ANTHONY PYM DANGERS IN HYPOTHESIS FORMATION. WHAT IS YOUR PROJECT? Now halve the number of words. Now halve the amount of work. Why are the other words

Anthony Pym

Dangers in hypothesis formation

What is your project?

• Now halve the number of words.• Now halve the amount of work. • Why are the other words not important? • Now who is going to pay you money?• What will they pay for? • Why is this important?

© Intercultural Studies Group

How specific is your project?

• Field• Topic• (Object of knowledge) • Hypothesis


data?

• Reverendissimo Toletanae sedis archiepiscopo et Hispaniarum primati, Joannes Avendehut Israëlita, philosophus, gratum debitae servitudinis obsequium. (Jourdain 1873: 449)• ...Hispaniarum primati Joanni, Avendaut

Israelita... / verba Avendeuth israelitæ (d’Alverny 1954: 27-28)• (The archbishop is called Johannes, not

Raimundus.)


hypothesis

• The role of Jewish intermediaries in the translation processes in the Toledo cathedral was repressed.



• Is a simple affirmative statement that relates variables. • Is clear.• Is not obvious. • Has no modal verbs. • Can be tested.• Can be generalized.• Is falsifiable, as far as possible.• Is important.• Need not be true.

A good hypothesis


• Bad teachers should be expelled, because they are the reason for the low standards of universities. • There are no social inequalities between

Martians. • The idiosyncratic typology of agricultural

maintenance operators is an irrational product of the combined action of social and cultural amalgams.

Pedagogical examples


• The higher the degree of urbanization in a region, the lower the birth-rate. • If a Spanish family lives in Lapland, it will be

highly integrated.



• Men with thin moustaches tend to have stomach ulcers. • Drug addiction is higher in immigrant groups than

in non-immigrant groups. • Drug addiction is higher among men than

women.



• Each translation is based on an interpretation. • Prestigious cultures use domesticating strategies• Translators become more independent the more

technical their tasks.• Translators can cause wars.• Translators have an effect on cross-cultural

relations.

Good hypotheses?


• Repression of multiculturality, mobility, writers, translators, Jewish translators? • Experimentally: Make sure that only one thing

changes (as far as possible). • Observationally: Compare cases where only one

thing is different (as far as possible). • (Write one doctoral thesis at a time!)

Controlling variables


• Define all terms, particularly evaluative terms. • State success conditions (how many texts /

translators?)• Draw up a model of how the variables interrelate.

operationalization


• Jewish intermediaries: List of non-Christian names on manuscript translations (Mozarabs?) • Translation processes: Descriptions in prefaces to

the translations. • Repression: (Near) omission of names or non-

attribution of agency. • Model: A later monoculture edited the

manuscripts in its favor. • Importance: Spain should see itself as being

multicultural.

operationalization


• Propose one hypothesis that is both important and testable (e.g. ”Translations of novels avoid rendering dialect”, “Dubbing into Spanish protects the national culture”, “Women interpret Malinche more positively than do men”). • In groups of five, vote for the most important

hypothesis (the one that will have the highest impact index when published).

tasks

Documents

ANTHONY PYM DANGERS IN HYPOTHESIS FORMATION. WHAT IS YOUR PROJECT? Now halve the number of words. Now halve the amount of work. Why are the other words