Richard Clouet

Richard Clouet holds a degree in English Philology from the University of Nantes, France, and a PhD in English Philology from the University of Paris-Sorbonne, awarded in 1998. He has been a member of the Department of Modern Philology, Translation and Interpreting at the University of Las Palmas de Gran Canaria since 2000, where he is a Full Professor in the Faculty of Translation and Interpreting. He has taken part in various research programmes at universities around the world and is a founding member of the FLETATIS research group (Foreign Language Education Through Applied Technologies and Intercultural Sensitivity). His research career is essentially linked to the teaching and learning of English for specific purposes, particularly as applied to translation and interpreting, and to multilingualism and intercultural communicative competence. He has carried out contrastive studies of Spanish, French and English, with particular emphasis on pragmatic and sociolinguistic aspects. Other publications of his, directly applicable to translation, address the identification and study of similarities and differences between languages. These studies help in understanding and analysing the divergences and analogies between linguistic and cultural systems, in grasping linguistic complexities more fully, and in making informed decisions to achieve effective communication across different languages and cultures. Finally, his reflections on the need to develop intercultural communicative competence are closely tied to the fields of intercommunication, intercomprehension and reciprocal understanding. In this respect, he has published work highlighting the need to build solid and lasting bridges, carefully exploring both sides of the divide.