Chapter 23 | Audiovisual Translation and Audience Reception

 

Back to Publications   Back to The Routledge Handbook of Audiovisual Translation

 

 

 

Publication date: 13 September 2018
Copyright date 2019
Hardback ISBN: 9781138859524
E-book ISBN 9781315717166
You can order this volume on the Routledge website

 

 

 

 

 
Reception studies stands out as a fast-growing area of research within audiovisual translation. Although most studies to date have focused on subtitling, other modalities of translation are beginning to receive more attention as users gain more exposure to them. This chapter delivers an overview of research methods used to study reception and a range of experiments that have been conducted within audiovisual translation studies. Traditionally, the most popular methods have been questionnaires and eye tracking, but interviews, focus groups and direct observation have also been used. As in most other areas of translation studies, methodological triangulation is bound to yield particularly sound findings.

In the case of interlingual subtitling, reception studies have been more concerned with empirically testing established professional standards; in less established audiovisual translation modalities, such as audio description, reception studies have facilitated the development of guidelines and standards. A number of future research avenues for reception studies in the context of audiovisual translation are sketched in the final part of the chapter. Future studies could draw on translation sociology to assess the social impact of audiovisual translation, and adopt a cognitive perspective to become better acquainted with the cognitive effort involved in processing translated media content.

 

 

David Orrego-Carmona is a Lecturer in Translation Studies at Aston University (UK) and a Research Associate at the Department of Linguistics and Language Practice at the University of the Free State (South Africa). His research explores the production and reception of professional and non-professional translations, as well as the impact of the democratization of technologies on the consumption of translations.

 

 

The Routledge Handbook of Audiovisual Translation Studies provides an authoritative and straightforward overview of the field through thirty-two specially commissioned chapters written by leading scholars in the field.

This state-of-the-art reference work is divided in four sections. The first part focuses on established and emerging audiovisual translation modalities, explores the changing contexts in which they have been and continue to be used, and examine how cultural and technological changes are directing their future trajectories. The second part explores the interface between audiovisual translation and a range of theoretical models that have proved particularly productive in steering research in audiovisual translation studies. Some of these models are associated with disciplines that have long intersected with audiovisual translation, while others are drawn from areas of knowledge that are only now beginning to make their presence felt in the audiovisual translation literature. The third part surveys a range of methodological approaches supporting traditional and innovative ways of interrogating audiovisual translation data. The final part addresses a range of themes pertaining to the place of audiovisual translation in society: these include the institutionalization, academization and technologization of audiovisual translation, as well as its role as a force for social change, both within and outside the industry. This Handbook gives audiovisual translation studies the voice it needs to make its presence felt within the Humanities research landscape.

 

Back to Publications   Back to The Routledge Handbook of Audiovisual Translation