Translaboration: Translation and Labour

Translaboration, a concept derived from blending ‘translation’ and ‘collaboration’, has the concept of labour at its core. This paper investigates the dimension of labour in online collaborative translation, relates translational labour to Arendt’s categories of work and action, and proceeds to broaden the discussion to the labour involved in translation more generally. It also considers what effect the application of these concepts has on the interests of translators and other stakeholders. Probing the labour of translation not only has a profound bearing on framings of both voluntary and professional translation practices, but can also reshape discussions of the translation concept as such. Rather than pitting ‘work’ and ‘labour’ as competing concepts, this paper shows that labour, work, and action all apply to translation and can be brought into productive dialogue in the translaborative space