In his book In Search of a Theory of Translation , Gideon Toury (1980), a pioneering translation studies scholar from Israel, suggested that scholars keep an open mind when defining the object of study for their field. He suggested that scholars study translation phenomena wherever they occur, and that the definition for the field include any text 'that is regarded as a translation from the intrinsic point of view of the target system' (p. 73). Because the field was so young, and because it had yet to collect a corpus of texts for study, Toury cautioned against preconceived notions of translation and the exclusion of texts because of differing definitions and national traditions. Toury's idea, which I greatly admire, was quite radical at the time, for it challenged traditional definitions and opened the field to many types of texts not considered by the discipline. Today I want to go even one step further: I suggest there are many texts that some cultures often do not consider as translations but which also need be included in the field's definitions. China and the United States may be two countries where such 'hidden' translations occur.

Despite the field's relatively young age, in parts of Europe, it has already coalesced into a fairly narrow discipline with a well-defined subject field for study and a fairly fixed research methodology, i.e. what has become known as descriptive translation studies (DTS). Yet I suggest both that many translation phenomena have not been included, especially those oral and non-published translations occurring in marginal communities in the Americas, Asia and Africa, and that research methodologies used in other disciplines, including philosophy, anthropology, psychology and political science, have not been sufficiently considered.