Retranslating ‘Kara Toprak’: Ecofeminism revisited through a canonical folk song

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Abstract

This chapter offers a close reading and retranslation of a Turkish folk classic from the twentieth century. The song’s lyrics draw on the trope of the generous and bountiful earth, seemingly with no end to its resources – a trope generally associated in the West with that of Mother Earth and the patriarchal, capitalist oppression and domination of both nature and women, which is heavily criticized by ecofeminist scholars, among others. The song, however, is also rooted in Anatolian mysticism, which runs counter to the artificial split between nature, God and humans associated with the ‘Western’ tradition. The objective of the contribution is to offer an ecological and feminist translation of this poem through the lens of ecofeminism, and in the process, expand the relevance of this particular theoretical framework geographically and temporally.
Original languageEnglish
Title of host publicationUnsettling Translation
Subtitle of host publicationStudies in Honour of Theo Hermans
EditorsMona Baker
Place of PublicationLondon
PublisherRoutledge
Chapter12
Pages180-193
Number of pages14
Edition1
ISBN (Electronic)9781003134633
ISBN (Print)9780367681999, 9780367681968
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 31 May 2022

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