Menghui Zhang
Research title: The logics of discursive construction of international legal discourse: Legal translation of WTO laws
Research Summary
Menghui Zhang obtained an LLB from East China University of Political Science and Law, an MA in English Language and Literature from Nankai University, and an MSc in Translation Studies from the University of Glasgow.
Her project examines how legal/institutional translation shapes socio-legal realities, policy reforms, and ideological transitions. Using a logics-based discourse analysis of archival and legal materials, it explores how translation functions as a constitutive force in institutional and ideological transformation within international political economic contexts. The study highlights how shifts in translation reflect deeper ideological realignments, enabling integration into global trade systems while potentially obscuring underlying structural imbalances.
Conferences
CONFERENCE PRESENTATION
‘Legal Translation as Resignification – Sociolegal Implications in Chinese Translation of International Trade Law’ at International Postgraduate Conference in Translation and Interpreting (IPCITI), University of Manchester, 5-6 December 2024
'State-Trading as Discursive Struggle: Legal Translation and the Logics of Resignification in WTO Law' at Online Pre-Congress Day of the 11th European Society for Translation Studies (EST) Congress, University of Leeds, 27 June 2025
'Resignifying WTO law in China: The Sociolegal and Discursive Dynamics of Legal Translation' at The Centre for Legal and Institutional Translation Studies (Transius) Conference, University of Geneva, 7-9 July 2025
EVENT ORGANIZATION
‘Space[s]’, University of Glasgow College of Arts Postgraduate Conference 2024, University of Glasgow, Joint organizer of a two-day hybrid conference, 13-14 June 2024
Teaching
2022-2023 Graduate Teaching Assistant, Chinese
2022-2023 Graduate Teaching Assistant, Translation Studies
2022-2023 Graduate Teaching Assistant, Translation Studies (Glasgow-Nankai programme)
2023-2024 Graduate Teaching Assistant, Chinese
2024-2025 Graduate Teaching Assistant, Chinese
Additional Information
Summer School
2023 Essex Summer School in Social Science Data Analysis, Course 1Q Doing Discourse Analysis - Populism, Neoliberalism and Radical Democratic Politics, University of Essex (online), 10-21 July 2023