This paper consists of two parts. The first part presents the opening address delivered by Professor Xu Jun at the 4^th Translator Behavior Studies Forum. The second part provides a commentary by Professor Zhou Lingshun, the founder of translator behavior theory. The commentary includes his personal research trajectory and future directions, as well as the new perspectives and expanded pathways demonstrated in the field of translation studies. Both parts focus on the study of translator behavior and are expected to promote the in-depth development of translator behavior studies.

The crisis experienced by foreign language majors in higher education stems from the misalignment between academic development and social needs. For instance, with approximately 1,000 universities and colleges having English majors focusing on linguistics, literature, translation, cross-cultural studies, and country-and-area studies within the Foreign Languages and Literature discipline, undergraduate and graduate students annually and inevitably face intense competition in the job market. The “Four New Constructions” initiative by the Ministry of Education advocates interdisciplinary approaches and major adjustments to meet societal demands. This study finds that language service is the major direction of adjustment for the Foreign Languages and Literature discipline. Foreign language graduates engaged in language services can better fulfill societal needs by applying linguistic theories to explore how knowledge of various disciplines, particularly in natural and technical sciences, is constructed and disseminated. Furthermore, this research demonstrates the necessity and feasibility of interdisciplinary integration in foreign language programs and proposes the establishment of a new sub-discipline, “Linguistics for Specific Purposes”, under the first-level discipline of Foreign Language and Literature to address the demands of language services.

Since 1908, the century-long journey of introducing translations of Burns’ (1759—1796) poetry into China has been marked by numerous outstanding translators who collectively contributed to the evolution of Burns’ poetry translations. The translation of Burns’ poetry was exceptionally active during the Republic of China era (1912—1949), Yuan Shuipai being one of the representative translators at the time. In 1944, Yuan Shuipai published ten poems by Burns in the influential cultural publication Zhongyuan edited by Guo Moruo, and demonstrated his progressive ideology of using poetry as a tool to inspire the people. Unlike many of his contemporaries, Yuan Shuipai exhibited unique translator behavior in his translations of Burns’ poetry. In this paper, we examine Yuan Shuipai’s translator behavior from both the extra-translation and the intra-translation dimensions based on the Critical Theory of Translator Behavior, with a focus on his dual roles as a “social being” and as a “linguistic being”. We explore how Yuan Shuipai prioritized “truth-seeking” over “utility-attaining” in his pursuit of rationalized translations, thereby enriching the study of translations of Burns’ poetry and translator behavior.

The English series Legends of the Condor Heroes was produced via a collaborative translation effort, and the translators’ behaviors jointly determined the communication effect. In this article, the Translator Behavior Trinity Evaluation System and three semantic frameworks of translation criticism are combined for the first time to compare the translator behavior of Anna Holmwood and Gigi Chang based on their translations of the English series Legends of the Condor Heroes. The results revealed that, according to the semantic framework of behavior criticism from the perspective of behavior-text and the semantic framework of text criticism according to the perspective of text-language, the two translators exhibited different behaviors due to having diff erent identities. As a result of having a dual social role as a translator and as a copyright agent, Holmwood paid particular attention to the acceptability of the translation and her translator behavior tended to be utility-attaining. Having a dual social identity as a translator and as a member of the Chinese diasporic community, Chang attached importance to the adequacy of the translation; hence, her translator behavior tended to be truth-seeking. Despite these differences, based on the semantic framework of eff ect criticism according to the perspective of behavior-society, the two translators’ English translations were evaluated positively in the English-speaking world, which revealed the eff ective communication of the English series Legends of the Condor Heroes.

The creation of large language models has led to a revolution in language services, which have become the new-quality productive force. This paper presents the argument that artificial intelligence (AI) language services are the new-quality productive force, describes the shift from traditional language services to AI language services, defines the concept, the connotations, the market, and education in AI language services with the aim of drawing attention to both the industry and to research on AI language services.

The rapid development and extensive application of artificial intelligence (AI) technologies have catalyzed transformations in the organizational structure and service models within the language services industry. This paper analyzes the impact of AI technologies on the language services market from both international and domestic perspectives by focusing on the demand and supply sides. It summarizes the developmental trends in the language services industry and provides recommendations for enhancing the industry’s growth and competitiveness. The research results indicate that AI technologies have permeated all the processes involved in language services and have established a human-in-the-loop translation model. Language service providers are strengthening their strategies for digitalization and intelligent development, and are transitioning toward knowledge processes outsourcing providers and global content strategy services providers. It is essential to increase the intelligent construction within China’s language services sector to further professionalize and internationalize the language services industry, to enhance the planning of standard language service systems, and to focus on professional talent development.

