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For years translations were considered as derivatives, copies, and translators as mechanical devices replacing linguistic codes (equivalents) from one language into another, and the translator's autonomy was always questioned (and is still being questioned) by those who thought of him/her 'as a monkey, with no choice save to make the same grimaces as his master' (Leppihalme, 1997: 19), until recent years when, under the influence of poststructuralism and functionalism, the focus of attention has been shifted to the issue of translator's agency and subjectivity, and the notions of originality and (absolute) equivalence and also author's superiority over translator have been severely questioned. Bassnett (1996) stresses the need for reassessing the role of the translator by analyzing his/her intervention in the process of linguistic transfer, when she argues 'Once considered a subservient, transparent filter through which a text could and should pass without adulteration, the translation can now be seen as a process in which intervention is crucial' . Awareness of complexity of translation process and avoidance of the simplistic view of regarding translation as mere process of transferring words from one text to another, Бlvarez & Vidal (1996) claim, will result in realizing the importance of the ideology underlying a translation. They argue that behind every one of the translator's selections, as what to add, what to leave out, which words to choose and how to place them, 'there is a voluntary act that reveals his history and the socio-political milieu that surrounds him; in other words, his own culture [and ideology]'. (Бlvarez & Vidal, 1996: 5).

The exercise of ideology in translation is as old as the history of translation itself. According to Fawcett (1998), 'throughout the centuries, individuals and institutions applied their particular beliefs to the production of certain effect in translation' . He claims that 'an ideological approach to translation can be found in some of the earliest examples of translation known to us' . Nevertheless, the linguistics-oriented approaches to translation studies have failed to address the concept of ideology through years of their prevalence, because such approaches are limited to their scientific models for research and the empirical data they collect, so that 'they remain reluctant to take into account the social values [and ideologies] that enter into translating as well as the study of it' (Venuti, 1998a: 1). The deficiency of old linguistics-based approaches - which 'are mainly descriptive studies focusing on textual forms' (Calzada-Pйrez, 2003: - in accounting for social values in translation and other aspects of language use resulted in developing a new trend of research called Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA) 'whose primary aim is to expose the ideological forces that underlie communicative exchanges [like translating]' (Calzada-Pйrez, 2003: 2). According to CDA advocates, all language use, including translation, is ideological and this means that translation is always a site for ideological encounters. Similarly, Schдffner (2003) claims that all translations are ideological since 'the choice of a source text and the use to which the subsequent target text is put are determined by the interests, aims, and objectives of social agents' . She evidently opts for van Dijk's definition for ideology as 'basic systems of shared social representations that may control more specific group beliefs' (van Dijk, 1996: 7). However, there are a profusion of diverse definitions of ideology defining the term from different perspectives - amongst them is van Dijk's definition - some of which are deemed necessary to be overviewed here.

Translation, according to Nida (1984) consists in reproducing in the receptor language the closest natural equivalent of the source language massage, first in terms of meaning and secondly in terms of style. The Chinese cihai (unabridged dictionary) defines translation as: expressing in another language the meaning carried in the original language (my translation from Chinese). Here meaning is apparently in the limelight of translation, which is why adequate understanding and interpretation is always an iron criterion in judging whether a piece of translation succeeds or fails. Style is another indispensable factor involved in translation but cannot be treated in this paper for it is not directly relevant to the present topic.

I believe however meaning is never concrete and tangible as many may claim and translation of meaning can only achieve a sort of approximation instead of exactness as is believed by some scholars working in the field. I reckon that when the translated meaning produces the same or a similar response in the target reader or listener as it does the original reader, the translation is successful by my standard. Newmark (1982) says that it is preferable to handle the issue in terms of equivalence of intended effects, thus linking judgments about what the translator seeks to achieve to judgments about the intended meaning of the ST speaker/writer. In other words I do not seek to reproduce the exactness of the original but always bear in my mind the rule of having the same effect on the target reader. This assertion is grounded on the fact that it is believed by many that translation is itself an end, serving a certain purpose. When it comes to a different point of view-translation is also a medium, or a process, I have something different to say. Simply put, translation involves decoding of the original discourse and encoding of the target discourse, both done by the translator or interpreter. During this process, absolute faithfulness or accuracy is but an illusion, or best, an impossible idealistic pursuit. To achieve the maximum effect or impact of the original discourse and to avoid failure of communication, accommodations are made for a variety of reasons. (See my paper Accommodations in Translation for reference, at www.accurapid.com)

In a word, translation in my opinion is both a process and a product. Research therefore ought to include all factors and elements concerned about them both.

