CFP: Punctum-International Journal of Semiotics (Volume 1, issue 2)

Punctum. International Journal of Semiotics
Punctum is a blind peer-reviewed, on-line journal dedicated to the semiotic study of contemporary cultural texts, practices and processes, published under the auspices of the Hellenic Semiotic Society. Aspiring to provide a venue for the advancement of international semiotic scholarship, the journal is published twice a year (July & December) in English, although submissions in French and German will be accepted as well. Punctum’s Editorial Board reflects both its international scope and the diversity of contemporary semiotic research and theory. Punctum invites submissions (original papers, review articles, book reviews) across this wide range of semiotic fields and methodologies on an on-going basis, and regularly puts out calls for special issues with guest editors.

Call for papers

Semiotics of Translation, Translation in Semiotics

Guest Editors: Evangelos Kourdis (Aristotle University of Thessaloniki) and Pirjo Kukkonen (University of Helsinki)

A growing number of translation scholars are using semiotics as a research tool. Scholars of semiotics on the other hand study translation as a purely semiotic act involving the transition from one source language to the target language, i.e. from one semiotic system to another. The act of translation, understood in semiotic terms can be interlingual, intralingual or intersemiotic, as Jakobson (1959) described it half a century ago. Since then, intersemiotic translation has been considered the primary object of study for the semiotics of translation by a significant number of translation scholars. In general, the contribution of semiotics to translation has been analytically explored by semioticians such as Yuri Lotman, Dinda Gorlée, Peeter Torop, Paolo Fabbri, Umberto Eco, Susan Petrilli, Göran Sonesson and many others.

But why do translators and semioticians need each other? Translation scholars such as Jeremy Munday (2004) hold that “translation studies must move beyond the written word and the visual, and multimodal in general”, while for semioticians such as Torop (2008) ‘‘the ontology of translation semiotics rests on the recognition that culture works in many respects as a translation mechanism’’.  In other words, our notion of translation mechanisms expands to the mechanisms of culture in general. If culture seems to resist translation, semiotics as a mediator between disciplines of signification could be an efficient tool for translation scholars.

The object of this issue of Punctum is the potential of interaction between the semiotics of translation and semiotically –informed translation studies. It sets out to explore the dimension of translation studies as an interdisciplinary endeavor and bring together scholars of translation and of semiotics.

Prospective authors should submit an abstract of approximately 300 words by mail to Evangelos Kourdis (ekourdis@frl.auth.gr) and Pirjo Kukkonen (pirjo.kukkonen@helsinki.fi) including affiliation and contact information. Αcceptance of the abstract does not guarantee publication, given that all research articles will be put through the journal’s peer review process.

Timeline
Deadline for abstracts: May 31, 2015
Notification of acceptance of the abstract: June 30, 2015
Deadline for submission of full papers: September 30, 2015
Final revised papers due: November 30, 2015
Publication: Volume 1, Number 2 (December 2015)

Website: http://punctum.gr/