Research concerning the cognitive effects on bilingualism spans over a century, progressing from an early view of bilingual disadvantage, through a period emphasizing on bilingual advantage, to the current debate in which both perspectives coexist and challenge each other. Clarifying this issue is essential not only for understanding human cognitive mechanisms, but also due to its theoretical and practical implications in the teaching of foreign languages. The first focus in this paper is on tracing the origins of the debate, followed by a summary of the key points of contention, and an examination of the current state of the discussion regarding bilingual advantages in three core areas: executive function, creative thinking and theory of mind. The findings suggest that the complexity of both bilingualism and cognition, compounded by ambiguities in the definitions, components, and measurements thereof, underlies the on-going debate. Thus, future research should increasingly adopt the frameworks and methodologies of dynamic systems theory to comprehensively and multidimensionally analyze the effects of bilingualism on cognitive abilities.

Using a grammaticality judgment test and a Chinese-to-English translation test, the paper explores the acquisition of verbal and adjectival raising constructions by 90 Chinese learners of English as a foreign language (EFL). The results revealed that the [EPP] feature was successfully reassembled in the intermediate and advanced groups. No difference between the two types of raising constructions was found because the movement of the argument was triggered by the [EPP] feature in both constructions. In addition, the animacy of the argument influenced the selection of lexical items in the construction of numeration. Both the intermediate and the advanced groups were inclined to producing DP-phrase raising constructions with an inanimate argument; however, expletive-it raising constructions were produced by both groups when the argument was animate. No difference between verbal and adjectival raising constructions was found. The argument in this paper is that the preference stemmed from the semantic relationship between the argument and the verb, as well as due to first language (L1) transfer.

The concept of the harmonious coexistence of humans and nature is a contemporary issue that all human beings encounter. The 19^th-century female British writer, Mary Shelley, criticized the anthropocentrism that was inherent in the 18^th-century Age of Enlightenment in her novel The Last Man. Shelley warned about the catastrophic consequences resulting from human cognition based on the binary oppositions in the man-nature relationship, and expressed the ecological ideal of following the rules of nature, humans coexisting with nature, and humans taking responsibility for rebuilding the human-nature relationship. This novel, which was ahead of its time, warned about the potential threats that the Enlightenment and the Industrial Revolution would pose for nature and humankind; the ecological ideas correspond to connotations with the contemporary ideal of building a “Life Community”. Re-reading The Last Man from this perspective is a new attempt at a cultural exchange between Chinese thought and Western literature, and will shed light on how to manage the challenges that are encountered by posthuman society.

Modern art has lost its traditional determining factors and has not yet obtained new ones, which makes modern works of art often seem strange and even absurd; this situation has repeatedly evoked reflections concerning the nature of art. Nietzsche opened a path to the original state of life through art criticism from the modern perspective by responding to the question regarding the nature of modern art. Nietzsche believed that, in the process of creating art, the artist discarded their identity as a “subject”, dissolved the world structure of subject-object, and entered the original level of life in order to encounter the “nothingness” directly and to feel the abundance of vitality in order to gain the intoxicating experience of Dionysus. Nietzsche pointed out that it was in this very process that the experience of Dionysus was able to enter the work of art and to manifest itself as the nature of art.

CiteSpace was employed in this study to investigate the trends, features, and key topics in overseas studies of second language (L2) written corrective feedback (WCF) from 1996 to 2024 based on the Web of Science database. The results revealed that research on WCF in countries other than China has increased. The studies were mainly published in linguistics and education journals, and featured the integration of psychology and computer science. Starting from the debate about the effectiveness of WCF, research on WCF underwent four shifts in the research foci, namely from external factors to internal psychological factors, from the effects of WCF to its process, from a micro perspective to a macro one, and from teacher and peer feedback to digital intelligence-empowered feedback. Future Chinese studies of WCF could adopt a dynamic, macro perspective to explore the effects of the feedback that is provided by automated writing evaluation systems and large language models on L2 writing performance based on theories such as the Unified Theory of Acceptance and Use of Technology. Researchers could further emphasize learners’ cognitive and affective individual differences and their engagement with feedback, and could examine learners’ and teachers’ feedback literacy. It is also suggested that researchers should improve data collection methods by integrating eye tracking, keystroke logging, and neuroimaging techniques to investigate WCF in more depth.

The Register-Functional (RF) approach, pioneered by Biber and his colleagues, highlights the importance of the situational characteristics and the communicative purposes of a register that account for its grammatical complexity. The major contribution of this approach includes the identification of phrasal modifiers that contribute to grammatical complexity in academic English and the proposal of hypothesized language developmental stages based on corpus research. In this paper, I present an introduction to the theoretical foundation of RF and its advantages, and provide a review of the development of English writing over the past decade using the RF approach as the framework. Based on a synthesis of the existing research, five aspects are recommended for future research, namely subcategorizing the functions and meanings of the lexico-grammatical patterns that are included in hypothesized language developmental stages, encouraging more case studies that investigate the linear/non-linear developmental trajectory of phrasal complexity features, integrating the use of automatic tools to diversify RF research methods, exploring the most effective modes for teaching phrasal complexity features in source-based writing classes, and applying the RF approach to other languages to establish a system for complexity features that can be adapted to different languages. Taking the characteristics of teaching English in China and research into account, three specific directions are recommended to advance research using the RF approach.