Scientific and Technical Translation: New Perspectives that Lead us to Achieve our Best Performance

Abstract

Given that scientific and technical translation is the translation specialization with the highest demand in the world (Diéguez Morales, Lazo Rodríguez y Quezada Gapanov, 2014) and, at the same time, the one that requires the highest volume of knowledge updating work (on the translator’s side) to process the different domains it embraces, due to the vertiginous advances in science and technology, it becomes necessary to review from time to time the bases that support this specialization. The purpose of this paper is to provide new insights into the translator’s or translator-to-be’s training and professional performance, which may have a positive impact on his/her ability to enhance and maintain his/her expertise in this translation branch, so that he/she can meet the challenge mentioned in the previous paragraph. During the speech, three main points that have to do with the teaching, learning and professional practice aspects will be addressed. As regards the first point, it will be demonstrated why Argentina needs more scientific and technical translators (Bacco, 2018) and how a curriculum agreed by different stakeholders can contribute to achieve this goal (Bacco, 2019). Regarding the second point, two types of learning processes that supplement the formal one and reinforce the idea of an alternate training process carried out inside learning environments other than the classroom itself will be analyzed. We will also consider the impact of the university social responsibility phenomenon (Calero, 2019) on the learner’s course of studies and the way he/she should prepare himself/herself for his continuing education. In the third point, the vicissitudes that the scientific and technical translator must face in order to solve problematic situations related to comprehension, grammar, re-expression and communication issues will be discussed, especially in the light of the new audiences and digital formats that have been emerging. To this end, the translator must apply his/her translation strategies in such a way as to achieve efficiency and harmony between what the author intends to communicate and what the recipient has to receive, all in agreement with the postulates of the functionalist translation theory (Sánchez Trigo, 2005).