Welcome to the Machine? Prolegomena zu einer kritischen Translationswissenschaft in Zeiten ungebremster Maschinisierung

Abstract

The social and cultural interplay between translation technologies and society has become a focal point of an emerging field which might be dubbed sociotechnical translation studies. Today’s transcultural com­mu­ni­ca­tion is inconceivable without technological aids. Alongside countless pub­li­cations on purely technological and business issues concerning translation tech­nologies, there are, however, only few studies on the individual, so­cio­cul­tural or ecological consequences of new technologies and labour prac­tices. This paper suggests a broadly conceived consequentialist ethics for in­ves­tigations of the sociotechnical implications of translation technologies in to­day’s globalized and digitally networked world. By now, it has become ev­i­dent that revolutionary leaps in the development of the latest com­mu­ni­ca­tion technologies––e.g. the launch of ChatGPT in November 2022––steadi­ly influence human perception, the dynamics of communication, and the en­tire social fabric. This contribution ponders on a selection of philosophical paradigms and societal discourses surrounding technology and digital trans­la­tion; it engages with broad paradigms and concepts such as critical theory, post­humanism and the Anthropocene, in an attempt to connect these with to­day’s sociotechnical and ideological realities in a political economy of trans­lation that remains to be governed by neoliberal dogma and highly un­equal power dynamics.