Migration and Translation. Changing Concepts, Critical Approaches. An Interview with Doris Bachmann Medick

Migration and translation are two major issues of contemporary life and are recurrent themes in theoretical and critical thought across many disciplines. Language practices in migratory times go beyond the level of linguistic and communicative activity and make us aware of the power of language, translation, mutual understanding and social/political/cultural practices. In order to better understand the challenges and potentials facing us as interpreters, translators or scholars in Translation Studies we need to move beyond our disciplinary borders and open the discipline up to new perspectives and methodologies. Starting from these premises we believe that Doris BachmannMedick’s work on migration and translation is central for a critical rethinking of the role of translation, translators, interpreters and cultural mediators in a period of massive migrations towards Western Europe. The interview proposes a new approach for studying, researching and working with linguistic/cultural translation in an era of transnational movements and displacements.