ABSTRACT
This part introduction presents an overview of the key concepts discussed in the subsequent chapters. The part presents a rationale and possible research lines, discusses methodological aspects of the application of corpus tools and resources in translation studies. It shows how debates on the notion of equivalence evolved from a search for isomorphism and semantic sameness across languages to an expansion of the concept and to various classifications of how different levels and types of equivalence may be realized. The part suggests that “the notion of norms is very similar to that of typicality, a notion which has emerged from recent work on corpus-based lexicography”. It provides examples of possible investigations which could be carried out in order to test hypothesized features; thus, a higher frequency of occurrence of the optional “that” in reported structures in translated English texts, as compared to a corpus of non-translated English texts, may provide support to the explicitation hypothesis.
