Bilingualism and translation

The literature provides a number of (sometimes) quite different definitions and descriptions of the phenomenon of bilingualism. Lörscher (2012, p. 4) identifies three concepts of bilingualism, which are, for the sake of completeness, briefly described here. The first, and most restrictive of the three, is the view of bilingualism as the ability to speak two languages to a degree where the speaker is recognized as native speaker in either of the two language communities. The second, broader view, comprises a communicative competence in a second language in either “speaking, listening, writing or reading” (p. 4) at any level of competence. Finally, a third approach assumes a position in-between the two aforementioned views stating that a person is bilingual if s/he uses two languages on a daily basis without necessarily assuming the status of a native speaker in both languages, that is being recognized as a non-native speaker or second language speaker. Irrespective of these three definitions of bilingualism, Lörscher argues that “translation – together with code switching and code mixing – occurs frequently among bilinguals”(p. 5, emphasis in original) at any level of

3 http://www.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/english/professional [4. Sept. 2015]

4 http://www.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/english/profession [4. Sept. 2015]

11 competence. It is therefore necessary to shed some more light on the concept of translation and its relation to bilingualism.

The term natural translation (NT) was introduced by Harris in the early 1970s.

In his 1976 paper on The Importance of Natural Translation, he defines NT as “the translation done by bilinguals in everyday circumstances and without special training for it”(1976, p. 99). Harris does not give a clear explanation of his understanding of bilingualism and bilinguals, but seems to distinguish between the latter from professional translators, because he criticizes the research field of translatology to be too narrow-minded by exclusively investigating texts produced by professional translators. He goes on pointing to the field of linguistics, which “has now reached out to include all speech acts, even the humblest and youngest babblings” and requests that “the proper study of translatology is all translation”(p. 97, emphasis in original). Harris calls for the inclusion of bilinguals into research on translation, because, as he states in his first postulate, “[a]ll bilinguals can translate. In addition to some competence in two languages Li and Lj, they all possess a third competence, that of translating from Li to Lj and vice versa” (p. 99). Furthermore, Harris claims that bilinguals should not only be included into the study of translation, but that the investigation of NT should precede all other research on translation. Pointing towards his own background as a teacher of translation, he argues that, in reality, translation schools do not teach students to translate, but “[w]e do try to teach them to translate better”(p. 100). It has to be pointed out that Harris considers NT to be predominantly oral arguing that “[t]ranslation is used in general language as a cover term that includes both the written and the oral variants”(Harris, 2013, no pagination, emphasis in original).

Toury agrees with Harris on the existence of some kind of pre-existing ability to translate, but does not consider it to be inherent to bilingualism. Introducing his own concept of the “native translator”, Toury distinguishes between translation as an innate predisposition and translation as a skill and argues that the former may indeed be inherent to mere bilingualism. However, translation as a skill “should be taken as coextensive with ‘interlingualism’ (which is the ability to establish similarities and differences – that is, interlingual relationships – on various levels, between items, structures and rules that pertain to those languages that the bilingual actually has at his disposal)” (1986,

12 pp. 19-20). Thus, this skill is activated and developed through practice by translating one’s own or other people’s verbal output, that is through some kind of social motivation. Furthermore, Toury argues that, in addition to a certain amount of command of two languages, a particular interlingual transfer competence is necessary for a bilingual individual to be able to translate. This transfer competence consists of linguistic (e.g., semantics, syntax) as well as non-linguistic skills (e.g., communicative functions of texts, text types). Lörscher (2012) presents three hypotheses for why Harris’ postulate that all bilinguals can translate is not applicable: (a) a difference in competence in the two languages of a bilingual person; (b) an absence of meta-lingual and meta-cultural awareness; and (c) an absence of the transfer competence as described by Toury (p. 5). Lörscher himself proposes that bilinguals possess a rudimentary ability to mediate assuming that “every individual who has a command of two or more languages (even with various degrees of proficiency) is also endowed with a rudimentary ability to mediate information between languages”(p. 6).

According to Lörscher, this ability relies mainly on two characteristic human traits: (a) to perceive and structure reality in categories; and (b) to compare knowledge and experiences in order to understand and make sense of the unknown. Lörscher introduces a non-verbal dimension to his rudimentary mediation ability stating that “mediations of sense and/or signs can occur within the verbal sphere, between the verbal and the nonverbal spheres and between different nonverbal spheres”(p. 6). Thus, translation in the sense of mediation is not restricted to written or oral communication (cf. Harris 2013), but involves also other, non-verbal modes. In his earlier work, Lörscher (1991) points out that such a view of translation is incompatible with the definition of translation as a text-based activity in translation theory, but that a cognitive analysis of translation processes inevitably enters the non-verbal level and thus makes it relevant for translation theory.

Summing up, Harris, Toury, and Lörscher acknowledge the existence of a bilingual ability to transfer meaning from one language to another at different levels of competence and in different modes. While Harris refers to it as translation competence, Toury and Lörscher refrain from the use of the word translation, talking about transfer and mediation instead. Lörscher highlights that NT in the sense of Harris “must not be confused with translation competence as

13 possessed by professional translators”(2012, p. 5), because this entails, amongst other things, the cognitive restructuring of existing knowledge.

In the confines of this research project, the main point of interest is translation as a profession, the translator as a professional participant in a (global) workplace. Thus, Lörscher and Toury’s argumentation is followed and a general bilingual competence to transfer meaning, on the one hand, is distinguished from a professional competence to translate, on the other hand.

The latter entails acts of language transfer at an advanced level of linguistic and non-linguistic competence and is acquired through theoretical and practical training and/or (extensive) experience. Collapsing the definition of a general professional competence with the rudimentary description of professional competence based on a distinction from natural translation and bilingualism, the following definition arises:

Professional translation competence is a conglomerate of abilities, knowledge, attitudes and skills related to acts of written language transfer at an advanced level of linguistic and non-linguistic competence in a professional/work-related context. It is typically acquired through theoretical and practical training and/or (extensive) experience, and its practice often involves compensation of some form or another (e.g., monetary).

The following section will present in detail the theoretical concept, composition and structure of such a professional competence to translate.