78667 - English for Specific Purposes 1 (LM)

Learning outcomes

The global aim of this course - which includes lectures and language classes - is to improve students’ communicative skills and provide them with a sophisticated knowledge of selected aspects of the English language and culture also in order to allow them to compete for jobs in the international sector. More particularly, lectures will enable students to think critically about specific varieties of English in connection with their context of production and of reception. This aim will be achieved by providing students with theoretical knowledge taken from linguistics and sociolinguistics, as well as through close readings of authentic texts. This course focuses on the language of tourism as a specific variety of English. Language classes aim at improving students’ linguistic competence; over the two-year period students’ knowledge of English should reach level C2 according to the European framework in all four abilities. These classes will work in connection with the lectures to improve students’ writing skills in particular.

Course contents

The lectures of this course are divided in two modules. The content of both modules is closely connected to a collaboration with Bologna Welcome as part of the Ricercatore PON Project – Green strand that has resulted in the creation of a work placement programme for LSC students. For this reason, particular attention during this module will be given to communication in cultural and sustainable tourism.

First Module -- Convenor: Monica Turci

This module analyses discursive strategies of sustainable tourism. After an introduction that is aimed at providing a general knowledge of the peculiar characteristics of sustainable tourism along the lines of UNWTO, a leader organization in sustainable tourism at a global level, the module concentrates attention on communicative strategies in this sector. The teaching is based on a practical and deductive method. A close multilevel analysis - from frame to syntactical and lexical choices -  of texts of sustainable tourism will be first step towards the identification of frequent strategies used in this kind of discourse and its effect. 

Second Module -- Convenor: Gaia Aragrande 

This module will introduce students to specialised translation in the field of tourism. Starting from the concept of language for specific purposes of module 1, module 2 will focus on the language transfer of LSPs, that is specialised translation into the L2 (English). Module 2 will then present students with some tools supporting translation both in its theoretical tenets and in its practice. In particular, students will explore the use of corpus linguistics for translation, learn how to perform better searches on search engines aimed at the retrieving of comparable texts, use some CAT tools to aid their translation practice and they will be guided in the use of AI chatbots for translation and post-editing purposes. Students are recommended to use their laptop during this module.

 ESERCITAZIONI LINGUISTICHE

Language classes are aimed at improving students’ language skills with particular reference to oral and writing ones. They also provide tools for developing critical reading skills of specialised texts, as well their production and comprehension. Particular attention will be devoted to the production of academic essays and extended essays.

The course themes are

Week 1 – 3 The ownership of cultural heritage

Week 4 – 5 The impact of mass tourism on cultural heritage

Week 6 – 7 Tourism in developing countries

Week 8 Dark Tourism

Week 9 Tourist vs Traveller

 

Readings/Bibliography

LEZIONI FRONTALI

Primo Modulo

Compulsory Readings:

Graham M.S. Dann The Language of Tourism. A Sociolinguistic Perspective (CAB International 2001); Introduzione; capitolo 3 solo pagg. 62-65; Capitolo 7. Questo testo è disponibile su Virtuale

Gunther Kress e Theo van Leeuwen Reading Images. The Grammar of Visual Design. Second edition (Routledge 1996) Capitoli 2, 3, 4,5 e 6. Questo testo è disponibile su Virtuale

Gli studenti sono inoltre tenuti a consultare i PPT pubblicati su virtuale compresi i risultati dei lavori di gruppo nonchè i documenti caricati nella cartella "Terminology" nella sezione "Bibliography"

Secondo Modulo

Compulsory Readings

Adab, B., 2001, “The Translation of Advertising: A Framework for Evaluation”, in Babel 47:2, pp. 133-157. DOI: https://doi-org.ezproxy.unibo.it/10.1075/babel.47.2.05ada

Aixelá, J. F., 1996, “Culture-specific items in translation”, in Translation, power, subversion, 8, pp. 52-78.

Katan, D., 2020, “Translating Tourism” in Bielsa, E., Kapsaskis, D. (eds) The Routledge Handbook of Translation and Globalization, pp. 337-350, London: Routledge.

