Time: Tuesday 8 April 2025 @ 16:45
Venue: Sala Górna, Collegium Heliodori Święcicki, Grunwaldzka 6
Speaker: Luc van Doorslaer (University of Tartu, KU Leuven)
City Translation: The Case of Central Europe
Abstract
Central European cities have already proven to be a very productive object of investigation for city translation research, in particular because of the variety of historical layers and historical perspectives. Over the past two decades and due to the pioneering work of Sherry Simon, the study of city translation has developed into a significant subfield within Translation Studies. As urban environments are inherently dynamic, fostering continuous interactions among diverse cultural and social elements (such as on markets or in museums), this area of research investigates how urban identities are shaped and understood. Lingual and translingual signage play a vital role in both reflecting and constructing these identities. Given that modern cities are increasingly characterized by cultural and linguistic diversity, translation zones have become ubiquitous, revealing the complexities of language and communication interactions. Examples illustrating such complexities will relate to the cities of Tartu, Lviv and Gdańsk.
About the speaker
Luc van Doorslaer is Full Professor of Translation Studies at the University of Tartu (Estonia), the former President of CETRA, the Center for Translation Studies at KU Leuven (Belgium), and Professor Extraordinary at Stellenbosch University (South Africa). Since 2016, he has been Vice President of EST, the European Society for Translation Studies. He is journal editor of ‘Translation in Society’ (John Benjamins). He has published widely in the field of translation studies, mainly on his research interests — journalism and translation, sociology of translation, imagology and translation, city translation, and the institutionalization of translation studies. His most recent book is entitled The Situatedness of Translation Studies. Temporal and Geographical Dynamics of Theorization (Brill, 2021).
About the lecture series
WA Distinguished Professors’ Lectures Series features internationally renowned scholars visiting the Faculty of English to share their research and professional expertise with the faculty and students.