Problems and advantages of multidisciplinarity: Some practical observations from a multidisciplinary Translation Studies project

Kirjoittajat

• Raila Hekkanen PhD, professional translator

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.61200/mikael.129623

Avainsanat:

multidisciplinarity, translation sociology, translation archaeology, reception, combining theories, translations of Finnish literature

Abstrakti

This article is a practically oriented case study on a multidisciplinary Translation Studies project, my PhD thesis (Hekkanen 2010), involving a combination of translation archaeology, translation sociology and text analysis. It aims to demonstrate some practical problems and advantages related to combining several methods in a one-author project. The main advantages in this case were the possibility to obtain a wider perspective of a field where previous research was scarce and the ability to use various materials and methods to support each others’ findings. Problems, on the other hand, involved problems fitting different types of data together, questions on the extent to which the various methods in fact address the “same” phenomenon, and issues in reporting the results in an approachable manner. The main aim of the article is to make it easier for researchers in the early stages of their career who are planning to embark on a multidisciplinary project to prepare for the task ahead.