms and
conventions), a hybrid text is accepted in its target culture
because it fulfils its intended purpose in the communicative
situation (at least for a certain time).”
Hypothesis
To what extent does language contact in translating
affect target text production beyond lexical borrowings
to take the form of the transfer of patterns such as
syntactic constructs, reproduction of source text
repetition and cohesion?
Adapted from Musacchio (2005: 73)
See also: House (2006, 2008), Baumgarten et al. (2004)
Effect of English on Italian economics articles
(Musacchio, 2005:93)
•
Lexis:
Loan words, loan translations, formation of
compound terms, phraseology and figurative
language
•
Syntax:
Close rendering of syntactic constructs; repetition;
higher frequency of cohesive links such as
coordinators, subordinators, possessive determiners
and demonstrative pronouns
Influence of English on German popular
science and economics texts
(House, 2008: 92)
“…analyses of most recent popular science
and economic texts do in fact point to a shift in
the use of those linguistic means which realise
the interpersonal function component, in
particular linguistic means of expressing
‘stance’, ‘subjectivity’, ‘point of view’ and
addressee orientation.”
II. The changing discourse of history
To what are extent changes in Portuguese
historiographic discourse due to the influence
of translated texts?
Method

Assess the prevalence of works translated from
English into Portuguese in history libraries
(Institute of Social and Economic History, University of
Coimbra)

Analyse those translations to determine the
strategy used (prevalence of DDFs)
Institute of Social and Economic History,
University of Coimbra
(total holdings - 21892 volumes / 10000 acquired since 1985)
33% foreign (i.e. non-Portuguese) works
 78% are untranslated (French – 58%; Spanish – 19%;
English – 18%)

22% are translated (76% in Portuguese)
63% from French
35% from English
↓
Projected presence of Eng→Port translations
(approx. 2.5% of total holdings)
Preliminary Results
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Prevalence of untranslated foreign texts
Great influence of French (untranslated and
translated texts) upon Portuguese history
French and English works of different nature
↓
accounts for why the traditional discourse in
Portuguese has persisted for so long
Mechanisms of language change in
the era of globalization
1) Calquing through imitation: “unconscious
imbibing of a dominant language” (Cronin,
2010: 251)
2) Authorial self-censorship: removal of DDFs
prior to translation
Self-censorship by authors writing
for international public
(Bennett, 2010b; 2011)
General orientation: more factual / pragmatic
/ technical; concrete rather than abstract
 Structure: argument clearer / more linear; text
& paragraphs more rigidly organised
 Style: more precise; more succinct; less
elaborate; more limited vocabulary; less
rhetorical or figurative devices

Historical situations where translation has
played a role in language change
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C12: calques onto Latin of terminology and
grammatical structures from Greek and Arabic
(Montgomery, 2000:148-9)
Late C19: systematic translation of Western
science into Chinese (Wright, 2009)
C19: deliberate imposition of scientific
discourse onto Indian languages (Dodson,
2009)
C21: creation of language of science in Arabic
Topics that could be elaborated on
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Reactions of Portuguese researchers to
encroachment of English
Appearance and development of Portuguese
academic style manuals
The ‘worldview’ encoded into EAD
The ‘worldview’ encoded into Portuguese
(Spanish/French) humanities discourse
Translation strategies
Possible discussion questions
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In your culture, does there exist a ‘traditional’
discourse of knowledge that is different from EAD?
Is it under pressure to change?
How is academic discourse translated in your culture
(to and from English)?
Is the spread of EAD a good thing (i.e. promoting
international communication) or is it leading to an
‘epistemological monoculture’?
Can translators do anything to impede the process of
linguistic imperialism in the academic sphere?