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/lit/ - Literature

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979146 No.979146 [Reply] [Original]

>“Translation rewrites a foreign text in terms that are intelligible and interesting to readers in the receiving culture. Doing so is akin to committing an act of ethnocentric violence by uprooting the text from the language and culture that gave it life. Translating into current, standard English at once conceals that violence and homogenizes foreign cultures,” he said.

http://www.temple.edu/newsroom/2009_2010/02/stories/Venuti.htm

>> No.979167
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979167

I will happily enable ethnocentric violence against Germany, France, Russia, Japan, and any other country which captures my fancy, and I'll do it all day long if the mood strikes me.

>> No.979170

lol

whats the alternative?

>> No.979176

Gosh! An academic elite sentiment that accuses of racism? NO WAY

>> No.979177

Hey, let's just read what's written in my language!

>> No.979178

In a sense translation is ethnocentric, in that it filters other cultures through one's own particular culture (embedded in language) but really, so what? People's experience of the world is mediated by their own cultural background, big deal. People should be expected to learn every language in the world to experience other cultural artifacts in the most authentic manner possible?

>> No.979179

I don't think that it's an act of "violence", but translations are and always have been bullshit. If you are a translation of The Brother Karmarazov you haven't read it at all- you've read some random person's re-imagining of it.

>> No.979181

>>979170

Yeah, pretty much this.

Whatever his point may be, expecting people to learn a new language for each book written in it they want to read is just stupid.

>> No.979183

>>979170
have parents that were, through the exploitation of poors, able to provide you with a multilingual education, then use your status as a sedate first-worlder to spend your ample free time (because you don't have to use it looking for food or protecting your family) to learn other languages you don't need to survive. then you can look down on everyone from your position of blind arrogance.

>> No.979187

Learning a second language commits an act of violence upon your first language!

>> No.979189

Agree with this actually. But taking this argument to it's extreme ends implies that the earth should culturally segregate itself by boundaries of current language. Cultural isolationism is more homogenizing then making a modest but poor attempt to translate Murakami.

>> No.979196
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979196

>>979195
You mean you don't know?

>> No.979195

>>979146

wtf do these images come from

>> No.979198

>>979195
"The Artist is Present" at the Museum of Modern art. An artist has people stare into her face for as long as they like (usually in silence) these are photos of the participants. Sticky this answer.

>> No.979202

>>979195

http://www.flickr.com/photos/themuseumofmodernart/sets/72157623741486824/

>> No.979204

I'd consider supporting making translating illegal, but such a law would be useless in the age of the Internet.

>> No.979206
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979206

>>979202

>> No.979208

>>979206
True face of /lit/

>> No.979214

>>979204
0/10

No one can be this retarded

>> No.979218
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979218

>>979202
Jeez.
Who killed this girl's puppy?

>> No.979240

>>979218
The melodrama of an sculpture student at RISD who thinks she understands art.

>> No.979254
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979254

>>979196

>> No.979256

the ideas within a work are more important than its stylistic elements. these can more or less be preserved through the act of translation, and it is also the only way to enjoy some things which would otherwise be impenetrable without years of study

>> No.979306

>>979167
this. who's the rapist and who's the 'rapee'(?)

>>979187
probably you're right... No, not really. Honestly, I got confused with my mother tongue when I got to learn my first and second foreign language intensely (e.g.: reading foreign lit, talking the foreign language 24/7). But once you come back to your mother tongue (reading lit and speaking it a lot), you're much more aware of its peculiarities...

Anyways, thanks for the interesting post, op. (although the initial statement is really the most contemptious thing I've ever read on translating.
Btw: Are there any good books on translating /lit/izens and (probably) fellow academics can recommend?
I know there's one really good philosophical essay by Walter Benjamin on translating. then there's Umberto Eco's experience in translation.
any other good ones?