Pedagogy of translation: the cognitive tasks of the act of translation

How do we understand a written statement? How do we construct a mental representation of what it states? How do we switch from a statement in one language to another equivalent statement in another language? These questions are of paramount importance to the pedagogy of translation. I attempted to obtain answers to these questions from cognitive scientists, convinced that knowing more about our own cortical processes can improve the act of translation. The more we know, the better we can translate. I also thought it appropriate to develop a model that would provide us with a simplified, but nonetheless realistic, image of the mental activity that is involved during translation. This will therefore transform the translation process into an object we can grasp - a tool for reflection.