The ever-changing face of Chinese Interpreting Studies

Abstract

As the discipline of Translation and Interpreting Studies (TIS) has continued to expand rapidly over the past twenty years, scientometric research has been applied increasingly often to analyse its trends and patterns. Drawing inspiration from Social Network Analysis (SNA), this study aims to quantify academic research impact and identify patterns of influence at an institutional level in Chinese Interpreting Studies (CIS), by seeking answers to the following questions: Which are the most influential publications? Which institutions carry the most weight? How have their respective levels of influence evolved over time? By analysing a near-exhaustive corpus of 59,303 citations from CIS literature, the study reveals that the majority of influential publications are monographs and theoretical in nature, though many Chinese textbooks on interpreting are also highly influential. It also finds that an institution’s ranking in research productivity does not necessarily translate into high academic influence.