Cultural translation, universality and emancipation

Abstract

In a way, the history of Translation Studies, at least for the last decades, has been that of a continuous broadening of the field of study. If the 1990s witnessed the "cultural turn" famously heralded by Mary Snell-Hornby, more recently scholars have turned towards the role that translation plays in cultural dominance and cultural resistance, in what has been referred to as the power turn. At the same time, a converging movement could be observed from outside the field of Translation Studies: Some thinkers, in their quest for new intellectual paradigms to tackle the challenges faced by emancipatory projects, have veered towards translation as a way to overcome particularism and nationalism, while at the same time avoiding the risks of a monocultural universalism that is seen to lead inevitably to imperialism. Translation, by necessarily reaching out to the Other and creating hybridity, offers a unique chance to "square the circle" and find "equivalence in difference." In this paper, we discuss the ideas about translation of four such thinkers, coming from very different backgrounds and traditions: Ngugi wa Thiong'o, Étienne Balibar, Judith Butler and Boaventura de Sousa Santos.

Gender Discourse – Representation of Ideas about the Distribution of Gender Roles

“…The problem of "cultural turn" in the theory of translation applies mechanisms of cultural dominance and cultural resistance and solves the problems of particularism and nationalism while avoiding the risks of monocultural universalism, which inevitably leads to imperialism. The interaction between translation and culture is conditioned by ideology and power, which is why the boundaries of translation studies have continuously expanded from linguistic considerations of various nature to a postcolonial view of the world, enriched by gender research, the achievements of queer culture, and focused on ideological and political aspects (Dols & Calafat, 2020). The concept of "cultural turn" is perceived as a new understanding of translation, optimisation of old and construction of new ways to convey reality.…”

“…The "Cultural turn" in the translation system was carried out using the post-structuralist method; its main task was to overcome the antinomies that have paralysed progressive thinking in recent decades, between imperialist tendencies and identity. The concept of "cultural" translation is interpreted as the usual transfer of text from one language to another, but with an understanding of universalist discourse, which entails the assimilation of differences, and the need to build a non-imperialistically directed universalism in the future (Dols & Calafat, 2020). Theorists who have studied the ideology of translation consider the latter as a powerful means of reflecting and transmitting the former, ideological changes can be the result of positioning publishers or other authorities, the dominance of a certain genre, and the socio-cultural origin of translators.…”