sociological turn ,” for some kind of alliance with a discipline better equipped to
handle contextual variables.
Theo Hermans (1999), for example, closes his account of
the paradigm by pointing the way to the sociologies of
Bourdieu and
Luhmann . And
so one turns that corner; but what do we find? Usually a plethora of data, on numerous
levels, with very few categories able to organize the data in terms of cross-cultural
communication. The great Modernist sociologies are based on the same structuralism
that informed the history of the descriptive paradigm itself, albeit now with more scope
for self-reflexivity (the sociologist can do the sociology of sociologists). More
problematic, these sociologies are overwhelmingly of single societies only, of systems
in the “one side or the other” sense that has reigned within the paradigm. They fit in so
well with the target-side orientation of descriptive approaches that they risk bringing in
little that is new. Indeed, the descriptive literary studies of the 1970s and 1980s were
already doing systematic sociology of a kind. A new “sociological turn” could risk
bringing us back full-circle.
Summary This chapter has sketched out the historical and intellectual background of the descriptive
paradigm of translation theory. The paradigm was mainly developed by literary scholars
working in relation to smaller cultures. Although based on empirical research, it has a set of
properly theoretical concepts, many of which can be traced from the Russian Formalists to
work done in central Europe, to the Tel Aviv School, and to scholars in Holland and Flanders.
The academic discipline of Translation Studies began to take shape from the exchanges
between those groups. In general, the descriptive theories oppose the equivalence paradigm in
that they aim to be non-prescriptive, their prime focus is on “shifts” rather than types of
equivalence, and they do not undertake extensive analysis of the source culture. They tend to
be like purpose-based
Skopos approaches in that they emphasize the target-culture context
and the
function of translations within that context. They nevertheless differ from purpose-
based approaches in that they see functions in terms of the positions occupied by translations
within the target
systems , rather than with respect to a client or a brief. Descriptive theories
also tend to concern what translations are
usually like in a particular context, rather than he
ways in which particular translations might differ. They are thus able to talk about the
consensus-based “norms” that inform the way translations are produced and received. The
paradigm is thus relativistic in that it is very aware that what is considered a good translation in
one historical context may not be rated so highly in a different context. The research based on
those concepts has done much to reveal the vast diversity of translation practices in different
historical periods, different cultures, and different types of communication.