This chapter presents a state-of-the-art analysis of cognitive accessibility in Spain and its convergence with Translation Studies, as well as a descriptive approach to the level of web accessibility of Spanish institutions and corporations. Since this chapter aims at describing the specific case of Spain in the aforementioned fields, a vast amount of the references made emerge from research studies conducted in this country. The chapter is therefore divided into three main sections: firstly, a road map of the convergence of cognitive accessibility and the fields of Applied Linguistics (AL), Pragmatics, and Translation Studies (TS) from the perspective of a number of Spanish researchers; secondly, a description of the current situation in Spain in terms of laws, decrees, and associations using easy-to-read tools as one of the main instruments of cognitive accessibility; and thirdly, a descriptive approach to the level of web accessibility in Spanish institutions and corporations.
TopIntroduction
Faced with a situation in which Applied Linguistics (AL) seems to have no clear-cut boundaries, some decades ago researchers like Brumfit already described this area of study as “the theoretical and empirical investigation of real‐world problems in which language is a central issue” (Brumfit, 1995: 27).
The term Applied Linguistics dates back to 1957, when the first program of that name was founded at the University of Edinburgh, leading in the 1970s to the Edinburgh Course in Applied Linguistics (Allen & Corder, 1975).
The Spanish researcher Díaz Fouces explains that the origins of AL coincide with the period of time just after the Second World War, when new international institutions with numerous working languages were proliferating. Díaz Fouces also points out that “in those years the term applied linguistics became identified with language didactics. Only later was it extended to refer to other areas like language planning, clinical linguistics, computational linguistics, etc.” (Díaz Fouces, 2004: online).1
Díaz Fouces explores different views on the possible interrelationship between AL and Translation Studies (TS), echoing several authors’ vindication of an independent charter for research into translation and interpreting activities (Rabadán & Fernández, 1996: 106-108; Hurtado Albir, 1996: 156-157; Baker & Pérez-González, 2011: 39-52) and also supporting the existence of a space for interdisciplinary convergence as defended by other researchers such as García Izquierdo (1997).
After compiling and comparing the different approaches used in AL and TS research, this author offers his own view of the relationship between Linguistics as applied to translating activity (LAT) and Translation Studies:
We understand Linguistics Applied to Translation to mean the set of resources (models, methods and instruments) provided by the different language disciplines that are used in any of the lines of research carried out in Translation Studies, that are in any way useful in professional language mediation practice, or that are designed ad hoc for any of those purposes (Díaz Fouces, 2004: online).2
For Díaz Fouces, therefore, LAT serves both as a reflexive tool and as an instrument of practical use in the context of translating activity. This view can be considered a legacy of the theory Ricardo Muñoz Martin describes in his work Lingüística para traducir, a theory very graphically illustrated in the following example:
The business of those who translate or interpret is communication by means of languages. As in the case of dentists, physiotherapists, and pharmacologists, who learn only those aspects of medicine that allow them to engage more efficiently in their professions, language mediators need to start by learning only those aspects of linguistics that will most help them to begin or improve their work. Otherwise, we might find ourselves not in the doctor’s shoes but in the patient’s: knowing where it hurts, but nothing else (Muñoz Martín, 1995: 6).3
According to Muñoz Martin’s line of argument, LAT becomes a kind of theoretical tool with which budding translators should be familiar as a basis for justifying their own decisions in their professional activity (the theoretical-practical approach). The objective of translator training is thus not primarily to reach the highest possible level of expertise in Linguistics (either general or applied), but to absorb enough theoretical knowledge of Linguistics to be able rationally to put it into practice and, thereby, perform the translating task efficiently.
One of the mainstays of this theoretical, reflexive-practical concept of Linguistics applied to Translation is the pragmatic approach, in which there is a direct link between the contextual value of language use and the parameters that influence the translation process.
TopObjectives
Following the premises described in the introduction section and on the search for a bottom-up linguistic, translation-related, inclusive and interdisciplinary perspective, the objectives of this chapter are as follows: