Translation and communication across languages and cultures has taken on a new urgency in response to recent geopolitical, and technological challenges. Digitisation, immigration, globalisation, have led to the rise of new modes of communication, changing translation practises, the diversification of identity negotiations in institutional settings, and new ways of thinking about text production and consumption. TIC hopes to provide a space for scholars working in cognitive and socio-linguistics, translation studies, literary analysis, and ethnography to work together on issues and projects addressing cross-disciplinary, cross-cultural, and cross-linguistic communications.
Ph.d. programme in humanities and education
Projects and programmes
Translating Worlds: Challenges and Innovations in Translating Genre Fiction Across Cultures
This new project will explore the issues involved in translating genre fiction as well as translation practices in genre fiction. We hope to develop a deeper understanding of how genre fiction develops its capacity to convey fantastical or speculative elements across and among languages and cultures.
Previous projects and programmes:
The unsecret agent: The translator in literature and history and the legacy of Walter Benjamin's "The Task of the Translator"
2023 marks the one hundredth anniversary of Walter Benjamin’s “The Task of the Translator.” In this landmark essay, Benjamin opened the door for a modern reinterpretation of translation not as parasitic, or replicative, but as innovative in its own right. For Benjamin a translation could be as much a work of art as that of the ‘original’ work preceding it, for indeed, in the “afterlife” of Benjaminian translation, “the original undergoes a change” wrought upon it by the very act of its translation (73). One might compare Benjamin’s argument to T. S. Eliot’s in “Tradition and the Individual Talent” (1919). Just as for Eliot a whole canon is regenerated through its supplementation by new, “original” works of literature over time, for Benjamin literary monuments from the past are recoded, and renewed, in translation. After Benjamin the translator would acquire a new and increased potential for linguistic and literary agency; the act of translation would possess a power, in potentia, to deterritorialize the field of literature, and help us comprehend the value of literature in new ways.
In a seminar, members and invited guests of TIC considered the significance of Benjamin’s essay for our contemporary times. The confounding of copies and originals, or translations and monuments, is part of the Benjaminian inheritance. So too is the contemporary fascination with the figure of the translator in memoirs, critical studies, and popular fiction.
A special issue of Translation Review (Spring 2025) will be devoted to our project.
Competence for Diversity
This project addresses the question of self-perceived identity in children attending international schools in Norway. In this population, the distinction between “home culture” and “host culture” is no longer relevant, since most of the children represent “hyphenated” (e.g. Asian-British or American-Scandinavian) or merged nationalities and cultures. The goal of the study is to investigate how these pupils define themselves and the notion of “home”. To achieve at least a preliminary picture of the children’s self-perception, the authors have analysed poems dealing with two concepts: 'Me' and 'Home,' written by pupils of an international school and a Norwegian school, both informant groups aged 11-13. A semantic analysis of the poems indicates that the international school children present strong assertions of individual identity as defined against societal roles, while the Norwegian school pupils do not conceptualize identity formation as a struggle and their poems reflect a high degree of social, familial and national integration
Research partners
- Kristiansand International School
- Fiedler Foundation
- Poznan University
- Marie Skłodowska Curie University, Lublin Poland
Publications
TIC Research Group, 2019-2026
Stephen Dougherty
Dougherty, Stephen Darren (2025). "From Pure Language to Word Embeddings: Benjamin, Metaphysics, and Machine Translation". Translation Review (TR). ISSN 0737-4836.
Dougherty, Stephen Darren (2025). "Plasticity at the Dawn of Deep Learning". University of Toronto Quarterly. ISSN 0042-0247. 94(2), p. 202–216.
Dougherty, Stephen. “Plasticity and Posthumanism.” The Cambridge Introduction to Literary Posthumanism. Joe Tabbi. Cambridge University Press, 2024. 191-194.
Dougherty, Stephen. “Gender, Fairy Tale, and Ecology in Sarah Orne Jewett’s ‘A White Heron.’” Polilog: Studia Neofilogiczne 14 (2024). ISSN 2083-5485: 19-31.
Dougherty, Stephen. “Let the Light Shine Through: Matthews’ Transparent Minds in Science Fiction.” Review Essay. Science Fiction Studies, 51.3 (2024): 477-480.
Dougherty, Stephen. “Olaf Stapledon’s Thwarted Cosmopolitics in Last and First Men and Star Maker.” Science Fiction Studies, 51.2 (2024): 202-220.
Dougherty, Stephen. “When Robots Choose to Die. Faber’s Robot Suicide: Death, Identity, and AI in Science Fiction.” Science Fiction Studies, 51.1 (2024):
Dougherty, Stephen. “Response to John Cayley’s ‘Modelit.’” Electronicbookreview. July 2, 2023. https://doi.org/10.7273/zvz6-9024.
Dougherty, Stephen. “At the Crossroads: Essence and Accidents in Catherine Malabou’s Philosophy of Plasticity.” In Contingency and Plasticity in Everyday Technologies. Natasha Lusetich, Iain Campbell and Dominic Smith eds. Washington, D.C.: Rowman & Littlefield, 2022. 219-234.
