Rethinking Translation Evaluation in Academic Contexts: Performance-Based Assessment as an Alternative Practice
Hossein Heidari Tabrizi
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Juliane House
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Keywords: Performance-based Assessment, Students’ Academic Translation Evaluation, Translation Assessment, Translation Evaluative Practices, Translation Tests,
Abstract :
In the context of translator education, evaluating students’ academic translations is a common, crucial activity. Evaluations are usually done by assigning numerical scores or letter grading in order to detect the relation established between intended instructional objectives and learning outcomes. Research shows that the dominant translation evaluation methods currently and commonly practiced by university teachers in undergraduate English translation programs are mainly based on the theoretical principles of the conventional testing paradigm. This paper tries to “address the ‘problem’ of evaluative practices provoked from the challenges and criticisms leveled against principles and procedures of Classical True Score Measurement Theory and conventional testing tradition. In doing so, the paper first reviews the status quo of translation evaluation and then pinpoints the problems and limitations which are typically associated with translation tests. As a result of the shift from conventional testing to language assessment and from language tests to alternative assessment practices, performance-based evaluation is introduced as one of the potential solutions that may help fill the gaps left by traditional testing. The paper concludes that Performance-based assessment is well-suited for translation evaluation, as both share a lot in terms of nature, features and purposes. The contributions made by the current work hopefully may open new avenues for further exploration in this decisive facet of research on translation studies, namely, academic translation evaluation.
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