1. Multilingual paradise and how to get there (perhaps)
Anthony Pym

2. Why talk about translation ?
“Everything we know about cultures beyond our own has come to us, has been appropriated or assimilated, through processes of translation” (Pym 1992: 17).
(All cultures are translations from other cultures.)
(If there are any untranslated cultures, then we know nothing about them.)

3. Why talk about translation ?
1992: How to be sure we know the foreign culture? (the epistemology of anthropologists and spies)
2017: How to create an inclusive democratic multilingual polis?
(“Inclusive”: The subject feels included in the first person of the laws)

4. Why talk about more than translation ?
The EU project Mobility and Inclusion in Multilingual Europe (MIME) In charge of the sub-project on “Mediation” Language policy should allow both inclusion and mobility.

5. Grin’s trade-off model

6. Why talk about more than translation ?
Mediation choices:
- Mediated translation (with many degrees of appropriation)
- Unmediated translation (online technologies)
- Learning the language of the other
- Intercomprehension
- Developing pidgins and creoles
- Learning a lingua franca
- Code-switching and similar mixes of the above

7. Why talk about more than translation ?
Mediation choices:
- Mediated translation (the only one that could block language learning)
- Unmediated translation (online technologies)
- Learning the language of the other
- Intercomprehension
- Developing pidgins and creoles
- Learning a lingua franca
- Code-switching and similar mixes of the above

8. Mediated translation and interpreting are:
Why talk about more than translation ?
Mediated translation and interpreting are:
- Needed (by law) in high-risk communication situations
- Relatively expensive
- Generally resented by mobile subjects
- Considered by mobile subjects to be preliminary to language learning
- Used as imperfect transitory solutions

9. Why talk about more than translation ?
If you translate for immigrants, they will not learn English.
Stopping the automatic use of translation and interpretation services into foreign languages will provide further incentive for all migrant communities to learn English, which is the basis for an individual’s ability to progress in British society. It will promote cohesion and better community relations. And it will help councils make sensible savings, at a time when every bit of the public sector needs to do its bit to pay off the deficit.

10. So is translation really more expensive?
Lindholm et al. (2012) study 3071 patients with Limited English Proficiency (LEP):
“the length of hospital stay for LEP patients was significantly longer when professional interpreters were not used at admission or both admission/discharge”
“patients receiving interpretation at admission and/or discharge were less likely than patients receiving no interpretation to be readmitted within 30 days”

11. So is translation really more expensive?
Diamond LC, Schenker Y, Curry L, Bradley EH, Fernandez A
Fagan MJ, Diaz JA, Reinert SE, Sciamanna CN, Fagan DM
Flores, G. 2005
Gallagher RA, Porter S, Monuteaux MC, Stack AM
Hampers Louis C., Cha S, Gutglass DJ, Binns HJ, Krug SE. 1999
Hampers, Louis C., and Jennifer E. McNulty. (2002).
Hudelson P, and Vilpert S. 2009
Jacobs, Elizabeth A., Laura S. Sadowski, and Paul J. Rathouz
John-Baptiste A, Naglie G, Tomlinson G, Alibhai SM, Etchells E, Cheung A, Kapral M, Gold WL, Abrams H, Bacchus M, Krahn M
Karliner, Leah S., Elizabeth A. Jacobs, Alice Hm Chen, and Sunita Mutha
Levas MN, Cowden JD, Dowd MD, 2011.
Lindholm, Mary, J. Lee Hargraves, Warren J. Ferguson, George Reed
Quan, Kelvin JD
Wallbrecht J, Hodes-Villamar L, Weiss SJ, Ernst AA

12. In high-risk situations where it is cost-effective.
The proper place of translation?
In high-risk situations where it is cost-effective.

13. The Western translation form:
What kind of translation?
The Western translation form:
- use the alien-I
- no addition, no subtraction
- complete language change
ONLY IN SITUATIONS WHERE THERE IS NO OTHER MEDIATION CHOICE
Elsewhere, mix the Western form with communicative translation (language learning and an ethics of service provision).

14. Laws and rights: - No high-risk vs. low-risk situation
Official language polices frame translation policies
Laws and rights:
- No high-risk vs. low-risk situation
- No discussion of costs
- No mixed or “impure” languages
- No concern with affective inclusion
- “… a language that the accused understands…”
- No sustainability over time (maintenance of diversity)
- No allowance for non-policy as a solution. (SAS as performative language policy)

15. Why talk about more than translation ?

16. Performative policy as a logic of trade-offs

17. Mediation choice is based on affective criteria
Performative policy in faith-based communities
Mediation choice is based on affective criteria
The aim is sustainability of the language community.
All mediation choices are available.
There is no question of language rights.
Mixed languages are acceptable.

18. Translations are provided.
Performative policy in faith-based communities
Translations are provided.
Interpreters are used.
Code-switching is used.
Language classes are proved.
Paradise is the business of churches. Can they show us the way?

19. The value of a language is affective and performed, time and again.
Affective language use
Brigitta Busch. Language biographies for multilingual learning (2006)
The value of a language is affective and performed, time and again.

20. Affective language use

21. “Translation” is the opposite of “language learning.”
Meanwhile back at the academy…
“Translation” is the opposite of “language learning.”

22. And yet…

23. Participatory Culture Foundation Videos in 20 languages in 24 hours
And yet…
Participatory Culture Foundation
Videos in 20 languages in 24 hours
170,000 videos subtitled

24. TED Open Translation Project
And yet…
TED Open Translation Project

25. Learners correct translations And translate the web for free?
And yet…
Free language courses
Learners correct translations
And translate the web for free?

26. Communicative translation becomes: affective, socializing,
And then…
Communicative translation becomes:
affective,
socializing,
deinstitutionalized,
pedagogical
and policy-free.
(Sounds like paradise?)

27. The primacy of spoken communication
A way toward communicative translation …
The primacy of spoken communication
Failure analysis instead of competence
Full range of translation solutions (breaking the binarisms)
Translator training for all language learners, for all communication settings, not just for would-be professionals.
Pedagogical use of online translation tools (TM/MT) and collaborative translation.
Renegotiate the pact with the professions.