This study explored issues, paradoxes, concerns, and practices regarding issues of interpretation and translation in qualitative research, which concern scholars in cross-cultural/cross-language studies. This study focused on two stages of research work. In the first, a bilingual dissertation was rewritten as a play and installation, and performed in three different venues, with the purpose of introducing audiences to the political crises in South America surrounding desaparecidos, the thousands of citizens who disappeared into the prisons of dictators. The second round of research was carried out through interviews with Spanish and Chinese doctoral students who conducted research and presented it bilingually. The conclusions can be applied to any cross-language study, but especially dissertation studies conducted by PhD students, and such bilingual studies, which address social problems in the international students’ home countries, have broad implications for enhancing and strengthening social justice beyond the boundaries of the United States.
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