Samuel López-Alcalá’s research while affiliated with Brigham Young University and other places

In recent years, Christopher Rundle has sparked methodological debates in translation history with his proposals on opposing historical paradigms, dichotomous theoretical frameworks, and seemingly incompatible audiences. This article examines critically Rundle's theses and links them to three dichotomous tensions between translation and historical studies. The contention here is that these key aspects of historical theory are tributaries to a more crucial concern of the historian, namely, the production of explanation structures. Echoing Andrew Chesterman, it is suggested that turning to causal explanation can be a positive step toward consilience regarding the unresolved dichotomous tensions between the study of history and translation. The article concludes with a survey of these issues by seeking to integrate translation phenomena in the structures of explanation pertaining to a specific case of US–Mexican religious history.