Long before the instauration of hermeneutical translation studies in the 1970s, understanding was considered a prerequisite for translation. Valery Larbaud’s (1881-1957) opus represents an outstanding example for this. It is mainly in his book Sous l’invocation de Saint Jérôme (1946), a collection of short multifaceted works, where the author argues for employing a modern approach to hermeneutical translation theory avant la lettre. For Larbaud, translation constitutes an intellectual, selfreliant work of writing, and it is also a research activity

The doctoral thesis Verstehen verstehen: Modellierung epistemologischer und methodologischer Grundlagen für die Konferenz - dolmetschforschung ausgehend vom Simultandolmetschen in die B-Sprache (Modelling Comprehension in Interpreting Studies: Epistemological and Methodological Foundations for Research on Conference Interpreting; with an Initial Concentration on Simultaneous Interpreting into the B-Language) (Leibbrand2009a/ 2011a) is situated thematically in the discipline of Interpreting Studies (Pöchhacker 2004). After briefly outlining the issues treated in my doctoral thesis, this essay tries to show what contribution the approach called “Hermeneutical Research into Interpreting” (Hermeneutische Dolmetschforschung) can make to the new field of Translational Hermeneutics. In addition, the essay demonstrates how this approach can fecundate the discussion concerning Hermeneutics and Cognitive Science on the one hand and, on the other hand, provide insights into the question concerning whether or not Hermeneutics and Empirical Research are conflicting paradigms. For Hermeneutische Dolmetschforschung, Translational Hermeneutics should not restrict its research to understanding in translation per se; rather it must go beyond this and also explore how understanding itself can serve as a research method and as the foundation for an epistemological attitude. The power and productivity of Hermeneutics for building a paradigm in Translation Studies is not limited to observing and explaining the processes and products of translation. Neither is it limited to contributing to the discussion of methods adopted by the translator/interpreter in translating or interpreting. The question of method includes the questioning individual who is actively and hermeneutically reflecting on his/her own research activities. The new methodology resulting from my investigations is called Verstehende Forschung and it is grounded on the epistemological attitude of Epistemologische Off enheit. Th is methodological approach is qualitative, notquantitative. Hermeneutical Research into Interpreting defines the process of understanding while interpreting (comprehension) as Produktionsorientiertes dynamisches Verstehen. However, the core of this new approach is built by the methodological dimension of Hermeneutics. Therefore, a contribution geared towards solving the LAP-versus-ESP-controversy in Translation Studies lies at the very heart of Hermeneutical Research into Interpreting.

Hermeneutical translation is based on the conviction that one first has to understand a text before being able to present the message once again in another language. The objective is precision in the sense of an authentic presentation of that message in the translation. Th is task requests a dynamical translation competence that interlinks knowledge-based, refl exive and strategic elements. Th e article off ers a systematic description of the factors involved in such a competence. Specifically, it addresses the necessary cultural and technical knowledge, hermeneutical fields of orientation as to how to comprehend texts and formulate their translation, and the issue of the translator’s intellectual growth brought about by lifelong learning and the inter-relation between various translation assignments. Hermeneutical translation competence, which can be presented in a systemic model,proves to be an informed, self-critical, dynamic and fl exibly networking approach to texts and their worlds.

By neglecting to integrate the final step of rhetorics into theory, i. e. pronuntiatio and actio, modern text linguistics passed a theoretical deficit on to modern translation studies. Literary texts must be read aloud in order to realize the acoustic potential programmed into the text by the author. The rhetorical tradition of writing and reading aloud was marginalized in the course of the 18th century when reading became a private and silent affair. Herder’s (and others’) foregrounding of the ‘tone’ or the ‘voice’ in literary texts and their translations is a theoretical attempt to return to the holistic view of text production, integrating performance into the process of literary production and reception. In practice, however, great literary translators always paid attention to the ‘voice in the text’. The tradition of orality – distinguishing precise voices in literary texts – seems to come to an end in Jelinek’s anti-individualistic texts.

Since at least the latter half of the 20th century, scientific theorizing has been marked by a tendency to focus increasingly on the concept of complexity. However, within the field of Translation Studies, we continue to work primarily with non-complex, uni-dimensional models. The relationship between the source text and the target text is commonly established in uni-dimensional terms, that is: either via sense (linguistics, hermeneutics) or via the function or skopos (Skopos theory, functionalism). Terms like equivalence (Nida, Kade) and adequacy (Vermeer) are also based on uni-dimensional models. In the late 1980s, Neubert suggested a two-dimensional approach using the notions of content and purpose to overcome uni-dimensional models. In my paper I would like to present a more complex approach to translation based on semiotics and interpretation philosophy. It consists of two levels: the intratextual level focusing the interrelation of signs (word, sentences, texts) within texts, and the extratextual level focusing the interrelation of signs with extratextual phenomena. Each level is divided into three dimensions. I use the concepts of meaning, function, and information to describe what a translator has to take into account on the intratextual level to be able to elaborate an equivalent target text, i.e. a text that fits into the constraints of a given linguistics settings. In addition to that, I use the concepts of sense, purpose, and form to describe what a translator has to take into consideration on the extratextual level to elaborate an adequate target text, i.e. a text that fits into the constraints of a given translatological setting. Whereas the uni-dimensional arrow just stands for the simple relation between source and target text, this new model establishes a whole translational space between both texts which is able to show the complexity of translational decisions to be taken.

Due to the fact that hermeneutical approaches have widely been ignored or falsely understood as missing the scientific requirements in Translation Studies, this article wants to demonstrate how Translational Hermeneutics as an approach based on grounded understanding is crucial and endorses various other approaches in the research of translation. Explaining the scholarly perspective here as an individual worldview, the external opinions can be defeated. Concepts like subjectivity, intuition, sense of the text to be understood, and ever unfinished time-sensitive translations within a cultural context are discussed. Various aspects of understanding and formulation come together in the translator’s dynamic competence. Translational Hermeneutics links up with linguistic theories such as text-linguistics, semantics, rhetoric, the sociological systems theory, cognition research, and empirical methods of inquiring into the translator’s thinking. It connects less to corpus studies or language-based inter-lingual transfer and the technology-based process analyses. Didactics based on an hermeneutical approach may strengthen the translator’s self-confidence by preparing the background of understanding.