Bangor academic Helena Miguélez-Carballeira wins award to lead research network on translation in Wales

The Project ‘Translation in Non-State Cultures: Perspectives from Wales’ has been awarded an AHRC Research Development Grant. Dr Helena Miguélez-Carballeira, Lecturer in Spanish and Director of the Translation Studies Graduate Programme at Bangor University’s School of Modern Languages has won £12,000 from the Arts and Humanities Research Council to lead a Wales-wide research network on translation in Wales.

The project will establish a collaborative network for Wales-based researchers, trainers, practitioners and policy makers in the field of translation. It aims to provide a platform for theory and practice-related research on translation that looks specifically at the Welsh context and simultaneously contributes to wider debates about translation in non-state cultures.

At the heart of the network is also a shared recognition that any understanding of Wales, both historically and in the contemporary period, needs to give greater attention to translation-related issues, a fact that has not always been explored beyond the field of language and cultural policy.

The network brings together Bangor-based academics in translation studies Dr Helena Miguélez-Carballeira, Dr Stefan Baumgarten and Dr Yan Ying (from Bangor’s School of Modern Languages), Dr Angharad Price (Welsh, Bangor), Professor Sioned Davies (Welsh, Cardiff), and Cymdeithas Cyfieithwyr Cymru [The Association of Welsh Translators and Interpreters].

Dr Miguélez-Carballeira says: “I am delighted to win this award and to be able to lead this ground-breaking project. The network will create a foundation for  much-needed research and practical cooperation within the theme of translation in Wales, at a time when greater devolution of powers and lesser public resources are turning translation into a pressing policy concern in the country.”

The network will hold three events over the course of the next six months: one whole-day workshop in April 2012 for network members; a dedicated panel at the NAASWCH   Conference to be held at Bangor University between 26-28 of July, 2012; and a larger two-day international conference entitled ‘Translation in Non-State Cultures: Perspectives from Wales and other Celtic Nations’, to be held in Bangor in early September this year. The network will also have a dedicated bilingual website containing a wide range of resources for teaching and research on Translation Studies in Wales. The website, which will be launched at the September conference, will be hosted on the Cymdeithas Cyfieithwyr Cymru server.

Publication date: 15 February 2012