Translational Literature and the Pleasures of Exile

PMLA ◽  
2016 ◽  
Vol 131 (5) ◽  
pp. 1435-1443
Author(s):  
Waïl S. Hassan
Keyword(s):  
Twelfth Century ◽  
The Other ◽  
Translation Theory ◽  
Sacred Text ◽  
Saint Jerome ◽  
Cultural Expressions ◽  
The One ◽  
International Success ◽  
Classical Arabic ◽  
Better Than

The Fundamental Concern in Translation Theory, from Saint Jerome to the Present, has Been the Relation Between a Text and its version in another language. This relation is often conceived in the Platonic terms of original and copy: the original is viewed as sacrosanct (especially when it is a sacred text but also when it is not), while the translation is seen, at best, as imperfect and deficient and, at worst, as an adulteration, a profanation, and a betrayal that is captured in the Italian phrase traduttore traditore. Conversely, that relation has on occasion also been inverted in claims that the translation can be superior to the original—for example, Jorge Luis Borges's famous declaration that “the original is unfaithful to the translation” (239) or, less radically, Gabriel García Márquez's reported remark that Gregory Rabassa's translation of One Hundred Years of Solitude is better than the Spanish original (Rabassa 43). At other times, the relation between original and translation is seen as antagonistic, the one trying to displace the other, or as its heir and only chance of survival. In this view, the original is condemned to death and oblivion because it is written in a dead language, a rival language, or a geopolitically weak language. Think of the phenomenon that Abdelfattah Kilito cites of some classical Arabic texts—such as al-Harīrī‘s Maqāmāt (“Assemblies”), written at the height of Arab civilization's power in the twelfth century—which seem to have been composed in such a way as to render their translation impossible (17-18). By contrast, notes Kilito, some contemporary Arab novelists seem to write with their translators in mind, avoiding difficult language and obscure cultural expressions that may reduce their works’ chances of being translated into English or French, the gateway to international success (19n7).

Bastard Feudalism and the Framing of Thirteenth-Century England

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Peter Coss
Keyword(s):  
Middle Ages ◽  
Thirteenth Century ◽  
Twelfth Century ◽  
The State ◽  
The Other ◽  
Great Work ◽  
Early Middle Ages ◽  
The One ◽  
The Relationship

In the introduction to his great work of 2005, Framing the Early Middle Ages, Chris Wickham urged not only the necessity of carefully framing our studies at the outset but also the importance of closely defining the words and concepts that we employ, the avoidance ‘cultural sollipsism’ wherever possible and the need to pay particular attention to continuities and discontinuities. Chris has, of course, followed these precepts on a vast scale. My aim in this chapter is a modest one. I aim to review the framing of thirteenth-century England in terms of two only of Chris’s themes: the aristocracy and the state—and even then primarily in terms of the relationship between the two. By the thirteenth century I mean a long thirteenth century stretching from the period of the Angevin reforms of the later twelfth century on the one hand to the early to mid-fourteenth on the other; the reasons for taking this span will, I hope, become clearer during the course of the chapter, but few would doubt that it has a validity.

Development of a Single-Code/Default Coding Strategy in Pigeons

2000 ◽  
Vol 11 (3) ◽  
pp. 261-264 ◽  
Author(s):  
Tricia S. Clement ◽  
Thomas R. Zentall
Keyword(s):  
Conditional Discrimination ◽  
The Other ◽  
Matching Accuracy ◽  
Efficient Coding ◽  
Coding Strategy ◽  
One To One ◽  
Retention Intervals ◽  
The Many ◽  
The One ◽  
Better Than

We tested the hypothesis that pigeons could use a cognitively efficient coding strategy by training them on a conditional discrimination (delayed symbolic matching) in which one alternative was correct following the presentation of one sample (one-to-one), whereas the other alternative was correct following the presentation of any one of four other samples (many-to-one). When retention intervals of different durations were inserted between the offset of the sample and the onset of the choice stimuli, divergent retention functions were found. With increasing retention interval, matching accuracy on trials involving any of the many-to-one samples was increasingly better than matching accuracy on trials involving the one-to-one sample. Furthermore, following this test, pigeons treated a novel sample as if it had been one of the many-to-one samples. The data suggest that rather than learning each of the five sample-comparison associations independently, the pigeons developed a cognitively efficient single-code/default coding strategy.

Bodily Adornment and Modification in Byzantium

2021 ◽  
pp. 98-116
Author(s):  
Alicia Walker
Keyword(s):  
Visual Culture ◽  
Twelfth Century ◽  
Church And State ◽  
The Other ◽  
Material Sources ◽  
Other Hand ◽  
Byzantine Church ◽  
The One ◽  
And Control

Focusing on Early and Middle Byzantine (fourth-to-twelfth-century) objects, images, and texts, this essay explores the tension between, on the one hand, efforts of the Byzantine church and state to discourage and control bodily adornment and modification and, on the other hand, the extensive evidence of widespread and immoderate engagement with these practices. The enhancement and manipulation of Byzantine bodies is considered as both a real and a metaphoric phenomenon. Evidence culled from secular and sacred, written and material sources demonstrates the importance of bodily adornment and modification to our understanding of Byzantine material and visual culture.

