Shared cognition in the translation process: Information processing and meaning production as interactive accomplishments

Abstract

This article complements the current understanding of cognitive processing in translation by discussing the concept and providing empirical evidence of socially shared, interactive cognition as it emerges in collaborative team translation processes. By analyzing face-to-face interaction between audio-describers, the article shows how cognition is distributed and shared between cognitive agents (in the sense of a tolerable shared interpretation), and how interaction is elementary of this translating system. The article reports on an interaction analysis of video data from authentic collaborative audio description processes. It intends to pave the way for the study of social interactions in translation and interpreting processes from the viewpoint of cognitive processing. The analysis describes different phases of the translation act, from source text analysis to target text production, and details cognition as information processing and meaning production, operations which extend from the personal level of a human being to the intersubjective and cultural-collective ones.