ABSTRACT
This chapter reflects on a survey using online questionnaires to collect both quantitative and qualitative data, in a practitioner research project on the commissioning and performance of legal translation outside institutions. Despite being largely ignored by researchers and overlooked by businesses and law firms, ‘outstitutional’ legal translation is an expanding and crucially important area. The channel and platform were chosen to offer participants flexible and expeditious access, given that informant profiles sought were (1) professional legal translators – internet-savvy but having to cope with constant deadlines; and (2) commissioning principals with very limited time availability. Triangulation was aimed at rendering the data obtained more robust. The online questionnaire method allowed for global reach, an advantage in this first foray to glean an overview of the whole market, and other pros and cons are discussed. Ethical and epistemological considerations are broached, as are the tools used. The method produced good levels of engagement and participation (303 legal translation practitioners, 84 principals): an extensive dataset addressing the research questions was obtained. Free-text boxes were used liberally by respondents, providing rich insights. Despite an option to remain anonymous, 91 percent of those participating provided their name, position and even contact details.