The translator’s immobility

Target ◽  
2009 ◽  
Vol 21 (2) ◽  
pp. 333-357 ◽  
Author(s):  
Paola Venturi
Keyword(s):  
Theory And Practice ◽  
The Other ◽  
Target Language ◽  
Translation Theory ◽  
The One

Translations are facts of target cultures, but the perceived status of source texts has a bearing on how these are reflected or refracted in the target language. This proposition is particularly evident in the case of classics: when translators have to work on literary creations occupying a pivotal position in the source/target cultures, they adopt strategies of literalness and ennoblement which betray a quasi-religious awe—on the one hand, a desire to ruffle the surface of the revered original as little as possible; and on the other, a determination to reproduce the supposed ‘classical qualities’ of the classic even when they are not present in the source. In the following article, I examine how the ‘idea of classic’ influences translation theory and practice, substantiating my theoretical observations by looking at Italian translations of English classics. A marked—and historically determined—disparity between source and target readerships, and the translators’ reverence for their prestigious originals, conspire to produce Italian versions which are much more ‘wooden’ and ‘elegant’ than their English counterparts.

The Economics of Health and Migration

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Osea Giuntella ◽  
Timothy J. Halliday
Keyword(s):  
Healthcare Quality ◽  
The Other ◽  
Positive Health ◽  
Mortality Risks ◽  
Economics Of Health ◽  
And Migration ◽  
The One ◽  
Successive Generations ◽  
Migration And Health ◽  
Better Than

Migration and health are intimately connected. It is known that migrants tend to be healthier than non-migrants. However, the mechanisms for this association are elusive. On the one hand, the costs of migration are lower for healthier people, thereby making it easier for the healthy to migrate. Empirical evidence from a variety of contexts shows that the pre-migration health of migrants is better than it is for non-migrants, indicating that there is positive health-based selection in migration. On the other hand, locations can be viewed as a bundle of traits including but not limited to environmental conditions, healthcare quality, and violence. Each of these can impact health. Evidence shows that moving from locations with high mortality to low mortality can reduce mortality risks. Consistent with this, migration can increase mortality risk if it leads to greater exposure to risk factors for disease. The health benefits enjoyed by migrants can also be found in their children. However, these advantages erode with successive generations.

scholarly journals PETER COMESTOR'S LECTURES ON THE GLOSSA “ORDINARIA” ON THE GOSPEL OF JOHN THE BIBLE AND THEOLOGY IN THE TWELFTH-CENTURY CLASSROOM

Traditio ◽  
2016 ◽  
Vol 71 ◽  
pp. 203-234 ◽  
Author(s):  
ALEXANDER ANDRÉE
Keyword(s):  
Twelfth Century ◽  
Gospel Of John ◽  
Academic Discipline ◽  
The Other ◽  
Close Reading ◽  
The Bible ◽  
Traditional Account ◽  
Glossa Ordinaria ◽  
The One ◽  
Alternative Understanding

The traditional account of the development of theology in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries is that the emerging “academic” discipline of theology was separated from the Bible and its commentary, that the two existed on parallel but separate courses, and that the one developed in a “systematic” direction whereas the other continued to exist as a separate “practical” or “biblical-moral” school. Focusing largely on texts of an allegedly “theoretical” nature, this view misunderstands or, indeed, entirely overlooks the evidence issuing from lectures on the Bible — postills, glosses, and commentaries — notably the biblical Glossa “ordinaria.” A witness to an alternative understanding, Peter Comestor, master and chancellor of the cathedral school of Paris in the second half of the twelfth century, shows that theology was created as much from the continued study of the Bible as from any “systematic” treatise. Best known for his Historia scholastica, a combined explanation and rewrite of the Bible focusing on the historical and literal aspects of sacred history, Comestor used the Gloss as a textbook in his lectures on the Gospels both to elucidate matters of exegesis and to help him deduce doctrinal truth. Through a close reading of Comestor's lectures on the Gospel of John, this essay reevaluates the teaching of theology at the cathedral school of Paris in the twelfth century and argues that the Bible and its Gloss stood at the heart of this development.

New Perspectives on Rosa Luxemburg’s Critique of Global Capitalism

2012 ◽  
Vol 11 (1) ◽  
pp. 27-37 ◽  
Author(s):  
Peter Hudis
Keyword(s):  
Foreign Trade ◽  
Economic Crisis ◽  
Capital Accumulation ◽  
Global Capitalism ◽  
First Century ◽  
The Other ◽  
Internal Dynamic ◽  
Capitalist Development ◽  
The One ◽  
Better Than

AbstractThe global economic-financial downturn has given new impetus to a re-examination of Rosa Luxemburg’s writings on capitalist accumulation and economic crisis, which pinpointed the central contradiction of capitalism in its drive for global expansion. In this article I critically engage Luxemburg’s theory of capital accumulation and crisis by evaluating it in comparison with the central categories of Volumes One and Two of Marx’sCapitalon the one hand, and the quest for an alternative to capitalism in the twenty-first century on the other. I argue that Marx’s procedure in Volume Two ofCapital, in which he abstracts from realization crises and foreign trade in order to discern the “law of motion” of capital freed from secondary and tertiary considerations, captures the internal dynamic of capitalist development and crises far better than its Keynesian and neo-Keynesian alternatives.

