Dr. Mattea Jean Cussel, postdoctoral researcher at the MIRAS research group, is this year’s runner up of the Martha Cheung Award, which aims to recognize the best Translation and Interpreting Studies research by early career scholars.
The winning article is An Ethnographic Account of Spanish-language Publishing and Reading in the United States: The Role of and Attitudes towards Translation, published in the fourth volume of the journal Translation in Society. Cussel analyses the phenomenon of the “simultaneous and parallel publishing” of works written in English and translated into Spanish in the United States, focusing on Latinx literature. More specifically, the article points to how this publishing practice can lead to a kind of invisibility that minimises the nature of the translated work in certain reading contexts.
Cussel proposes the concept of translation avoidance to address how various actors involved in the publication, distribution and reception of literary works (such as publishers, booksellers and readers) avoid translations in favour of the originals. In this context, Cussel warns of the negative impact this can have: rejecting translations into Spanish closes doors to the coexistence and creativity that arises from contact among languages.
The MIRAS team would like to extend its sincerest congratulations to Dr. Cussel for this well-deserved milestone and encourages everyone to take a few minutes to read her research that is available in open access.