Women in audiovisual translation in Spain: A walk through academia and the industry

Abstract

More than 70% of ATRAE's (Asociación de Traducción y Adaptación Audiovisual de España) members are women. DAMA (Derechos de Autor de Medios Audiovisuales) seems to have similar figures (Mariani, 2021). Furthermore, according to Pérez Escudero’s (2021, p. 423-424) doctoral study within the BITRA database (Franco Aixelá, 2001-2024), Pilar Orero was the most prolific author in audiovisual translation research (AVT) in the world, and of the 20 authors with the most publications in this field, 12 were women. Despite these figures, which in themselves show a clear leading role for women in this specialized field of translation, the number of prizes awarded to their translations, or even the presence of women as plenary speakers at conferences in this field, does not always correspond to these figures. In fact, when it comes to citations, of those 20 most productive authors in AVT, there are only 8 women among the 20 most cited authors. In view of this situation, recent publications have emerged, such as those of Botella Tejera and Agulló García (2021, 2022a), which give voice to women, academics and professionals, who, based on the different modalities of AVT, depict the situation of women in academia and the professional world, and give us some clues about the future to come. This article gathers bibliometric and statistical data that try to help us understand the evolution of women researchers and professionals in AVT in Spain, as well as to discover which authors are the most influential and the most promising ones. In addition, various hypotheses will be studied, and answers will be sought about the situation and future prospects of women in AVT.

Keywords
AVT; women; research; profession; gender gap