Innovative Ecological Approaches in Translation Studies: Mapping the Field

Abstract

This introductory article frames the special issue Towards an Ecology of Translation: Translating Nature, Places, and Identities in the Global World by outlining the main conceptual strands informing ecological approaches to translation. It traces the evolution of eco-translation from Clive Scott’s emphasis on the translator’s embodied engagement with the text, through Michael Cronin’s expansion of the concept within a broader political-ecological perspective, to Gengshen Hu’s eco-translatology, grounded in models of selection and adaptation. Drawing on Cronin’s work on linguistic diversity, power asymmetries, and minority language agency, the article situates eco-translation as an approach attentive to the social, cultural, political, and environmental conditions of translation in the Anthropocene. It then outlines the main research trajectories explored in the nine contributions, including representations of nature in tourism discourse, mediation and diversity, redefinitions of land and environment, and hybrid textualities. As an inaugural contribution to the Italian debate on ecological perspectives in Translation Studies, the volume aims to foster critical reflection on translation through ecological entanglements, situated knowledge, and practices of care and responsibility.