Dougherty, Stephen. ”Plasticity and the Event of Literature: Reading Catherine Malabou with Anne Carson.” In Literature and Event: Twenty-First Century Reformulations. Eds. Mantra Mukim and Derek Attridge. New York: Routledge, 2022. 27-41.
Dougherty, Stephen. “We Need to Talk About English: On National Literature Surveys and Other Aspects of the Curriculum.” Nordic Journal of English Studies (NJES) 2021
Dougherty, Stephen. "Messages from the Stars: 2001: A Space Odyssey and His Master's Voice". Science Fiction Studies 48.2 (2021): 306-331.
Dougherty, Stephen. Holbergprisen 2019: Paul Gilroy. Agder Vitenskapsakademi Årbok 2020; Volum Årbok 2019. s. 223-227.
Dougherty, Stephen. “Liu Cixin, Arthur C. Clarke, and ‘Repositioning.” Science Fiction Studies 46.1 (2019): 39-62.
Dougherty, Stephen. “The Life In Death of Psychoanalysis.” Mosaic 52.1 (2019): 69-85.
Susan Erdmann
Erdmann, Susan Lynn & Garshol, Lenka (2025). "Teaching rehearsals in English subject didactics courses in primary teacher education." In Cabot, Michel Alexandre; Høisæter, Sissel Margrethe & Vangsnes, Vigdis (Ed.), Rehearsing for teaching Theoretical and empirical approaches to a practice-based teacher education. Fagbokforlaget. ISSN 9788245052602
Garshol, Lenka & Erdmann, Susan Lynn (2024). “Reflektert bruk av digitale verktøy. Lærerstudentenes tanker.” I Tømte, Cathrine Edelhard; Lien, Anne; Trysnes, Irene & Smith-Gahrsen, Martin (Red.), Lærerrollen i endring. Studentaktive læringsformer og profesjonsfaglig digital kompetanse. Universitetsforlaget. ISSN 9788215064727. s. 145–168.
Erdmann, Susan Lynn (2022). “Double Vision in The Blythes are Quoted: Reading Marked External References.” Journal of L. M. Montgomery Studies. doi: 10.32393/jlmms/2022.0001.
Erdmann, Susan Lynn & Gawronska, Barbara (2019). “Norwegian Translations of Anne of Green Gables: Omissions and Textual Manipulations.” I Glaz, Adam (Red.), Languages, Cultures, Worldviews; Focus on Translation. Palgrave Macmillan. ISSN 978-3-030-28508-1. s. 349–366. doi: 10.1007/978-3-030-28509-8_14.
Anna Fürstenberg
“Två verkligheter till priset av en: Anne Carson och fragmentets estetik” Information och Kunskap, Axel och Margaret Ax:son Johnson Stiftelse för allmännyttiga ändamål (2019).
Barbara Gawrońska
Gawronska, Barbara (2025). "Wielkie Pomorze. Rody i rodziny." Wielkie Pomorze. ISSN 2956-3844. 2025, s. 95–112
Gawronska Pettersson, B. (2024). “Uprooting and Taking Root: War and Post-War Pomerania in Selected Literary Works”. Folk, Knowledge, Place, 1(2). 149-170. https://doi.org/10.24043/001c.126038
Gawrońska Pettersson, B. (2023). “A Swedish romantic poet visits the former Swedish Pomerania: P. D. A. Atterbom’s travel diary from the year 1817”. Wielkie Pomorze. Kontekst skandynawski/Great Pomerania. The Scandinavian Context. ISSN: 2956-3844. ISBN: 978-83-7467-385-3. ISBN: 978-83-67683-08-1. Wydawnictwo Naukowe Akademii Pomorskiej. 131-146.
Gawronska Pettersson, B. (2023). “The Magic of Sound and Colour. Multimodality in Eleanor Farjeon’s Martin Pippin Books and their translations into Polish”. Polilog. Studia Neofilologiczne. ISSN: 2083-5485. 13 (13).167-182. doi:10.34858.
Gawrońska Pettersson, B. (2022) “The World of George Grosz’s Pictures and the World Depicted in The Novel Pokora by Szczepan Twardoch”. Polylogue. Neophilological Studies 12, 153-168. Electronic version: https://polilog.pl/index.php/polilog/article/view/478
Gawrońska Pettersson, B. (2021) “Eric of Pomerania in the eyes of Swedes – his and our contemporaries”. Wielkie Pomorze. Gryfici oraz ich dziedzictwo/ The House of Griffin and its Heritage. ISBN 978--83-65826-58-9. Wydawnictwo Naukowe Akademii Pomorskiej. 153-172.
Gawronska Pettersson, B. (2019) ”Kinderland ist abgebrannt”. Wielkie Pomorze. Wojna i Pokój/Great Pomerania. War and Peace. ISBN: 978-83-65826-22-0. Wydawnictwo Naukowe Akademii Pomorskiej. 179-194.