Kelly, D., 2017. The translation of texts from the tourist sector: textual conventions, cultural distance and other constraints. In TRANS: Revista De Traductología, (2), 33–42. https://doi.org/10.24310/TRANS.1998.v0i2.2354

Manca, E., 2012, “Translating the Language of Tourism Across Cultures: From Functionally Complete Units of Meaning to Cultural Equivalence” in Textus XXV no. 1, pp. 51-68.

Stavroula, P. (2024). Innovative Approaches In Political Translation: The Role Of Ai Prompt Engineering In Translation Studies. In Translation Studies: Retrospective and Prospective Views, vo. 27/2024: 198-208. DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.14750682

Zanettin, F. 2014, “Corpora in Translation”, in House, J. (ed) Translation: A Multidisciplinary Approach Palgrave Advances in Language and Linguistics. Palgrave Macmillan, London. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/9781137025487_10

Suggested Readings:

Aragrande, Gaia; Frosi, Irene, [https://cris.unibo.it/handle/11585/1044533], in: Teaching Specialized Translation in the Machine Translation Era, Mons, éditions universitaires de l'umons, 2025, pp. 81 - 112

Carvalho, I., Ramires, A. & Iglesias, M. (2023). Attitudes towards machine translation and languages among travelers. InfTechnol Tourism 25, 175–204. https://doi.org/10.1007/s40558-023-00253-0

Gandin, S., 2013, "Translating the Language of Tourism. A Corpus Based Study on the Translational Tourism English Corpus (T-TourEC)." CORPUS RESOURCES FOR DESCRIPTIVE AND APPLIED STUDIES. CURRENT CHALLENGES AND FUTURE DIRECTIONS: SELECTED PAPERS FROM THE 5TH INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE ON CORPUS LINGUISTICS (CILC2013) 95 (2013): 325-35.

Gries, S. Th., 2006, “What is Corpus Linguistics?”, in Language and Linguistics Compass 3(5), pp. 1225-1241, DOI:10.1111/j.1749-818X.2009.00149.x

Hansen, G., (2008). A Classification of Errors in Translation and Revision. In M. Forstner, Lee-Jahnke, H., Schmitt, P. A. (eds), CIUTI-Forum 2008 Enhancing Translation Quality: Ways, Means, Methods, Bern: Peter Lang, pp. 313-326.

He, S. (2024). “Prompting ChatGPT for translation: A comparative analysis of translation brief and persona prompts”. CoRR, abs/2403.00127. https://doi.org/10.48550/arXiv.2403.00127

Jaworska, S. 2017, "Metaphors We Travel By: A Corpus-Assisted Study of Metaphors in Promotional Tourism Discourse." Metaphor & Symbol 32.3 (2017): 161-78.

Kruger, A., Munday, J., Wallmach, K., 2011, Corpus-based translation studies: research and applications, London: Continuum.

Lecci, C. & E. Di Bello, (2012). “Usare la traduzione assistita” [http://www.clueb.com/servlet/SchedaArticolo?cat_id=3636]. Bologna: CLUEB.

Mattiello, E., 2012, “Metaphor in Tourism Discourse: Imagined Worlds in English Tourist Texts on the Web” in Textus XXV no. 1, pp. 69-84.

Mikhailov Mikhail, Cooper Robert. (2016). Corpus Linguistics for Translation and Contrastive Studies : a guide for research. London and New York: Routledge.

Nigro, M.G., 2012, “From Words to Keywords: The Journey from General Language to the Language of Tourism”, in Textus XXV no. 1, pp 105-119.

Pan, H., & Zhang, M. (2022). Translation and Linguistics. In K. Malmkjær (Ed.), The Cambridge Handbook of Translation (Cambridge Handbooks in Language and Linguistics, pp. 238-257). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. doi:10.1017/9781108616119.013.

Scarpa. F., (2008), La traduzione specializzata. Un approccio didattico professionale. Milano: Hoepli.

Sulaiman, M. Z., Wilson, R., 2019, Translation and Tourism Strategies for Effective Cross-Cultural Promotion, Singapore: Springer.

