The sociology and practice of translation: interaction, indexicality, and power

Abstract

This article addresses the sociology and practices of translation. The main argument is that translation work should be understood in ethnomethodological terms as an indexical, social, and interactive practice that produces an ongoing “third space” of difference. The article provides insights into the practice of ethnographic translation work in a multilingual and foreign research context. The study reveals that cooperation between locally involved translators and researchers is highly productive—even necessary—for translation, transcription, and interaction analyses. Moreover, the article argues that in order to make translation practice understandable, not only ethnographic research, linguistic knowledge and cooperation between translators and researchers is required but equally reflections on social theory and the production of scientific texts. Finally, a novel sociologically informed methodology of translation work for qualitative social research is offered using the concepts of “cooperation,” “indexicality,” “power,” “representation,” and “third space.”