Hans-Georg Gadamer’s philosophy of understanding and its implications for a model of hermeneutical translation competence

ABSTRACT In the last decades, the notion of translation competence, as well as a translator’s competence, has become increasingly significant as the number of translation courses, both at undergraduate and postgraduate levels, has grown exponentially across the globe. The expansion of such courses in many countries around the world necessitates developing theoretical models of translation competence which could serve as starting points for rethinking the existing frameworks within the field of translation pedagogy. The main objective of this paper is to discuss a novel hermeneutical model of translation competence as based on the main tenet of Hans-Georg Gadamer’s philosophy of understanding, namely, the hermeneutical circle. This paper is embedded within the domain of translational hermeneutics, a subfield of translation studies which has yet not been given proper attention among translation scholars. The first part of this article offers a concise state of the art of the notion translation competence. The second section of this paper provides a brief overview of Hans-Georg Gadamer’s philosophical hermeneutics, with particular emphasis on the philosopher’s views on the nature of the hermeneutical circle. Capitalizing on these notions, an original hermeneutical model of translation competence is presented. The paper concludes with general remarks pertaining to avenues for future research into hermeneutical translation competence.