The Three Factors All Considered

In the following discussion I will concentrate on the development of translation theory on the hermeneutic basis.

Hermeneutics, briefly, can be defined as the science and methodology of interpreting texts. The philosophical background on which hermeneutics is based is demonstrated by the forerunners in this area such as Gadamer. According to Gadamer, words, that is, talk, conversation, dialogue, question and answer, produce worlds. In contrast to a traditional, Aristotelian view of language where spoken words represent mental images and written words are symbols for spoken words, Gadamerian perspective on linguistics emphasizes a fundamental unity between language and human existence. Interpretation can never be divorced from language or objectified. Because language comes to humans with meaning, interpretations and understandings of the world can never be prejudice-free. As human beings, one cannot step outside of language and look at language or the world from some objective standpoint. Language is not a tool which human beings manipulate to represent a meaning-full world; rather, language forms human reality. (quoted from Bullock, 1997)

Another important figure in this sphere is Schleiermacher whose concept of understanding includes empathy as well as intuitive linguistic analysis. He believed that understanding is not merely the decoding of encoded information, interpretation is built upon understanding, and it has a grammatical, as well as a psychological moment. The grammatical thrust places the text within a particular literature (or language) and reciprocally uses the text to redefine the character of that literature. The psychological thrust is more naive and linear. In it, the interpreter reconstructs and explicates the subject's motives and implicit assumptions. Thus Schleiermacher claimed that a successful interpreter could understand the author as well, as or even better than, the author understood himself because the interpretation highlights hidden motives and strategies. (quoted from the web: www.ai.mit.edu)

Dilthey, initially a follower of Schleiermacher, went further. He began to emphasize that texts and actions were as much products of their times as expressions of individuals, and their meanings were consequently constrained by both an orientation to values of their period and a place in the web of their authors' plans and experiences. Therefore meanings are delineated by the author's world-view reflecting a historical period and social context. Understanding (verstehen), the basis for methodological hermeneutics, involves tracing a circle from text to the author's biography and immediate historical circumstances and back again. Interpretation, or the systematic application of understanding to the text, reconstructs the world in which the text was produced and places the text in that world. (ibid)

Modern ideas on hermeneutics hold that the writer may be an editor or a redactor and that he may have used sources. In considering this aspect of discourse one must take into account the writer's purpose in writing as well as his cultural milieu. Secondly, one must consider the narrator in the writing who is usually different from the writer. Sometimes he is a real person, sometimes fictional. One must determine his purpose in speaking and his cultural milieu, taking into consideration the fact that he may be omnipresent and omniscient. One must also take into consideration the narratee within the story and how he hears. But even then one is not finished. One must reckon with the person or persons to whom the writing is addressed; the reader, not always the same as the one to whom the writing is addressed; and later readers. Thirdly, one must consider the setting of writing, the genre (whether poetry, narrative, prophecy, etc.), the figures of speech; the devices used, and, finally, the plot. (Hanko, 1991)

Following the above ideas, we realize that understanding and interpreting the meaning of a discourse involves actually three factors: the author (writer), the text (or speech) and the reader.

Translation theory was once strictly confined within the scope of linguistics for translation was merely referred to as a conversion of languages, from the source language into the target language. Nevertheless, when research is carried further and deeper, meaning is found not only associated with the language or the text but also with the author and the reader, which form the tripartite in understanding of the appropriate meaning of any text. This paper starts with the discussion of the relationship of hermeneutics and literary translation and then goes on to propose that a perfect theory of translation should be an overall concern of all the three aforementioned factors.

Key words: hermeneutics; translation; meaning; semiotics; reception theory.

Why is hermeneutics relevant to translation? Because there is no translation without understanding and interpreting texts, which is the initial step in any kinds of translation including literary translation of course. Inappropriate interpretation inevitably results in inadequate translations, if not absolutely wrong translations. But how do we understand?

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Whence cometh the true professionals? Are they born or bred? If born, can we develop a brain scan system to detect their ability and then nurture it? If bred, can we identify and then duplicate the ideal conditions to create a translator? More importantly, what do we do now, when we can’t answer the above questions? And most importantly, what do we do as freelance translators to become more professional ourselves and enhance the level of professionalism in our industry.

