A Narrative-Argumentation Framework for Translation Quality Assessment: Exploring a Chapter in “Discourses of Rumi”

Although argumentation theory can contribute to translation studies and especially translation quality assessment (TQA), argumentation models need to be further expanded to specifically serve the process of translation. How an argument is embedded within a larger body of text (e.g. a book chapter), and how the argument-related structural pieces are put together through textual progression represent some of the challenging questions that assessors/practitioners of translation need to deal with. This study proposes a holistic, multi-genre TQA framework that relies on narrative theory and argumentation theory. Pragma-dialectics (including argument scheme and structure) shapes the argumentative parcel, while the notion of narrative coherence, with reference to Ricoeur’s configuration, builds the narrative component. The framework is tested on an English translation of a Rumi’s chapter in his major book Fihi Ma Fihi (Discourses of Rumi). The findings show that the framework, as a multifaceted TQA instrument, can functionally process arguments in narratives.