Thorsten Päplow
Päplow, Thorsten (2024). "'Irland war für dich eher ein Fluchtort, das Gegenteil Deutschlands'. Hugo Hamiltons ‚Die redselige Insel. Irisches Tagebuch‘ als literarische Fortschreibung einer Nachkriegsdiskussion." Perspektiven. Nordeuropäische Studien zur Deutschsprachigen Literatur und Kultur. ISSN 2363-6939. 24(8), s. 213–229.
Päplow, Thorsten (2024). "Prostitution in Ernst Moritz Arndts Reise durch Schweden im Jahr 1804 und E.T.A. Hoffmanns Die Bergwerke zu Falun". Nordeuropäische Arbeiten zur Literatur, Sprache und Kultur. ISSN 2196-9760. 18, s. 149–158.
Schloon, Jutta Saima; Päplow, Thorsten; Schmidt, Maike; Ilgner, Julia; Grote, Michael (2022). "Einleitung: Alter & Ego. (Auto)fiktionale Altersfigurationen in deutschsprachiger und nordischer Literatur." Perspektiven. Nordeuropäische Studien zur Deutschsprachigen Literatur und Kultur. ISSN: 2363-6939. 23 (1). s 8 - 19.
Päplow, Thorsten (2024). "'Tag- und Nachtseiten': Göteborg in E.M. Arndts Reise durch Schweden im Jahr 1804 und dessen dunkle intertextuelle Erkundung in E.T.A. Hoffmanns Die Bergwerke zu Falun. Polilog. Studia Neofilologiczne. ISSN 2083-5485. s. 97–114.
Päplow, Thorsten (2022). "„Hautsache nich’ Mitte 30“. Quarterlife Crisis in Simon Strauß’ Sieben Nächte (2017)". Perspektiven. Nordeuropäische Studien zur Deutschsprachigen Literatur und Kultur. ISSN: 2363-6939. 23 (1). s 137 - 155.
Päplow, Thorsten (2020). "Et forholdsvis kortfattet foredrag om litteraturprisvinneren 2019, Peter Handke". Agder Vitenskapsakademi Årbok 2019. ISBN: 9788283900507. Novus Forlag. s 232 - 241.
Horverak, May Olaug; Aanensen, Mariette; Langeland, Gerd Martina; Olsbu, Inger; Päplow, Thorsten (2020). Systematic motivation work in the language classroom - An action research study from southern Norway. Nordic Journal of Modern Language Methodology (NJMLM). ISSN: 1894-2245. 8 (1). s 55 - 80. doi:10.46364/njmlm.v8i1.484.
Haag, Ingemar; Molander Danielsson, Karin; Öhman, Marie; Päplow, Thorsten (2019). Introduction. Perspectives on Ecocriticism: Local Beginnings, Global Echoes. ISBN: 978-1-52753200-7. Cambridge Scholars Publishing. Introduction. s 1 - 8.
Alf Tomas Tønnessen
Meyer, Alix & Tønnessen, Alf Tomas (2024). "A Tale of Two Presidents: Biden and/or Trump Effect in the 2022 Midterm Elections?" I Duda, Renata & Turek, Maciej (Red.), The crossroads elections. Routledge. ISSN 9781032577647. s. 96–107.
David Mauk, Alf Tomas Tønnessen, and John Oakland, American Civilization: An Introduction (London: Routledge, 2021). eBook ISBN: 9781003107934
Citation: Mauk, D., Tønnessen, A.T., & Oakland, J. (2021). American Civilization: An Introduction (8th ed.). Routledge. https://doi.org/10.4324/9781003107934
Ida Marie Olsen
Ida Marie Olsen (2023). "Collapse and Reversed Extinction: Beyond Inherited Epistemologies of Species Loss in Louise Erdrich’s Future Home of the Living God". Studies in the Novel. Print ISSN: 0039-3827, Online ISSN: 1934-1512. s. 7–19.
Ida Marie Olsen (2022). "Extinct and Undying Species: Animal Fetishism in Green Lion and How the Dead Dream". Studies in the Novel. Print ISSN: 0039-3827, Online ISSN: 1934-1512. s. 426-444.
Ida Marie Olsen (2022). "Saving Species: Dialectics of Environmental Stewardship in Maja Lunde’s Bienes Historie and Przewalskis Hest". Green Letters. Studies in Ecocriticism. Print ISSN: 1468-8417, Online ISSN: 2168-1414. s. 157-170.
Ida Marie Olsen (2021). "Beyond Taxonomic Bias in Extinction Discourse: Endangerment, Alterity, and Noncharismatic Species in Annie Proulx’s Barkskins and Orson Scott Card’s Ender’s Game". ISLE: Interdisciplinary Studies in Literature and Environment. Print ISSN: 1076-0962, Online ISSN: 1759-1090. s. 321–339.