ABSTRACT
In so far as all texts can be categorized in terms of genre, there is no reason why one particular genre should be singled out for special attention rather than any other. However, since technical translation is a far more marketable skill than literary translation, and since most language students are, owing to their lack of training in science or technology, in awe of ‘technical’ texts, we consider it worthwhile to devote a separate chapter to problems confronting the translator of texts in this genre. By ‘technical’ translation we mean especially the translation of empirical/descriptive texts written in the context of scientific or technological disciplines. As a matter of fact, any specialist field, from anthropology to zymurgy via banking, history, numismatics and yachting, has its own technical register, its own jargon, its own genre-marking characteristics, with which translators should be familiar if they are to produce convincing TTs in the appropriate field. This is as true of scientific and technical translation as it is of any other specialized field: a look at a hobby magazine, or a review of a rock concert, or the sport or business pages in the paper quickly confirms this. Take, for example, the opening sentence of an article from the leading Spanish press agency, EFE, published by the sports newspaper, Diario As:
María José Rienda, la española que más pruebas ha ganado de la Copa del Mundo (seis), se mostró ayer ‘orgullosa y feliz’ por haber vuelto a esquiar seis meses y una semana después de lesionarse de gravedad la rodilla derecha.
(EFE 2007: 53)