This course prepares students with the necessary research methods and techniques to conduct, evaluate and communicate research. The course examines the epistemological foundations of qualitative and quantitative research, in addition to ethical and political factors in research. It familiarizes students with research design, research methods and data collection. It also introduces linkages between broader theoretical and conceptual perspectives and alternative approaches through which to organize knowledge, construct ideas and present various arguments.

This course introduces students to the main approaches in the field of Translation Studies. It follows a chronological trajectory of the development of the major theories in the field, including theories of equivalence, translation products and processes, functionalist approaches, discourse and register analysis, systems theories, narrative theory, norm theory and descriptive translation studies. This course invites students to think critically and reflectively about the complexity and implications of the choices they have to make as translators and scholars.

Transcreation Skills and Practices is a foundation practice-oriented course designed for students with little or no background in transcreation, especially for the creative industries. It aims at developing in students the essential skills and knowledge to perform transcreation tasks to the required standard in this class, in classes running in parallel and later in other more advanced courses. Transcreation practical work focuses on many text types and genres, such as literary, media, advertising, performing arts, museums, and audiovisual texts.

This course primarily aims to engage translation students in analysing Arabic morphologically, syntactically, semantically, pragmatically, and stylistically with the potential to enhance their appreciation of and competence in manipulating various grammatical, stylistic, and rhetorical features and devices of Modern Standard Arabic (MSA). Students are taught to comprehend prose in MSA. Special emphasis is placed on key linguistic features within different genres of MSA. Through practical exercises, students will learn the main issues that should be given full consideration by translation students while dealing with different texts for translation purposes.

This is mainly a practical course that introduces students to a selection of language technology tools with a focus on their professional practice. These will range from widely used open access CAT tools to the industry standard RWS TRADOS (Getting Started level). Students will create and manage translation memories and terminological databases, which will improve the accuracy, consistency and quality of their translation. They will also integrate the use of corpora into their translation practice, which will allow them to study language behaviour by analysing large text collections. Finally, they will reflect on the role of machine translation and post-editing and their application in the translation process.

This course will address the creative industries as “cycles of creating, producing, and distributing goods and services that use creativity and intellectual capital as primary inputs” (UNCTAD). Students will be given an overview of how creative industries in the Arts, Media, Heritage, and functional creations comprise a set of knowledge-based activities that produce tangible goods and intangible intellectual or artistic services with creative content, economic value, and market objectives.

This is a largely practical course that introduces students to the technique of interlingual subtitling and SDH. Students will be introduced to the temporal and spatial constraints, timing, condensation, verbal and non- cues, appropriate punctuation, positioning and segmentation. Students will be encouraged to analyse how subtitles function as a form of inter-semiotic communication and inter-linguistic mediation and reflect on the implications of choosing the most appropriate strategies. Students will also explore methods of handling culture-specific difficulties of audiovisual texts in interlingual subtitling.

In this course, students move beyond traditional notions of translation to address accessibility, both as a sub-discipline of Translation Studies, and a topic at the intersection of multiple scientific and technical domains. During the course they acquire factual, conceptual and procedural knowledge that will support their work as researchers or professional service providers of multiformat resources and sensory experiences to enhance people’s access to information and culture.

This unit introduces students to the translation and adaptation of dialogue in preparation for either non-lip-synched dubbing, voice over or Audio Description. Students will learn to work with and create scripts and deal with a wide range of linguistic, cultural, semiotic and technical issues faced when producing a dubbing/voicing script. Students will work with a range of different multimodal products including documentaries, interviews, cartoons, paintings, movies etc.

This course introduces students to more recent scholarly approaches to the study of translation and creativity. The course follows a thematic overview of the major theories in the field of TS in relation to specific creative industries. This is done in a constant dialogue with other disciplines such as cultural studies, theatre studies, film studies, human interaction studies, among others. Through discriminating, critical engagement with theory and its scholarly and practical applications, this course invites students to think critically and reflectively about the complexity and implications of the choices they have to make as translators/mediators and scholars.