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Establishingcommongrounds
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attheteachingoftranslationnotonlyasapracticalbutasatheoretical
problem”(Cronin2005:250).Therestillisalotofmisunderstandingabout
whataretheessentialingredientsoftranslationexpertise,andtheolddi-
lemmaswhetheritisindeedanartoracraft,amatteroftalentandnatural
giftorhardwork,practiceandperseverancearestilldebated(Tabakowska
2003,PieĔkos2003,Piotrowska2007).Itseemsjustifiabletosuggestthat
togaingroundsforchallengingthesedilemmasoneshouldtrytoretrace
thecourseofthedevelopmentoftranslationasahumanskillfrompredis-
positiontoexpertise.Recentprojects(e.g.,thePACTEandtheTransComp
project)conductedbyTSscholarscommittedtoinvestigatinghowtransla-
tioncompetencedevelopsintraineeswhoaspiretobecomeprofessional
translatorswillhopefullyadvanceourunderstandingofthedevelopmental
natureoftranslationskill.Letuslookatpsycholinguisticsandcognitive
psychologytoseewhetherthesedisciplineshavedisplayedinterestinan
all-inclusiveapproachtotranslationskill.
1.7.3.Psycholinguisticsandcognitivepsychology
Inher1997articleentitled,“Thecognitivestudyoftranslationandinter-
pretation”DeGroot(1997:26)notedthattranslationhasnotbeenconsid-
eredasasubjectworthyofinvestigationinthefieldofappliedlinguistics,
psycholinguisticsandcognitivepsychology.Severalreasonswerepointed
outforthisneglectincluding,forexamplethefactthattranslationwasnot
emphasizedinmainstreamjournalsandthatitwastooquicklylabelledasa
‘specialskill’reservedforhighlytrainedprofessionals(seealsoMalakoff
andHakuta1991)andthereforejudgedbymany“toocomplextograpple
with”(DeGroot1997:26).Nearlyadecadelaterthenichehasnotbeen
filledbypsycholinguisticstudiesoftranslationingeneralapartfromsome
isolatedcasestudiesintheformofPhDdissertations(Hejwowski1992,
Whyatt2000)whichremainedunpublishedandthusgenerallynotavailable
toawiderresearchcommunity.Inconsequence,in2005Waltersadmitted
that,“Therehavebeensurprisinglyfewsystematicandscientificstudiesof
interpretationandtranslation(Shlesinger2000),particularlyinthefieldsof
appliedlinguisticsandpsycholinguistics”(2005:209).Furtherreasonsfor
theabsenceoftheinterestinthestudyoftranslationasaninstanceofbilin-
guallanguageperformanceaccordingtoWaltersaretobefoundin“the
sheercomplexityofthephenomenoninvolvinghiddensocialagendas,non-
explicitpragmaticconsiderations,unbridgeablecross-linguisticgapsand