Concepts and Contests in the Translation of Indigenous Poetics in Brazil

Abstract

This study examines the creative and theoretical engagement of contemporary Brazilian translators with the specificities of the translation of lowland South American Indigenous verbal arts into Portuguese. Amerindian verbal arts, as a field of scholarly interest, have been mobilizing the commitment and expertise of more and more linguists, ethnologists, and translation and literature researchers in the country. As the applicability of concepts such as “literature”, “poetry” and “verbal arts” to Amerindian poetics is questioned by many of them, this article offers a critical review of recurring tensions in scholarly discourse.