A Genre-oriented Translation-based Instruction to Professional Communication

Abstract

This paper seeks to validate the use of translation as a methodological procedure that facilitates learners' interpretation of professional writing practices. We mainly contend that translation activities can become an adequate linguistic input in the teaching of professional written genres as regards the analysis of the linguistic, rhetorical and social components of these genres. Relying on the students' comparison of source text and target text, the paper discusses (i) how translation- based assignments reinforce the acquisition of lexico-grammatical patterns at a textual level, (ii) how L1 to L2 transfer foregrounds the way texts are organised and the way thematic elements are semantically connected within a rhetorical structure, and (iii) how translation-based noticing helps teachers raise learners' aware- ness of interpersonal mechanisms, epistemic positions and, more broadly speaking, of the construction and negotiation of social relations in the professional arena. As reported in the paper, teacher/students discussion in an ESP classroom illustrate the role of translation as a suitable pedagogical means to raise students' awareness of those textual, rhetorical and social aspects involved in professional genres.