Abstract
The descriptive and functional approaches of Translation Studies contributed to the so-called “cultural turn” by proposing non-prescriptive ways of approaching translation and redirecting the study focus to the reception context. This paper provides a comparative analysis of the main aspects of these approaches, identifying common points and divergences in their theories. We start by analyzing its general proposals and then by comparing the main contributions of Gideon Toury and Christiane Nord to Translation Studies, in order to better understand the two proposals. Finally, we investigate the application of functionalist and discriptivist theories in translation research, based on the analysis of theses and dissertations.
Keywords:
translation studies; functionalism; descriptivism