Translation: Factory, Dialogue, or Network?

Drawing on interdisciplinary theories of translation and empirical research into the BBC World Service, I propose a set of three conceptual metaphors to model media-based translation work. ‘Factory’, ‘dialogue’ and ‘network’ can each serve as a metaphor for the processes of interlingual and transcultural journalism by international broadcasters. Rather than periodizing these historically, I propose that all three metaphors, from the Fordist centralized factory via the user-friendly dialogue rhetoric to the seemingly power-free digital network, can best be seen as concurrent and competing journalistic processes in daily dynamic interaction, whether they concern centralized practices or user-generated contents.