Abstract FALC ( Facile à lire et à comprendre ) is a variety of French, designed to make texts more accessible. The French government promotes the use of FALC for health communication and electoral campaigns. Although societal awareness is increasing and research interest is growing, data scarcity remains a problem. This paper presents one of the first large corpora on FALC, containing over 100,000 words and compiled based on a clear corpus design. The corpus is analyzed with a focus on lexis and syntax, and the results are compared to standard French reference corpora. This analysis reveals several linguistic features of FALC that partially align with the recommendations in the guidelines published by Inclusion Europe, but in some cases also contradict them. For example, while sentences are indeed shorter, the number of negations is higher.

Abstract This article examines the critical and subversive linguistic strategies employed by Zé do Rock in his fourth book, jede sekunde stirbt ein nichtraucher: a lexicon üba vorurteile un andre teile (2009). Conceived as an alphabetically structured reference work, the so-called “lexicon” integrates short entries and extended sections featuring cultural comparisons, travel experiences, and reflections on otherness. By playing on linguistic and cultural misunderstandings, it deconstructs perceptions of foreignness and invites readers to critically reassess their biases and preconceptions. This approach fosters a critical engagement with mechanisms of discrimination and stereotyping. The study investigates how his deliberate humoristic creation of communicative barriers challenges essentialist notions of identity. Additionally, it interrogates how these disruptions, far from obstructing communication, serve as a platform for exploring new pathways through processes of cultural translation toward successful transcultural dialogue. In doing so, the article highlights the transformative potential of misunderstanding as a means to rethink intercultural exchanges and to promote a more nuanced understanding of cultural diversity.

Abstract The present article is concerned with the translational strategies employed by translators of the Swedish crime novel Kinesen by Henning Mankell. In this context, I shall focus on the translation of pronominal address forms, indicating the social distance between the novel’s characters. The aim is to demonstrate how the decisions taken by the translators might generate intercultural misunderstandings. The translation of pronominal address forms is a particular challenge as they depict the social relationships between characters. All the languages quoted in this article possess a binary address system of pronouns of proximity and distance, at least if we consider the contemporary standard varieties of the countries where the translations were published. Nevertheless, the contemporary rules of use differ significantly. Swedish is of particular interest as a source language because, since the so-called du -reform of the 1960 s, the pronoun du can be regarded as the unmarked form of address. Consequently, a multitude of dialogue constellations exist in which a Swedish du cannot be directly translated into the target language using a 2 nd person singular pronoun.

Resumen La creciente movilidad de estudiantes y profesionales desde la creación del Espacio Europeo de Educación Superior y otros programas de intercambio internacional ha favorecido la demanda de traducciones juradas de documentos académicos; de hecho, los documentos académicos han constituido en los últimos años uno de los encargos de traducción más habituales que reciben los traductores jurados. Con el objetivo de proporcionar un marco claro para la toma de decisiones en las distintas fases del proceso de la traducción jurada de documentos académicos, Lobato y Relinque (2024:104–117) proponen una categorización de los problemas de traducción (en adelante PT) de dichos documentos. Esta categorización, obtenida de forma inductiva a partir de un enfoque funcionalista, se centra particularmente en la traducción del inglés al español de certificaciones académicas estadounidenses. En el trabajo que aquí se presenta las autoras profundizan aún más en la categorización presentada en 2024, detallando y analizando los diferentes ejemplos encontrados en el corpus y prestando especial atención a los problemas transversales que plantean los referentes culturales, la inter/intratextualidad y los elementos paralingüísticos, ya que se trata de elementos muy recurrentes en esta tipología textual.

Abstract This article is an attempt at a pragmalinguistically grounded approach to Easy Language – an approach that has received little attention in previous research on accessible communication. Specifically, using the German and French versions of an Easy Language text from the field of health communication – namely an information text on organ and tissue donation – this study aims to examine problematic aspects of the guiding principle of maximum explicitness, which is often emphasized in manuals and regulatory frameworks. Drawing on Levinson’s implicature model, which closely links implicated meanings to lexical-semantic and morphosyntactic elements and structures, the analysis seeks to demonstrate how linguistic structures endorsed by guidelines and implemented in accessible text products may, contrary to their intended purpose, trigger implicatures. Furthermore, this study seeks to highlight the need for a more nuanced conceptualization of implicitness in the Easy Language discourse – one that moves away from blanket classifications and instead considers implicatures in light of textual and pragmalinguistic factors. In order to better illustrate this issue and to contribute to future developments in Easy Language research, an attempt is also made to categorize the implicatures identified in the analyzed text according to their different potential effects.

