Course aim and content:
The aim of this course is to improve students’ written English through translation. In this sense, it is not a course in translation skills per se. Rather, it is to help students improve their level of correctness in written English by focusing on those problems, particularly in grammar and sentence structure, which otherwise compromise their work.
The texts we will use are taken from newspapers and magazines. The initial purpose of the articles is the simple transmission of information to the reader. As a result, students are not expected to deal with tone, style, subtext, and so on. Rather the focus is more on the straightforward use of language and structure. In this way, it will be easier for us to focus on problems in the written language which are pertinent to the course.
Before we begin with the translation texts, however, we will work with grammar exercises design to familiarise students with terminology that will aid us in our discussion of these texts. Also to this end, we will use gap-fill exercises which will focus on verbs forms and the article system.