Global Journal of Human Social Science, G: Linguistics and Education, Volume 23 Issue 8

Opportunities and Challenges Facing the Profession of Translator in Africa Dr. Servais Martial Akpaca Abstract- In many African countries, for historical reasons, European languages including English, French, Spanish, and Portuguese are used in schools, churches, public and private institutions. Therefore, translation from and into these languages is frequently done during international conferences as well as for international organisations and projects located in the African region. The purpose of this paper is to discuss the opportunities and challenges of this linguistic situation for translators across Africa. So far, translation has played a major role in the progress of humanity and should continue to do so, especially in Africa, a continent that heavily depends on the wealth of knowledge and information available, especially, in English and in a few other languages. History reveals that medicine, which was originally practiced by the Arabs, was introduced through translation into Western universities in the 8th century. Nowadays, thanks to the globalisation process, translations are increasingly done by multinationals into many languages even in Africa. The methodology of the paper is both descriptive and explanatory. The findings of the paper include the following challenges and opportunities: a limited number of institutions employ translators in Africa, therefore job opportunities are not plenty in this profession; translation studies fail to attract many students because of the limited number of opportunities provided by the labour market; there are few schools of translators in African countries; small corporations complain about the high cost of translations and expect every translator to excel in both their mother tongue and their second or third language instead of employing more than one translator; translators in Africa also play the role of terminologists because of the lack of terminology databases in most institutions; freelance translators find it difficult to cope with this situation, especially when their working relationship with these institutions date back to a recent past; the use of European languages is a challenge for many student translators and practising translators; there is a need for translators to have a noticeable web presence in order to attract clients from all over the world; they also need to create an instrument (i.e. a journal or a newsbulletin) to express their opinions and concerns; last but not least, national translators' associations need to register and effectively defend their members' interests. Keywords: freelance translator, translation technology, market demands, africa, professional ethics. I. I ntroduction ranslation has rendered valuable services to humanity from time immemorial. It not only disseminates knowledge from one language to another, but it also brings people together and promotes friendly relations and international understanding. Remember that from the 8th century, medicine was introduced to Western universities by the Arabs through translation. Toledo, the erstwhile capital city of Spain, became a ''beehive of translation'', i.e. a busy place where translations were done on a large scale. That is what Berschin (1986, pp. 163-168) recalls when he notes that: En effet, Tolède, la capitale de l'Espagne à l'époque, est devenue un centre de traduction à la suite de la conquête musulmane en 711. L'École de Traducteurs de Tolède a été créée au XIIème siècle par l'archevêque de Tolède: don Raimundo. À partir de la seconde moitié du Xème siècle, Huesca, Tarazona, León, Pampelune, Segovie et Barcelone ont suivi l'exemple. Tolède est devenue un centre culturel qui exportait le savoir à toute l'Europe chrétienne. Des traductions étaient effectuées de l'arabe au latin. Plus tard, au XIIIème siècle, Alphonse X dit Le Sage a continué à traduire des livres de philosophie, d'astronomie, de médecine, de littérature, etc., de l'arabe vers le grec, le castillan et le latin. Indeed, this conference provides an opportunity to recall the contribution of translation to civilisation and to discuss practical aspects of the profession in Africa. It is a fact that the practice of this profession in Africa faces opportunities and challenges, which need to be discussed in a bid to improve translators' working conditions and status. This paper shows that the demand for translation is increasing across the world, and Africa needs to find ways and means to get a share of the market. In other words, African translators need collective strategies to seize the opportunities available in the national, regional and international translation markets. To this end, issues pertaining to training and curriculum, regulating access to the profession, education of work providers, translation technology, official registration of translators' associations, tariffs, ethics, etc., are discussed. The paper hinges on practical ideas developed by Gouadec (2007) and takes into account the current market trends highlighted by Victoria Nicol (2018). Aspects relating to translation technology, i.e. Neural Machine Translation and translation memories, are dealt with using papers published by Doucet (2022), Kook (2022), and Martikainen (2022). Professional aspects of the topic are discussed using the regulations of a number of translators' associations from Africa and overseas. T Author: Department of English/Translation Unit, Faculty of Languages, Arts, and Communication (FLLAC), University of Abomey-Calavi, Benin. e-mail: akpacasm@yahoo.fr © 2023 Global Journals Volume XXIII Issue VIII Version I 101 ( ) Global Journal of Human Social Science - Year 2023 G