Before attending the African TIS Academic Writing Workshop in Stellenbosch some weeks ago, I thought I had original ideas for my articles and that the latter could be published in almost any translation journal but the workshop forced me humbly to reconsider.
It was a three-day programme with 15 early-career researchers (ECRs) from Africa, Europe and Asia, three instructors from South Africa, the UK and New Zealand (who are also editors of international journals) and other journal editors from various parts of the world. The instructors talked about academic writing, proposal writing for funding, journal publishing, stylistic editing, and predatory journals. We also had one-on-one tutorials with the editors to discuss our articles and on the last day, ECRs presented their articles and got feedback from the seven editors present and the other ECRs. The workshop ended with the editors’ roundtable during which they expressed their views about TIS in general.
During the workshop, I was encouraged to pay more attention to journal guidelines. I realized how easily one could misread them. As one of the instructors said, ‘It’s not the editor’s job to tell you if your paper is within the scope of their journal’. I was also made to see the weaknesses of my topics and I had to rework them. For instance, one of the editors suggested we avoided articles dealing with challenges, which is precisely one of the ideas I wanted to explore. I was particularly interested in the idea of linking translation studies with some of the new research areas such as Africa/China, climate change, food security and many more. I learnt about some of the problems inherent in TIS in Africa and I also learned about funding opportunities I was unaware of. I found out what the other ECRs are currently researching and I am grateful to belong to this community. The editors’ feedback was invaluable. It is not often that I meet so many editors at once. One of the objectives of the workshop was to provide mentoring to the participants and for an ECR like me, such guidance is priceless.
Here are three tips from the workshop that I would like to remember:
- write to express and not to impress;
- if you cannot write, read;
- produce research that is relevant to Africa.
In all, the workshop was well-organized, the atmosphere was friendly and convivial, whether during the sessions or at the restaurants where we had dinner every night. I enjoyed myself while learning. I would strongly recommend the programme to other ECRs. Such workshops are an opportunity to write, be mentored and get published, collaborate with other researchers, even get institutional back up, and of course, visit tourist attractions. It is however preferable to have a draft article ready when applying so as to be more likely to submit a publishable version within the required deadlines.
Édith F. Koumtoudji, South Africa