Representing experiential knowledge: Who may translate whom?

Research output: Contribution to journalComment/debatepeer-review

Abstract

This provocation piece discusses the difficulties of translating texts based on experiential and corporeal knowledge. Personal narratives often comprise such knowledge; therefore, their interpretation and rendering in other languages give rise to some controversial questions. For instance, do we need translators/interpreters with supposedly “analogous” life experiences to source authors/speakers? Who has “the right” to translate/interpret/represent whom? In this contribution, these questions are elaborated on by using the concepts ‘secondary-witness’ and ‘debriefing’, as well as examples from research on translation of childbirth narratives and recent debates in the film industry regarding representation.
Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)84-95
JournalTranslation Studies
Volume14
Issue number1
Early online date10 Dec 2020
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 10 Dec 2020

Keywords / Materials (for Non-textual outputs)

  • representation
  • experiential knowledgeethics
  • ethics
  • translation
  • interpreting

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