French connection

Award-winning translator Marc Orlando has gained a reputation for bringing the realities of war to a global audience. Now he is leading a unique new double masters program in translation studies in partnership with Jean Moulin University, Lyon, in his native France.

A former English teacher in France, Marc Orlando, was working as a freelance translator and interpreter in New Zealand in 2005 when he was asked to translate into French a report in New Zealand's Metro magazine by Iraq-based independent war correspondent Jon Stephenson.

The duo's collaboration culminated in Mr Stephenson winning the prestigious 2006 Bayeux-Calvados award for war correspondents, while Mr Orlando's translation was recognised with a 2007 award for excellence in translating by AUSIT, the professional association for translators and interpreters in Australia.

"It was an incredible encounter," Mr Orlando said of the collaboration.

We worked together for three months and really polished a translation that eventually competed against original French articles.
Marc Orlando

"He had spent four months in Iraq as a non-embedded journalist, hiding in caves and with local people.

"We worked together for three months and really polished a translation that eventually competed against original French articles."

That success and Mr Orlando's personal connection with Jean Moulin University aided the establishment of the new Double Master of Translation Studies in French and English. The course allows students to immerse themselves in two distinct cultures, as they spend a year in Australia and a year in France, and graduate with degrees from the two leading language universities.

During the course students will be offered an internship with a company in France, and can be recommended for accreditation as a translator in Australia.

Mr Orlando said graduates would also benefit from a new partnership between the French and Australian Chambers of Commerce and Industry.

The Monash School of Languages, Cultures and Linguistics currently offers masters studies in 11 languages and plans to establish similar double master partnerships with universities in Italy, Germany and Latin America.

The Double Master in Translation Studies will commence in the second semester of 2009.

For more information, see the Translation Studies website.