For-the-record aesthetics and Robert Johnson's blues style as a product of recorded culture

Popular Music ◽  
2006 ◽  
Vol 26 (1) ◽  
pp. 65-81 ◽  
Author(s):  
ERIC W. ROTHENBUHLER
Keyword(s):  
Historical Context ◽  
The Other ◽  
Musical Culture ◽  
Professional Musician ◽  
The 1960S ◽  
The One ◽  
Two Bodies ◽  
Better Than

Robert Johnson (1911–1938) is the most venerated of all pre-war blues musicians; the veneration borders on hagiography. Recently published revisionist literature has constructed a sociologically realistic portrayal of a professional musician working among other musicians for a contemporary audience in a specific historical context. This has left unexplained, however, the veneration granted to his music by the audience for his records from the 1960s to today. This paper presents the case that these two bodies of fact can be connected and the one serve as an explanation for the other. As Robert Johnson learned his craft from records and radio, and polished his songs to be recorded, he effectively developed a ‘for-the-record’ aesthetic that made his music sound different to that of his Delta contemporaries and many others who used musical techniques honed in performance for an audience. Decades later, when a ‘for-the-record’ aesthetic was the taken-for-granted standard in popular musical culture, Robert Johnson's records sounded better than those of his contemporaries, and the audience from the 1960s to today has had a reason to think that he and his music were special.

Philip of Harvengt and Anselm of Havelberg: The Premonstratensian Vision of Time

1993 ◽  
Vol 62 (4) ◽  
pp. 483-493
Author(s):  
Carol Neel
Keyword(s):  
Twelfth Century ◽  
The Other ◽  
Religious Groups ◽  
Religious Reform ◽  
The Past ◽  
Recent Scholarship ◽  
The One

During the past two decades, a spate of interpretive studies has addressed the spirituality of regular canons in the twelfth century. Caroline Bynum'sDocere Verbo et Exemplo, most notably, has established that there was a distinctive canonical perspective on medieval religious reform. In Bynum's work in particular, the works of two Augustinian canons of the Order of Prémontré, Anselm of Havelberg (d. 1158) and Philip of Harvengt (d. 1183), figure importantly. Both Anselm and Philip—the one a bishop on the Slavic frontier and the other abbot of a double community in Brabant—were prominent apologists for their order's place among a proliferation of new religious groups. But recent scholarship has so far suggested no particular community of ideas between these two eminent twelfth-century Premonstratensians. Nor, more generally, has the ideology and spirituality of canons of their order, founded in 1121 by the Belgian nobleman Norbert of Xanten, been set clearly apart in more than name from the thought and practice of other groups of contemporary Augustinians.

scholarly journals What’s Modern in Chinese Translation Theory? Lu Xun and the Debates on Literalism and Foreignization in the May Fourth Period

2003 ◽  
Vol 14 (2) ◽  
pp. 195-223 ◽  
Author(s):  
Leo Tak-hung Chan
Keyword(s):  
Foreign Language ◽  
Chinese Language ◽  
Historical Context ◽  
The Other ◽  
Original Text ◽  
Translation Theory ◽  
Lu Xun ◽  
Chinese Translation ◽  
The One ◽  
Classical Language

Abstract This article attempts to assess the contribution of Chinese translators and theorists of the twenties and thirties, in particular the famous writer Lu Xun, whom I consider the first modern translation theorist in China. It is with him that China entered its modern phase in translation. Not only did he advocate retaining the foreignness of the original text, in a way reminiscent of the entire tradition of German Romantic translation theorists from Schleiermacher to von Humboldt to Goethe; he also explored in his own translations the possibilities for enriching the Chinese language through the importation of Europeanized structures and expressions. It is these foreignizing impulses that set Lu Xun apart most clearly from pre-modern Chinese theorists. At the same time, these impulses connect him with leading giants of translation theory like Nabokov and Benjamin (who emphasized the importance of the literal method in translation) on the one hand, and Venuti and Holmes (who highlighted processes of indigenization and exoticization in translation) on the other. Lu Xun’s ideas had a particular place in the wider cultural and historical context. Views similar to his had been advocated by his predecessors at the beginning of the century, whose attempt to Europeanize the classical language did not, unfortunately, find a large following. In his own time, Lu found ardent supporters among friends and colleagues who either (a) suggested thorough Europeanization, or (b) preferred limited Europeanization. Dissenting views, however, were clearly voiced by some of the other leading writers of the day. So there were (a) those who favored the use of a language based on the actual words spoken by the populace and (b) those who queried why one should not learn a foreign language and read the original instead. My article deals at length with the debates among these theorists and seeks to understand them from the perspective of contemporary Western translation theory.

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