The True Professional

I am going to make a hazy but important distinction here. I believe there are translators and then there are professional translators. The former are people who translate on the side, using their knowledge of a particular field to translation work. For instance, in a previous article, I referred to a mathematician who translated a book on advanced mathematics from French to English. I do not consider him a professional translator.

Professional translators are applied linguists whose ability to work with language, write well, and for free-lancers, to operate a business, represents their source of income. Professional translators are people who are dedicated to their languages and the nations, societies, and cultures which come with them. They are devoted to improving their ability to understand their source language and write in their target language. They recognize that translation is both an art and a skill. As such, they are also committed to deepening their knowledge of the fields they translate in, and to cultivating greater facility for writing about such matters. They also have nurtured a deep respect for business ethics, aware that they are in many instances the communications conduit for a product or service, for information or opinion, and so must consider the consequences of their linguistic decisions. Finally, professional translators know that they can always improve and polish their translation ability.

Professional translators are also distinguished by certain attitudes and approaches to their work. In this article, I want to take a close look at these attitudes and approaches and help clarify what a professional translator is and how we can all become more professional about being a translator.

Unlike the medical or legal professions, there are no precise academic or professional prerequisites to be a translator. This is a boon for those talented individuals who want to get started in the translation industry and a bane for those people trying to identify true professionals. The only requirement a translator must fulfill is knowing two or more languages. Anything less is rather hard to accept.

Virtually all professional translators in the United States have at least a Bachelor’s degree, and translation vendors will rarely if ever work with a translator who does not have an undergraduate education. Often these degrees are in language studies, or some related field. However, some translators have degrees in their field of specialization and have academic language training as a college minor. Others have advanced degrees in translation itself. Still others have little if any formal academic language training, instead having learned their languages either in the home or while living abroad.

Translators have to be able to write, so you might assume that translators have formal academic training as writers and professional writing experience. I have found little evidence for this. Few translators I know truly love writing; to most it seems to be merely an essential aspect of translation. However, most professional translators do have a deep interest in writing, be it as a necessary tool or an art form.

Finally, virtually all translators have a well developed knowledge of one or more specialized fields, such as finance, law, including in particular patent and corporate law, computer science, medicine, pharmaceuticals, and so on. This is not to say that translators are experts per se in such fields, but they do have enough knowledge to read, understand, and then translate common material in the field. And very few translators will ever develop such in-depth knowledge in more than a few fields.

It is fair to say that most small to medium sized GILT (Globalization, Internationalization, Localization and Translation) companies have professional looking and informative brochure web sites. What is interesting is that more and more of these companies are now following in the footsteps of the industry giants and revamping their sites to facilitate online translation services.

The service to which I am referring is not machine translation, but an automated online translation service where the user supplies all project criteria such as materials (which are uploaded), personal details, project details, expectations etc. online. Once all requirements have been supplied the user is given an immediate quote onscreen and an estimate date\time of completion. Once billing and payment information has been entered by the user they will receive an automated response via email, confirming the transaction while a corresponding mail is sent internally to the company's project manager with all the project details.

It is then up to the project manager to assign the project to a translator before emailing the final product back to the client, or making it available by other means (ftp\managed server) depending on the projects size.

All very straightforward.

Some companies are now furthering the automation of the process. Based on the criteria of the project entered online the translator(s) will be selected automatically from a database. An email is sent to the translator, requesting their services, and they will have a certain amount of time to respond, before the project is offered to the next most suitable translator. Although based upon a complex IS system the obvious advantage here would be bypassing the bulk of project management costs and administration tasks.

To give the user an extra sense of satisfaction it is also possible for the client to track the status of their project via a personalised login to the company's extranet.

So it seems possible to automate the entire process, cut out the middlemen and make a reasonable profit, and if this is the case then why aren't more companies doing it? Maybe it is only a matter of time but the general feeling within the industry is that despite the obvious advantages to the system, customers remain unconvinced of having their translations completed without any human contact.

Presently, few companies offer this kind of service. It started with Bowne Global, Berlitz (who are now one and the same) and more recently SDL have entered the fray. Understandably, market leaders such as these are equipped to offer a complete range of services, therefore leading the way. It also is good to see that smaller companies in the UK such as K-International and The Big Word are also moving into this area.

