Associate Professor Giuseppe Palumbo Visiting Writing Studies Fall Semester

Please welcome Giuseppe Palumbo, our visiting professor for Fall 2022. Giuseppe Palumbo is Associate Professor of English Language and Translation at the University of Trieste, Italy, where he is a member of the Department of Legal, Language, Interpreting and Translation Studies. Over the last decade he has served as Director of the University’s Language Center (2014-2017) and Head of the BA Degree Program in Applied Interlinguistic Communication for the Legal Professions.

Over the last few years, his research interests have mainly touched on specialized translation, with reference to three particular areas: translation teaching; analysis of academic discourse; and difficulties and problems posed by the translation of scientific texts.

Please plan to greet him on Wednesday September 28th between noon and 1:00 in Nolte 125.

Professor Palumbo will be delivering a lecture for all Writing Studies members (at a date TBD). He also will be joining Aki Ito (member, Technical Communication Advisory Board) for a hybrid event Tuesday Oct. 25, 4:00-5:30 on Access and Inclusion in Translation.

He looks forward to visiting with students, staff, and faculty in Writing Studies and across the University. Please help him make important connections, and make sure to invite him to your classes to provide key direction on translation. You can contact him at gpalumbo@units.it.

Biography

In 2008, Giuseppe Palumbo obtained a PhD from the University of Surrey (UK) after completing a thesis of the difficulties posed by the translation of scientific texts. Over the last few years, his research interests have mainly touched on specialized translation, with reference to three particular areas. The first area is that of translation teaching. More specifically he has carried out research on the development of online teaching materials, on the distinctive aspects of the teaching of specialized translation and on the use of electronic corpora as a teaching aid. He has also written on the contribution of new sociological approaches to translation research to the teaching of specialized translation, with particular reference to notions such as “translation norms”.

His second area of interest is the analysis of academic discourse. He has carried out some research on the use of terminological and phraseological patterns found in a corpus of lectures of Nobel laureates in physics and, adopting a translational and contrastive perspective, has investigated the use of connectives in specialized and semi-specialized texts written (or translated) in English and Italian.

His third area of interest concerns the difficulties and problems posed by the translation of scientific texts, with particular reference to the syntactic aspects of source texts and the role played in them by the tendency towards nominalization. This was the subject of his doctoral dissertation, where he analyzed a range of datasets related to the translation process and the translations produced by a small group of subjects for three English source texts, chosen with a view to presenting increasing degrees of nominalisation. Specifically, the analysis looked at the editing performed by the translators on their own drafts, the degree of inter-translator variation manifest in the target texts and the errors identified in the target texts.

His continued interest in the theoretical and methodological aspects of Translation Studies has led to the publication in 2009 of the volume “Key Words in Translation Studies” (Continuum), where he gives an overview of the major approaches to translation research highlighting key concepts and pointing out differences and commonalities.

His more recent research interests include: the role of translations in English-speaking publishing markets; the analysis of institutional communication; the role and significance of online collaborative platforms for students of language and communication.

Between 2005 and 2010 he was an Assistant Professor at the University of Modena and Reggio Emilia, Italy, where he was responsible for the Academic English Workshops within the PhD Program in Information and Communication Technology.

Recent publications (selection)

PALUMBO G. (2022) “Is everything a "dictionary"? Exploring users' views of online language resources”, Lingue e linguaggi, 49, Special Issue, 31-51.

PALUMBO G. (2021) “’Visible’ at Last? Some Notes on English as a Target Language and Translated Books in the US”, ELOPE: English Language Overseas Perspectives and Enquiries, 18(1), 55-69.

PALUMBO G. (2019) “The future of translation and translators in a fast-changing economic and technological landscape”. In: B. Maylath, K. St. Amant (eds) Translation, Localization, & Internationalization. London/New York: Routledge, 220-241.

PALUMBO G. (2019) “Looking for Traces of Mediation in Written Academic English”, Textus. English Studies in Italy, 32(1), 163-181.

PALUMBO G., HILL DUIN A. (2018) “Making Sense of Virtual Collaboration Through Personal Learning Networks”. In: B. Mousten, S. Vandepitte, E Arnó, B. Maylath (eds), Handbook of Research on Multilingual Writing and Pedagogical Cooperation in Virtual Learning Environments. Hershey, PA: IGI Global, 109-136.

PALUMBO G. (2017) “Notes on investigating the native vs non-native distinction in written academic English”. In G. Palumbo (ed.), Testi, corpora, confronti interlinguistici: approcci qualitativi e quantitativi. Trieste: EUT Edizioni Università di Trieste, 111-125.

PALUMBO G. (2015) “Studying ELF Institutional Web-based Communication by Universities: Comparison and Contrast with English Native Texts”. In: P. Thompson, G. Diani (eds), English for Academic Purposes: Approaches and Implications. Newcastle upon Tyne: Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 245-264.

VANDEPITTE S., MOUSTEN B., MAYLATH B., ISOHELLA S., MUSACCHIO M. T., PALUMBO G. (2015) “Translation Competence: Research Data in Multilateral and Interprofessional Collaborative Learning”. In: Y. Cui, W. Zhao (eds) Handbook of Research on Teaching Methods in Language Translation and Interpretation. Hershey, PA: IGI Global, 137-159.