Translating Development

Introduction
Hilary Footitt (University of Reading)

Panel 1: Translators in Development NGOs
Chair: Wine Tesseur

Alberto Sanz Martins (Translations manager, Oxfam GB)
Jessica Matthews (Internal communications officer, Family for Every Child)
Patricia Sommer (Freelance translator)
Verity Leonard Hill (Translations manager, Save the Children)

This seminar aims to provide a forum for translators working in the area of development and NGOs to talk about their work, and to discuss the challenges that it involves. It will bring key translation studies specialists and trainers into dialogue with practitioners, and it will inform broader translation networks, including the ITI, about translation in the field of development.

Translation is an area that has been generally overlooked and underfunded in NGOs. Previous workshops at the University of Reading (2014) and Aston University (2015), in which NGO practitioners and translators from various organisations participated, highlighted the challenges the sector faces in using foreign languages in its work, and the need for research and collaboration in this area. Languages issues do not tend to have a high-profile within organisations. Formal language policies are often not in place, and translation needs are often under-funded.

Aiming to raise the profile and importance of translation in development, the ‘Translating Development’ seminar will for the first time bring together the different interest groups involved to think about what practical steps would support translation in and for NGOs, how practitioners might be networked together, and what implications their work has for future research and postgraduate translator training.

This seminar is organised as part of the AHRC-research project 'The Listening Zones of NGOs: Languages and Cultural Knowledge in Development Programmes'.