Translation and corpus design

In this article I discuss the role of translated texts in different types of corpora. I first consider the role of translations in corpus-based monolingual linguistics, arguing that while translated texts are often excluded from corpora on the basis of a more or less implicit assumption that they “corrupt” the reference norm for a language, this assumption does not seem to be justified on theoretical grounds. For the same reason, translated texts should also be included in bi- and multi-lingual comparable corpora. The incorporation of subcorpora of parallel texts within comparable corpora can also offer practical advantages for contrastive studies. Finally, I provide an overview of the different types of corpora which can be used in translation studies research, and discuss the role of (sub)corpora of translations within these corpora