ABSTRACT
The use of Gerard Genette's theoretical framework in translation studies might thus be termed pragmatic: scholars tend to take those aspects of his framework which can be readily adapted to the discipline without any significant theoretical manoeuvring and move ahead with analysis of paratextual elements in accordance with the key concerns of their research. More generally, when paratexts are used to discuss translation choices, they become places where the inherent self-referentiality of translation is 'raised to self-reflexivity'. Context-oriented research accounts for a large part of the existing studies on translation paratexts. In this sense, research into paratexts cannot be separated from the various so-called 'turns' of translation studies, most notably the cultural and sociological turns. Richard Watts' analysis of Caribbean and North African literature in US translations presents an interesting variation on the way in which publishers appeal to stereotypes of foreign cultures through paratexts.
