Translation asadaptationandselection

Abstract This article discusses translation ‘as a translator's adaptation and selection activities in a translational eco‐environment ‘. Such an environment includes the worlds of the source text and the source and target languages, the linguistic, cultural, and social aspects of translating, as well as the author, client, and readers. Within a theoretical framework of translation as adaptation and selection, the process of translating is a production of target texts by ‘natural’ selection via the translator's adaptation to the eco‐environment and the translator's selection of both the degree of the adaptation and decisions about the form of the final target text in terms of the Darwinian principle of natural selection. This approach to translation highlights adaptation and selection as aspects of translational activities and hopefully adds new dimensions to Translation Studies as an academic discipline.