Invited by the College of Foreign Languages, Professor David Johnston, dean and doctoral supervisor in translation of the School of Arts, English Language of Queen’s University Belfast (QUB) visited the college from May 10th to 13th . He also communicated with students and faculty of our college. Professor Johnston held a series of lectures on translation in the college as planned and exchanged ideas about further cooperation of the two colleges.

On May 11st, Series Lectures on Translation Theory and Practice were given in the conference room 500 of the Foreign Language Building. Based on the topics of “Translation from the Perspective of Belfast” and “Professional Quality of Translators and Interpreters”, Professor Johnston shared his teaching and research experiences in the field of translation with graduate students of our college.

In the lectures, Professor Johnston introduced the abstract translation theories and curriculum ideas of translation major in QUB in a simple, easy and humorous way. Loading his pages with references and combining his rich experience in translating Spanish, Portuguese and French dramas into English, he claimed that owing to historical, religious and social factors, every nation has the case of demonizing and denaturalizing alien cultures. Therefore, translators should take the responsibility to eliminate such misunderstanding, reproduce the nature of culture and dig out the human nature and real life that hid behind language. After every lecture, students and faculty in attendance discussed and interacted positively with Professor Johnston.

After the lecture in 11st, Professor Zhou Yifu, Dean of the College of Foreign Languages, met in person with Professor Johnston. Prof. Zhou warmly welcomed Professor Johnston’s visit and appreciated his wonderful lectures on behalf of the students and faculty of the College of Foreign Languages. Professor Johnston, representing the School of Arts, English Language of QUB, had a talk on the cooperation of two colleges. Both sides reaffirmed to strengthen academic exchanges of the two colleges and expressed wills to develop comprehensive scientific research and talent-training cooperation.

It was the first time that Professor Johnston came to Jilin University. He spoke highly of students and faculty of the College of Foreign Languages and he asked to leave the message on the information platform that: “I’m very glad to come to Jilin University and have a face to face conversation with the students and faculty of the College of Foreign Languages. Students from Jilin University in Belfast are very diligent and excellent. But here, I see more intelligent students. The questions they asked during the lectures are very good and profound, which shows high teaching level of the College of Foreign Languages and strength of Jilin University. I do welcome more and more students from this college to further their study in Belfast.”

Professor Johnston’s gave 4 lectures in 2 days. The whole series concluded in the afternoon of May 12.