Newcastle University > Postgraduate > Find a Degree > Module

• Offered for Year: 2022/23

• Module Leader(s): Dr JC Penet
• Lecturer: Mrs Carole Moore, Dr Michael Jin, Miss Noelia or Lia Cacheiro Quintas, Dr Jennifer Arnold, Dr Fred Wu, Dr Philippa Page, Dr Jessica Lin, Professor Francis Jones, Dr Pauline Henry-Tierney
• Other Staff: Ms Jos Harrison

• Owning School: Modern Languages
• Teaching Location: Newcastle City Campus

Semesters

Aims

This module has two parts:

Semester 1 (‘Profession’)aims to prepare you to become a more effective translating and/or interpreting (‘T&I’) professional. In it, you will learn:

• about the professional characteristics of T&I work, including key specialist areas.
• about the professional ethics and principles behind T&I work.
• career-starting and career-management skills for the T&I professions.

Semester 2 (‘Processes and Society’) underpins this by giving you an awareness of the wider context of T&I work worldwide and through the ages. This involves:

• A knowledge of T&I practice and theory in various world cultures and ages.
• Seeing T&I in a social, geographic and political context.
• A knowledge of key issues in interpreting studies, and of the principles of educating T&I professionals.

Outline Of Syllabus

Semester 1: ‘Profession’
• Professionalism, professional organizations and ethics
• Getting started as a T&I professional, career planning
• Freelancing
• Working at an agency and project managing
• Translation & interpreting jobs and clients
• Translation editing
• Translating books
• Literary translation as a profession

Semester 2: ‘Processes and Society’
• Interpreting studies
• The psycholinguistics of interpreting
• T&I in history: Europe, Middle East and China
• T&I, philosophy and religion
• Roles, society and networks in T&I
• Ideology and identity, gender and sexuality in T&I
• T&I and politics
• T&I training
• T&I and language learning

Teaching Methods

Teaching Activities

Teaching Rationale And Relationship

A module talk will introduce students to the module and explain learning/teaching methods. Live lectures + online Lecture materials (guided student tasks + discussion-board activities) on Canvas will enable students to engage with the required knowledge-base. The combination of lectures and workshops enables students to get a combination of lecturer input, mini practical tasks and discussion, thus building up their knowledge and professional expertise.
This module a limited number of asynchronous online lectures as the blended learning mode of teaching allows students to reflect in their own time, to complete collaborative activities and to revisit some of the lecture materials for new tasks (e.g. translation project management). Evaluation from last year showed that a majority of students appreciated the online elements as part of the module contact hours. The blended learning mode of teaching showed to be very effective as it allowed students time to reflect in their own time. Lectures on topics such as Translation Project Management work best online as they allow students to take part in reflective peer-exercises and to come back to these resources throughout the year.

Assessment Methods

The format of resits will be determined by the Board of Examiners

Other Assessment

Assessment Rationale And Relationship

The essays test the students’ knowledge of relevant input, and allow them to do in-depth research in two specialist areas.

Reading Lists

• SML8023's Reading List

Timetable

• Timetable Website: www.ncl.ac.uk/timetable/
• SML8023's Timetable