Course title: Translation of Scientific and Academic Texts
Instructors: Dr. Nataša Pavlović and Dr. Snježana Veselica Majhut
ECTS credits: 5
Status: Mandatory
Semester: 7th
Enrollment requirements: The students must be enrolled in the graduate program in English Language and Literature, Specialization in Translation.
Course description:
The course consists of four blocks. In each block the students translate specialized texts from a different field. The first three blocks deal with selected texts from the fields of social sciences, humanities, and natural sciences. The final block is dedicated to texts from the area of business and economics. The translations are done from English into Croatian and from Croatian into English (approx. 60/40).
The coursework is organized around projects that the students do in groups, partly in the virtual environment, on http://omega.ffzg.hr/ (Moodle). The students learn how to use printed and electronic resources to research the subject matter and build corpora and glossaries of terminology. They also revise their own and each other’s translations, manage translation projects, cooperate with subject-matter experts and clients, and so on.
Objectives: By the end of the course the students should be able to translate, individually and in groups, texts similar to those dealt with in the course. They should be able to identify translation problems in the text and to adopt strategies appropriate to the situation, the target readers, the client’s requirements, and so on. The students should also be able to use parallel texts to build their own glossaries of specialized terminology. They should be able to use search engines and online resources for terminology mining and subject-matter background reading. The students should also be able to do on-the-spot translations of short, relatively simple texts from the specialized areas dealt with in the course, without the help of aids other than their own glossaries of terminology.
Course requirements: Regular course attendance, regular submission of assignments, participation in the online forums as requested. Students get their final grade on the basis of their “portfolio” (collection of translations done during the course, both at home and in class, individually and in groups).
Week by week schedule:
| Session | Topics |
| 1 | Introduction. Course description, goals and requirements. Instructions for use of the online learning system (Moodle). |
| 2-7 | Social sciences: Sociology |
| 8,9,10 | Natural sciences: Medicine |
| 11,12,13 | Humanities: Linguistics |
| 14-19 | Humanities: Art History |
| 20-28 | Business and economics |
| 29 | Revision |
| 30 | Student feedback, suggestions for future work |
Reading:
Textbooks:
Nord, Christiane. 1997. Translating as a Purposeful Activity. Manchester: St. Jerome Publishing.
Baker, Mona.1992. In Other Words. A Coursebook on Translation. London: Routledge
Bilingual dictionaries, such as:
– Bujas, Željko. Veliki hrvatsko-engleski rječnik. Zagreb: Nakladni zavod Globus
and Bujas, Željko. Veliki englesko-hrvatski rječnik. Zagreb: Nakladni zavod Globus
– Grupa autora. Englesko-hrvatski rječnik. Zagreb: Školska knjiga
Monolingual dictionaries, such as:
Hornby, A. S. Oxford Advanced Learner’s Dictionary. Oxford: Oxford University Press
Anić, V. Rječnik hrvatskoga jezika. Zagreb: Novi liber
Encyclopaedic dictionaries, such as:
The New Oxford Dictionary of English, or
Webster’s Third New International Dictionary, Unabridged
Anić, V. et al. Hrvatski enciklopedijski rječnik. Zagreb: Novi liber
Collocation dictionaries, such as:
Oxford Collocations Dictionary for Students of English. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Specialized dictionaries, such as:
Ivir, V. Hrvatsko-engleski poslovno-upravni rječnik. Zagreb: Školska knjiga.
Špiljak, V. Englesko-hrvatski poslovni rječnik. Zagreb: Masmedia.
Electronic resources