Investigating the workplace networks of Chinese in-house translators in the GenAI era

Abstract Social network analysis (SNA) posits that individuals’ professional activities are shaped by their relationships with other actors and should therefore be understood through a network-based perspective. With generative artificial intelligence (GenAI) increasingly demonstrating agentic features and becoming integrated into translation workplaces, translators are required to interact with both human stakeholders and GenAI tools, which complicates their work. To investigate how translators’ workplace practices are shaped in the GenAI era, this explorative study adopts an ego-centred SNA approach and employs the three-concentric-circles model in semi-structured interviews with seven in-house translators in China. By examining the structure of translators’ professional networks, the study elucidates their interactions with both human stakeholders and GenAI within their workplace settings. It further provides practical insights into the design of AI-integrated translation workflows from a socio-technical perspective and offers implications for translation training programmes in preparing students for AI-integrated translation workplaces.