translation studies. retrospective and prospective views

Translation Studies: Retrospective and Prospective Views ISSN 2065 – 3514
(2008) Year I, Issues 1 Galati University Press
Proceedings of the 3rd Conference
Translation Studies: Retrospective and Prospective Views,
9 - 11 October 2008 – “Dunărea de Jos” University of Galaţi, ROMANIA
English that is promoted in mass media: television, magazines, newspapers and
radio. Unlike the English that students learn in schools, the English used in mass
media accepts strange abbreviations and grammatical mistakes in constructing a
phrase with the single purpose of persuading, provoking or entertaining.
This gulf between the ‘two languages’ raises an important question: ‘What
should teachers do – include mass media material during their English class or
ignore it?’
Knowledge and Representation in the Contemporary British Novel
Ecaterina PĂTRAŞCU - “Spiru Haret” University of Bucharest
Postmodernism is, par excellence, the term to characterize the majority of
the post-1968 writers, particularly when reference is made to the American space.
Concepts as reality, history, knowledge, truth are marked by external subjectivity,
perspectivism, and even worse, by relativism. None of these can be based on
ontology. Nevertheless, despite its mask, one can see at the opposite pole, the
attitude of the British writers of the same time interval: Graham Swift, Julian
Barnes, Salman Rushdie.
Although all the above mentioned concepts will be found in the narrative
discourse of the said authors, they are epistemologically perceived and subsumed
to a much larger and more significant discourse, that of power and the right to
authority, in a seemingly fragmentary and confused universe.
These authors’ question is whose is the power? Because it is a fact: he who
holds power holds truth. History, from the perspective of British authors, defines
and establishes identities; from the American relativistic perspective, history is
being built b y itself. It is true, political discourse and shade of meaning are
involved in both of the cases, but the accent is different.
From Reflection-Based LTE to Competence-Based LTE
Ecaterina PEGULESCU – Ministry of Education, Research and Youth
Language teacher education (LTE) has been placed between two sorts of
contextual factors: social, political and cultural factors, on one hand and provision
factors, on the other hand. Last but not least a discussion on ideology and on the
teaching process, including teacher's knowledge, students' learning and
the teachers and learners’ beliefs, is necessary.
From the general attitude of all the implied actors of the learning
process and from the frame of reference offered by the European documents of the
European Commission and the Council of Europe, the Romanian institutions
responsible of the language teachers' education have to re-think the whole system.
Sir Gawain and the Green Knight: (Re)Translating the Medieval Code of
Chivalry
Dan Nicolae POPESCU – “Ştefan cel Mare” University of Suceava
The present paper argues that by the end of the Middle Ages the Code of
Chivalry had estranged itself so much from its original meaning that somebody, if
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