A sociocultural case study in translation as service-learning: Shaping the professional profile of Spanish heritage language learners and understanding their sense of multiculturalism

Abstract

There is a growing demand for certifications (e.g., translation and interpretation) that validate the linguistic knowledge and professional capabilities of Spanish heritage language learners. Given the practicality of the accreditations in question, the engagement of Spanish heritage language learners in hands-on tasks that involve the surrounding community is also in the raise. Thus, this study mainly seeks to explore whether, and how the involvement in a Spanish translation course embedded in a service-learning task, shapes the professional and multicultural profile of a Spanish heritage language learner in the Midwest of the United States of America. A secondary objective of the present work is to establish any relationship between the tools (i.e., online and computerized visual resources) that were available for the participant to complete the outreach project and the way the task was approached. To achieve both aims, the obtained data was analyzed drawing upon activity theory. The results of this study suggest the multiculturalism, bilingualism, available tools, such as visual aids and specialized medical dictionaries, enabled a sense of preparation particularly corresponded to five factors. Two of these were language-related: (1) becoming aware of sociolinguistic features (i.e., formal vs. informal register), and (2) acquiring a more complex and professional jargon (i.e., medical lexicon); while the other three were embedded in translation matters. The latter implied the development of three specific techniques: (a) visiting with community members before the interpretation procedure takes place; (b) encouraging the latter group to maintain eye contact with the professionals with whom they intended to communicate; and (c) developing the ability to convey the message without doing a word for word linguistic equivalence. The results in the type of research suggested here are foreseen to provide knowledge that could facilitate further understanding of the relevance of service-learning when teaching Spanish to heritage language learners.