Innovation in Times of Crisis: Online Disruptive Methodologies in the Undergraduate Program of Translation and Interpreting

Abstract

In the current context of sanitary crisis caused by the COVID-19, a change in the traditional education paradigms has taken place. Thus, due to the lockdown imposed in many countries –among them, Spain– the teaching-learning processes has had to be immediately adapted to an online and distance education context. This situation has led to the emergence of new educational needs at all levels of education, and higher education is not an exception. At the same time, we should not forget that the current labour market is subject to constant changes driven by globalization and the growth of new technologies, and higher education must therefore adapt to these characteristics in order to train its students. It is then necessary to explore new, innovative and disruptive teaching methodologies to meet these needs. In the case of the translation sector, new multifaceted profiles requiring a great domain of new technologies have emerged: localization, post-editing and transcreation. The main objective of this paper is to explore how disruptive methodologies can be applied to higher education studies in Translation and Interpreting to support distance learning. This main objective is materialized in three specific objectives: SO1) to identify the pedagogical needs demanded by an exceptional context of sanitary crisis and distance education; SO2) to propose and describe disruptive methodologies that are adapted to distance training in Translation and Interpreting, and SO3) to define future lines of work to encourage distance learning through innovative methodologies in Translation and Interpreting. To this end, first, innovative and disruptive methodologies that can be adapted to distance and online education have been pinpointed. Second, different methodologies specifically targeted to Translation and Interpreting training have been identified. Finally, future lines of work have been outlined to apply these methodologies in the educational field and to design evaluation procedures adapted to the demands of the current sanitary, social and economic context. Our research shows that innovative and disruptive methodologies are applicable to online contexts and are a promising and necessary future line of research.