Abstract The Covid-19 pandemic has had an impact on communication practices and practices at work by fostering collaboration in virtual environments. Against the backdrop of the Covid-19 pandemic, this paper deals with virtuality as a catalyst for textual and linguistic change using the example of Italian-language email communication and chat communication in video conferencing, two forms of communication relevant to the organizational workplace. Within the university context, which provides the setting of the present study, the pandemic acted as a catalyst for virtuality in several regards. The aim of the paper is to take a descriptive and explanatory account of both linguistic and textual genre practices of Italian in the digital space, which are examined in the light of change. In doing so, it draws on approaches and models from the fields of text and media linguistics, variational linguistics, workplace discourse, organizational, and institutional communication. As the investigation shows, it proves particularly insightful to engage with the concept of proximity and distance from Romance linguistics (Koch/Oesterreicher 1985, 2011), and with the concept of the Communicative Constitution of Organizations from organization studies (e. g. Brummans et al. 2014).

Abstract This article traces the attitudes of national (German-speaking) and international employee associations in the field of audiovisual translation towards the development, training and use of AI in the language industry. By collecting and examining key statements in positioning papers, it is shown that the employees who unite in such creative associations are less concerned with the use of AI in the context of the multi-step translation process. Rather, they denounce the legal situation surrounding the use of copyrighted material in the development, training and subsequent use of AI applications. Copyright infringement has already occurred and continues to occur as questions around copyright are still insufficiently clarified. The collection of arguments in this contribution is followed by a look at the solutions provided by the associations for building a sustainable AVT industry that does not shy away from the use of AI solutions but also clearly defines the rights and obligations of the stakeholders involved.

Abstract This article analyses and compares two texts produced via neural machine translation (NMT). It describes potential problems concerning lexical, syntactical and textual aspects and potential strategies for legal translation from English to German with reference to a blog text on criminal law authored by a US law firm. The text is part of the teaching material in a legal translation course of the Master’s program in Multilingual Specialized Communication and Specialized Translation (MA FKÜ) at the Institute of Translation and Multilingual Communication (ITMK) at the TH Köln – University of Applied Sciences. For this purpose, translations produced by DeepL and ChatGPT (more specifically the didactic interface used at the TH Köln, THKI GPT-Lab) are analysed with a focus on specific legal questions and the issue of legal comparison which is fundamental to legal translation. Finally, this comparison leads to a recommendation on the use of these tools.

Abstract When comparing an ancient original text with its translations into a modern language, one may be surprised by the considerable variety of terms chosen by different translators in target texts, which is manifested not only in a lexical variety between synonyms, but also in a certain type of lexical variety that can be subjectively influenced by translators’ interpretations. With regard to the latter, this study analyzes to what extent this variety can affect the depiction of the Viking that is transmitted through translations into Modern English, deviating from what the original texts may be transmitting in Old English. For this purpose, the present study undertakes a qualitative and comparative analysis of thirteen different translations of poetry anthologies in Old English with texts in which the Vikings are mentioned, such as The Battle of Maldon, The Battle of Brunnanburh, Widsith, the Sermo Lupi ad Anglos (Wulfstan), as well as the Passion of Saint Edmund (Ælfric). Among the conclusions it is worth highlighting, in addition to a great lack of lexical uniformity, a generalization of terms such as Viking and pirate in translations, which can distort the image of the Viking in the original texts.

Abstract This study investigates the relevance of including the translation of non-verbal elements in film subtitles. It suggests that non-verbal elements play a crucial role in understanding films and, consequently, need to be considered when translating: what is non-verbal becomes written in the translation, carrying a significant semantic load. The article presents an empirical study adopting a qualitative approach that aims to explore and analyse the effect of including non-verbal translation in film subtitles, particularly in a Lebanese movie titled The Insult, subtitled in French. The results show that non-verbal communication and its semantic value should be explicit in subtitling to the foreign-language audience, whether explicitly apparent, graphically represented, or implicitly present between words and lines.