Two Literary Translation Studies students present at a conference
In early April two postgraduate students (pictured Rory McKenzie) in Literary Translation Studies at the School of Languages and Cultures attended an international conference on translation titled Regional Identities on a Global Scale: Translation, Audiences, Reception hosted by the University of British Colombia, Vancouver. The conference featured some of the most well respected translators and theorists of translation of Italian literature in Lawrence Venuti and Loredana Polezzi, as well as other participants from North America, Europe and Australia.
Francesca Benocci (PhD Candidate) presented her paper Women Poets from Aotearoa: from New Zealand English into Italian. A Case Study in Cross-cultural Creative Translation which featured a selection of poems by New Zealand authors both of Māori and Pasifika heritage she translated as part of her PhD thesis. In her paper, Francesca explored the issues of trying to retain multilingualism and multiculturalism in poetry translation providing creative solutions through a foreignising approach.
Rory McKenzie (MA Candidate) presented his Honours research paper Subtitling Dialectal Variation: Benvenuti al Sud (2010) which looked at the ways that Italian dialect was represented in the English subtitles of the film Benvenuti al Sud by director Luca Miniero. The paper explored the often under-appreciated form of translation that is subtitling, then gave a brief overview of the Neapolitan dialect, followed by techniques used to translate Italian dialect, and finally proposed new innovative subtitles that could have better represented the dialect of the film.
Both papers were very well received by the audience, and both students received feedback from experienced translators that will no doubt advance their studies in their respective fields.