A fordítás és közvetítés változó szerepe az idegennyelv-oktatásban: a tudományos nézőpontok közeledése

Abstract

In multilingual and multicultural contexts, individuals who speak foreign languages but are not translation professionals increasingly engage in oral or written translation and language mediation activities both at the workplace and in everyday life. These formal or informal translational actions are connected to various formal or informal interactions for a variety of purposes, and are often done on an ad hoc basis. In applied linguistics, more and more authors emphasize that integrating translation with foreign language learning and teaching not only has a number of benefits related to language learning, but can serve more general educational purposes as well. Unfortunately, translation has been a highly dismissed topic in the theory of Second Language Acquisition (SLA) and in the mainstream global practice of ELT (English Language Teaching) for a long time, and is still dominated by theories and norms stemming from monolingual teaching principles. In the past few decades, however, translation is gradually being rediscovered in foreign language learning and teaching not only as a tool to develop communicative and intercultural competence but as a useful skill in itself, which can also help to promote cross-curricular learning. The aim of this paper is to offer a brief overview of some of the strongest arguments recently presented in relevant disciplines with a view to urging that translation should gain a more prominent place and become a more integral part of foreign language learning and teaching