Extended Abstract: What We Can Learn From Shifts in Emphasis in Technical Translations

This research project is the continuation of a study that focused on the translation of technical instructions. The field of technical communication would benefit from more studies on technical translation and a reassessment of the role of translators as primary users of technical documentation. My early study shows that translators will frequently reject word-by-word translation to embrace functional equivalence even when this change of strategies is not strictly necessary or warranted. A future study should focus, more specifically, on how translators manipulate the level of emphasis used in target texts to make them more attuned to different cultural and rhetorical traditions. In general, the idea that translators ‘do’ culture when working on technical documents deserves further investigation.