This module serves as the final graduation project for students at the end of their MA study, and is completed over the summer. Students have the option of writing a traditional dissertation on a chosen topic or conducting a translation project (which involves a piece of extended translation and an accompanying commentary / critical analysis). The module is supervised on an individual one-to-one basis (5 hours).
The dissertation length is 15,000 – 18,000 words. The translation project consists of a translation of approx. 9,000 words (or equivalent Chinese character count) and a commentary/critical analysis of approx. 7,500-9,000 words. The word count for the translation may be less if the student opts for more difficult and complex genres (e.g. poetry and song) or specialised texts (e.g. chemistry and engineering). Usually, students will translate into their first language.