The Linguist is a languages magazine for professional linguists, translators, interpreters, language professionals, language teachers, trainers, students and academics with articles on translation, interpreting, business, government, technology
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Our workshops challenge the hierarchy of languages in schools by drawing on a full range of languages 22 The Linguist Vol/59 No/3 2020 FEATURES relationships between languages. Our aim is to present language-learning as fun and creative but also, and most importantly, a relevant endeavour. With a background in translation and social research, I founded Shadow Heroes in 2016 with the award-winning literary translator Sophie Lewis, who was longlisted for the 2020 International Booker Prize for her co-translation of Emmanuelle Pagano's Faces on the Tip of My Tongue. Since then, we have run translation workshops in more than 20 state-maintained and private schools in the UK and Geneva, as well as several UK universities. While our workshops are chiefly designed for secondary and sixth-form students, we have also worked with primary schools, including a current project with York University: an experimental workshop developed to encourage monolingual children to experience what it might be like to think in a new language. The workshops are run by a range of translators who form a growing collective of guest collaborators. These are passionate professionals – literary translators, interpreters, subtitlers and academics – working across a variety of languages, offering diverse frames of reference for young people, and providing an approachable point of contact. A workshop series in action Our most recent workshop series, funded by the Royal Society of Arts (RSA), took place at the start of the year. Over the course of five weeks, we worked with a group of Year 11 students and a group of Year 12 students in two state schools in Camden. Each Shadow Heroes series is tailored to the student group in question: we prioritise engaging the full spectrum of languages in the classroom and supporting any special educational needs. Before each series, we conduct a focus group with the students and work closely with our liaison teacher to shape the activities to suit the group. For example, having found that many of the students in the cohort liked Marvel films, we developed a workshop on dubbing Japanese anime films, which gave many students the opportunity to flaunt a previously hidden expertise. The first workshop was called 'Finding the Translator in the Text'. Students explored the different factors that may influence the way we read and interpret sources, and the effect this might have on our translations. With its focus on film adaptations, the workshop expanded students' ideas about what translation is, and where it occurs, by asking them to interpret a text for a new medium. Our methodology foregrounds learning by doing, providing the means for individuals to understand things for themselves, to take risks and to work through different options. By the THINKING DIFFERENTLY Pupils work on 'finding the translator in the text' during a Shadow Heroes workshop thelinguist.uberflip.com Shadow Heroes currently offers workshops involving 13 languages: Ancient Greek, Arabic, French, German, Indonesian, Japanese, Latin, Portuguese, Russian, Spanish, Turkish, Urdu and Yoruba. Each one begins with an introduction from the workshop leader, who tells the group about their career path and their motivation to pursue it. According to a teacher at Camden School for Girls, this is a key strength of the programme: "The speakers were full of energy and enthusiasm for their craft, this was conveyed through their encouragement of the students to be creative, take risks and understand that there are many ways to translate. They really gave students the opportunity to think about appropriate approaches without imposing their own views. The wide range of experiences speakers shared with students was inspiring in terms of the variety of work translators encounter."