ABSTRACT
146In this chapter: A useful way of thinking about translation and language is that translators don’t translate words; they translate what people do with words.
Intuitive leaps: obviously, guessing at what a word means, or at the best target-language equivalent, is not going to be a reliable strategy for producing final copy; but it’s an excellent way to get started (so long as you remember to check your guesses later).
Pattern-building: translating, like all verbal activities, is doing things to people with words; and like all activities, requires attentive practice.
Rules and theories: linguistic pragmatics, including speech-act theory, is a useful guide not only to what the source author was trying to do to the source reader with words, but also to what the translator is trying to do to the target reader with words.