ESERCITAZIONI LINGUISTICHE

Una dispensa. Disponibile come file pubblico su virtuale.

Teaching methods

LEZIONI FRONTALI

First Module

The first module includes lectures, group work for text analysis, guided corpus-based investigation in groups on SketchEngine

 

Second Module

Traditional lectures, viewings, and group discussions  

Assessment methods

 

LEZIONI FRONTALI

 

First Module

 A 20-minute oral text during one of the exam sessions or after the course. Details: The oral test consists in finding a text and an image that illustrate a form of sustainable tourism. For the oral test students have to undertake independent research. This consists in finding a text and an image that illustrate a form of sustainable tourism. The text and the image must be sent to the teacher the day before the oral exam. During the oral test students will be asked to discuss linguistic techniques and provide an interpretation of the image following the model of Kress and van Leeuwen. One further question focuses on aspects of theory covered during the course.

Evaluation criteria: knowledge of the module content and linguistic theories discussed during the course; capacity to use English in a fluent way without making mistakes, knowledge of specialised lexis.

Second Module

 A written take-home exam consisting of a translation from Italian to English of a tourist text and a comment to said translation. The comment to the translation will be carried out using the theories and strategies presented in class. Every student will have approximately 4 weeks to carry out this part of the exam, students will receive their source text the last day of class and the deadline will be after the Christmas break.

Evaluation criteria: comprehension of the theory and practice of module 2. Translation marking will envisage the following three types of mistakes: serious mistakes (severely hindering the comprehension of the target text); significant mistakes (significantly hindering the comprehension of the target text); slight mistakes (hindering the readability of the target text). These three types of mistakes concern the following areas: terminology, syntax, omissions/additions, morphology and concordances, typos and punctuation. The theoretical and methodological foundations of the criteria for translation evaluation are drawn from Hansen (2008, see suggested readings list). These criteria were adapted to the needs and scopes of this course by its teacher and tutor (more in Aragrande, Frosi 2025, see suggested readings list). Students will be provided with a translation error grid available on Virtuale at any time. Comment marking will evaluate theory competences and their explanation/justification in terms of the translated text, accuracy of the comment in terms of its readability and comprehension. Both comment and translation will be graded individually (1 to 30) and the mean between the two grades (with the comment weighing 2/3 and the translation 1/3 of the final grade; e.g. translation 24, comment 26, mark: 24+26+26/3=25 ) will define the final grade of module 2.

ESERCITAZIONI

For all students, those who attend and do not attend the language classes, the written exam will consist of a 500-word essay on a theme connected to topics dealt with during the course. The written exam lasts 90 minutes and is held once per exam session. Students have to pass the exam before registering their overall final mark on almaesami.

The essay will be assessed at the C2 level of the Common European Framework for the following:

appropriateness of argumentation relating to the topic;

presentation (layout, spelling, punctuation);

structure/organization (application of academic writing criteria, cohesion/coherence); 

lexicogrammatical and discursive accuracy of the standard academic English required.

The final mark is calculated as follows: the final mark for the lezioni frontali is an average of the marks of the two modules. This is multiplied by 2, added to the esercitazioni mark and divided by 3.

As concerns the use of AI, in module 1 and esercitazioni, this is forbidden. Module 2 requires a critical use of AI

 

Teaching tools

Multimedia materials and PPTs presentations. Sofware for text analysis; this is freely accessible to all UNIBO students

Students with SLDs or temporary or permanent disabilities: we suggest that you contact the relevant university office (https://site.unibo.it/studenti-con-disabilita-e-dsa/en ) and your teacher immediately to work together to find the most effective strategies for attending classes and/or preparing for exams.

Any requests for exam accommodations must be made at least 15 days before the date of the exam, by sending an email to the teacher and copying (Cc) the email address disabilita@unibo.it [mailto:disabilita@unibo.it] (in case of disability) or dsa@unibo.it [mailto:dsa@unibo.it] (for students with Specific Learning Difficulties).

 

Office hours

See the website of Monica Turci

See the website of Gaia Aragrande