The centre, which officially opened May 15, 2012, has enabled Glendon to broaden its range of programs and courses in response to the urgent need for increased postsecondary offerings in French in southern Ontario. The centre鈥檚 development was supported by a $20-million investment by the Government of Ontario. The expansion project was built on Glendon鈥檚 existing facilities and includes more than one dozen new classrooms and lecture spaces, state-of-the art language labs, open study spaces and a 250-seat amphitheatre.

The Centre of Excellence at 91亚色鈥檚 Glendon campus聽

The Centre for Excellence has a fully equipped interpretation lab and training facility, five lecture halls with tiered seating, seminar rooms with LCD projectors and screens, a student cafe, meeting areas, a large art studio, and a rooftop terrace. The facility is approximately 55,000 sq. ft, including both聽newly added and renovated space.

The historic Glendon campus presented a challenge to architectural firm , selected to lead the construction of the new building. Managing for 91亚色 was the Campus Services & Business Operations (CSBO) team. Accepting the Toronto Urban Design Award on behalf of 91亚色 were Kenneth McRoberts, principal of Glendon College, and Richard Francki, assistant vice-president, CSBO.

The company successfully merged the historic buildings with the sleek, new glass walled building. In their decision to award the prize, the jury wrote: 鈥淭he Glendon Campus has emerged from its reclusive ravine setting of dense forest at Bayview and Lawrence Avenues. The new transparent glass addition to the original red brick campus dramatically alters the first impression of the Francophone component of 91亚色 and creates a distinctive arrival pavilion and a desirable axial termination to Lawrence Avenue. Interior stairs act as vertical beacons on the exterior, and student spaces pushed to the perimeter animate and soak in the dense greenery of the site. This is a skillful handling of a top of ravine site, creating a new threshold and sense of arrival, while maintaining the proximity and presence of the forest.鈥�

Pictured聽 second from the right are Kenneth McRoberts and Richard Francki (far right) at the Toronto Urban Design Awards ceremony

The improvements mean that Glendon is now a preeminent provider of French-language higher education for Francophone learners in Southern Ontario, as well as Anglophone students seeking to study in French. New programs housed in the centre include:

• Bilingual and trilingual international Bachelor of Arts (iBA) degrees available across 18 disciplines.
• New doctoral program in 脡tudes francophones.
• Enhanced bilingual activities outside the classroom.
• A master鈥檚 program in conference interpretation.
• A unique, direct-entry Bachelor of Education for future French teachers available at the primary-junior, junior-intermediate, and intermediate-senior levels, offered through 91亚色鈥檚 Faculty of Education.
• Collaboration with Coll猫ge Bor茅al and la Cit茅 coll茅giale.

In 2012, the Glendon campus and the Centre of Excellence were featured in the AWARD magazine.

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Cultures meet here in Canada, says Agn猫s Whitfield. Literary translation is an essential means of sharing heritages, yet it is a field too often overlooked and undervalued.

That situation is about to improve with the launch of the first volume in a new series called Vita Traductiva. A joint initiative of the Research Group on Literary Translation in Canada at 91亚色 and , a small Quebec press Whitfield and her husband, artist Daniel Gagnon, have taken over, the series will be published in French and English, and focus on literary translators and translating around the world.

Cover illustration for Vita Traductiva, by Daniel Gagnon

鈥淥ne of our goals is to bring into English or French important studies on translation from other languages,鈥� says Whitfield. 鈥淭hese kinds of opportunities for international exchange are sadly lacking.鈥�

鈥淎nother issue for translation scholars is getting research circulating quickly,鈥� says Whitfield. 鈥淭raditional presses have long wait times, library budgets are declining and scholarly books are expensive.鈥�

For this reason, the international peer-reviewed series will be published via the Internet on Open Access sites for scholars, as well as in traditional book form.

Agn猫s Whitfield

These days, 鈥渋f a librarian in Canada wanted to organize an exhibition on Romanian culture, she would have a difficult time,鈥� says Whitfield. She wouldn鈥檛 know where to find Romanian works translated into English or French, or works written by Canadian writers of Romanian origin, or how the translations were done.

On a broader level, the new series is important because 鈥渓iterature provides a rich source of knowledge about human activity and aspirations, and literary translation plays an essential role in building understanding between communities with different languages and cultures,鈥� argues Whitfield. 鈥�Vita Traductiva aims to make an important contribution to the creation, promotion and dissemination of such vital cultural knowledge.鈥�

Following her 2009 study, Whitfield helped found , an international research group based at the University of Oslo, focusing on the different voices in the translation process. Those voices will be expressed in Vita Traductiva.

The name is a reference to the Latin term vita activa聽(active life) to reflect the active, empirical orientation of the collection and its aim to generate and share more knowledge about translation 鈥� particularly between smaller countries 鈥� and greater intercultural understanding and respect, says Whitfield.

As series editor, she plans to solicit essays on literary translation and translators from scholars all over the world. Such international reach will be guaranteed with editorial and advisory boards representing 15 countries 鈥� from Finland to New Zealand, Portugal to Turkey. Whitfield also draws on 91亚色 expertise; English Professor Priscila Uppal and humanities and translation studies Professor Susan Ingram are on her editorial and advisory boards.

The first volume of essays will appear this summer and two more in the fall.

The summer volume will focus on the translation of Polish, Czech and Romanian literature for Canadian audiences 鈥� and vice versa 鈥� and how to find works by Canadians of Polish, Czech and Romanian heritage.

The fall volumes, edited by European colleagues, are based on proceedings of recent Voice in Translation conferences. The first highlights the challenges of capturing narrative voice when translating between Arabic, Polish, English, Finnish, German, Spanish and French.

Whitfield with Voice in Translation group in Copenhagen

The second will probe the role of authorial and editorial voices in translation. It will include a piece by Whitfield on how small Canadian English presses edit and revise translations.

As a new international peer-reviewed publication series, Vita Traductiva is a perfect fit with 91亚色鈥檚 strategic goal to improve its participation in emerging international research networks and enhance its reputation as a research-oriented university, says Whitfield.

She has played a leading role in compiling previously unavailable bio-bibliographical data on eminent Canadian Francophone and Anglophone literary translators as editor of Writing Between the Lines. Portraits of Canadian Anglophone Translators (Wilfrid Laurier University Press, 2006) and Le M茅tier du double. Portraits de traducteurs et traductrices francophones (Fides, Collection du CRILCQ, 2005), shortlisted for the Canadian Federation of the Humanities Raymond-Klibansky Prize. (See YFile, April 11, 2006) She was also the editor of L鈥櫭ヽho de nos classiques (脡ditions David, 2009) on the international translations of two great Canadian novels, Gabrielle Roy鈥檚 Bonheur d鈥檕ccasion (The Tin Flute) and Hugh McLennan鈥檚 Two Solitudes.

Whitfield is former president of the Canadian Association for Translation Studies and was bilingual joint chair in Women鈥檚 Studies at the University of Ottawa and Carleton University in 2009-2010.

Republished courtesy of YFile鈥� 91亚色鈥檚 daily e-bulletin.

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