As more and more companies realize the potential in this and begin to offer the same service it is my feeling that it will become the industry standard for translation services. Optimistic surely, but not inconceivable.

Computer-assisted translation (CAT), also called computer-aided translation, is a form of translation where a human translator creates a target text with the assistance of a computer program. Note that in computer-assisted translation, the machine supports an actual, human translator.

Computer-assisted translation can include standard dictionary and grammar software; however, the term is normally used to refer to a range of specialised programs available for the translator, including translation memory, terminology management and alignment programs.

Translation memory (TM) programs store previously translated source texts and their equivalent target texts in a database and retrieve related segments during the translation of new texts.

Such programs split the source text into manageable units known as "segments." A source-text sentence or sentence-like unit (headings, titles or elements in a list) may be considered a segment, or texts may be segmented into larger units such as paragraphs or small ones, such as clauses. As the translator works through a document, the software displays each source segment in turn and provides a previous translation for re-use, if the program finds a matching source segment in its database. If it does not, the program allows the translator to enter a translation for the new segment. After the translation for a segment is completed, the program stores the new translation and moves onto the next segment. The translation memory, in principle, is a simple database fields containing the source language segment, the translation of the segment, and other information such as segment creation date, last access, translator name, and so on.

Some translation memory programs function as standalone environments, while others function as an add-on or macro to commercially available word-processing or other business software programs. Add-on programs allow source documents from other formats, such as desktop publishing files, spreadsheets, or HTML code, to be handled using the TM program.

Terminology management software provides the translator a means of automatically searching a given terminology database for terms appearing in a document, either by automatically displaying terms in the translation memory software interface window or through the use of hot keys to view the entry in the terminology database. Some programs have other hotkey combinations allowing the translator to add new terminology pairs to the terminology database on the fly during translation.

Alignment programs take completed translations, divide both source and target texts into segments, and attempt to determine which segments belong together in order to build a translation memory database with the content. The resulting TM can then be used for future translations.

Machine translation (MT) is a form of translation where a computer program analyses the source text and produces a target text without human intervention.

In recent years machine translation, a major goal of natural language processing, has met with limited success. Most machine translation involves some sort of human intervention, as it requires a pre-editing and a post-editing phase. Note that in machine translation, the translator supports the machine.

Tools available on the Internet, such as AltaVista's Babel Fish, and low-cost translation programs, have brought machine translation technologies to a large public. These tools produce what is called a "gisting translation" — a rough translation that gives the "gist" of the source text, but is not otherwise usable.

However, in fields with highly limited ranges of vocabulary and simple sentence structure, for example weather reports, machine translation can deliver useful results.

Engineer and futurist Raymond Kurzweil has predicted that by 2012, machine translation will be powerful enough to dominate the translation field. MIT's Technology Review also listed universal translation and interpretation as likely "within a decade" in its 2004 list. Such claims, however, have been made since the first serious forays into machine translation in the 1950s.

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The translation of religious works has played an important role in world history. For instance the Buddhist monks who translated the Indian sutras into the Chinese language would often skew the translation to better adapt to China's very different culture. Thus notions such as filial piety were stressed.

See also: Chinese Translation Theory

One of the first instances of recorded translation activity in the West was the rendition of the Old Testament into Greek in the third century B.C.E.; this translation is known as the Septuagint, alluding to the seventy translators (seventy-two in some versions) that were commissioned to translate the Bible on the island of Paphos, with each translator working in solitary confinement in a separate cell. Legend has it that all seventy versions were exactly identical. The Septuagint became the source text for later translations into many other languages including Latin, Coptic, Armenian, and Georgian.

St. Jerome, the patron saint of translation, is still considered one of the greatest translators in history for his work on translating the Bible into Latin. The Catholic Church used this translation (known as the Vulgate) for centuries, but even his translation met much controversy when it was released.

The period prior to and contemporary with the Protestant Reformation saw the translation of the Bible into the local languages of Europe, an act that had a great impact on the split between Protestantism and Catholicism, owing to the divergences between the Protestant and Catholic translations of particular words and passages of the Bible.

Martin Luther's Bible in German, Jakub Wujek's Bible in Polish, and the King James Bible in English had lasting effects on the religion, culture, and language of those countries.

See also: Bible translation and Translation of the Qur'an

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