Articles

Using video and online subtitling to communicate across languages from West Papua

Using video and online subtitling to communicate across languages from West Papua

Alexandra Crosby and Tanya Notley Article first published online: 1 JUN 2014 DOI: 10.1111/taja.12085 The Australian Journal of Anthropology, Vol 25 Issue 2 In this paper we examine mediated practices and experiences of online translation and subtitling. Our paper is based on a collaboration with EngageMedia − a not-for-profit organisation based in Australia and Indonesia − and is specifically focused on its work in West Papua. We argue that the video-hosting and online subtitling that is enabled through EngageMedia's websites, while mobilising West Papuan stories in a logical, relatively fast and organised manner, is embedded in a more messy socially-mediated translation process that occurs across shifting scales (local, national, regional, and global), and a range of cultures (online, offline, local, global, networked).
Rethinking the Art of Subtitles

Rethinking the Art of Subtitles

By Grant Rosenberg/Paris Tuesday, May 15, 2007 Early on in the 2004 supernatural Russian thriller Night Watch, the protagonist, trying to prevent a witch from casting a spell on his unborn child, yells at the top of his lungs in protest. For English-speaking audiences, the subtitles do more than just translate the literal meaning: the words "no" and "stop" with three exclamation points are shown on different parts of the screen in large, moving letters.
On Books in Translation in the American Market

On Books in Translation in the American Market

September 15, 2014 The German Book Office’s Riky Stock spoke to editors and publishers about the factors at play when considering publishing a translation in the US market. By Katharina Rapp Which foreign books are interesting to American publishers? How do they find these books and who is involved in the translation process? What role does translation funding play and how do the sales and marketing departments deal with translated books?
The Poet Cannot Stand Aside: Arabic Literature and Exile

The Poet Cannot Stand Aside: Arabic Literature and Exile

M. Lynx Qualey Fourteen hundred years ago and more, the poet-prince Imru’ al-Qais was banished by his father. The king exiled his son, or so the legend goes, in part because of the prince’s poetry. Thus it was that, when the king was killed by a group of his subjects, al-Qais was traveling with friends. Al-Qais returned to avenge his father’s death, but afterward spent the rest of his life in exile, fleeing from place to place, writing poetry and seeking support to regain his father’s throne.
Interpreting Conflict: Training Challenges in Humanitarian Field Interpreting

Interpreting Conflict: Training Challenges in Humanitarian Field Interpreting

Barbara Moser-Mercer, Leïla Kherbiche and Barbara Class* Journal of Human Rights Practice(2014) 6(1): 140-158. doi: 10.1093/jhuman/hut025 First published online: January 6, 2014 Abstract When communication breaks down, conflict ensues. Resolving conflicts successfully relies heavily on re-establishing communication. Almost all conflicts involve parties who do not speak the same language or share the same culture. Language is the main vehicle of communication under such difficult circumstances, and yet there are few professional interpreters in the field to mediate between languages and cultures.
Cosmopolitanism as Translation

Cosmopolitanism as Translation

Esperança Bielsa Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona, Spain Published in Cultural Sociology, online before print September 2, 2014, doi:10.1177/1749975514546235 Abstract Whereas globalization theory was predominantly silent about the role of translation in making possible the flow of information worldwide, assuming instant communicability and transparency, translation has gained central importance in recent accounts of cosmopolitanism that emphasize global interdependence and the negotiation of difference. In this context, a specification of translation processes provides a way of analysing the form in which interactions between different modernities take place and of specifying a notion of cosmopolitanism as internalization of the other.
“A Bitter Disappointment,” Edward Said on His Encounter with Sartre, De Beauvoir and Foucault

“A Bitter Disappointment,” Edward Said on His Encounter with Sartre, De Beauvoir and Foucault

AUGUST 26, 2014 EUGENE WOLTERS In 1979, Edward Said was invited by Jean-Paul Sartre and Simone de Beauvoir to France for a conference on Middle East peace. It was in the wake of the Camp David Accords that ended the war between Egypt and Israel, that the author of “Orientalism” and ardent supporter of the Palestinian people, was invited to contribute with other prominent thinkers. Said offered effusive praise for Sartre when recounting his adventure, writing for the London Review of Books:
The Case of the Arabic Noirs

The Case of the Arabic Noirs

Pocket Novels: The Exile, J. Kessel, 1940. “A Novel of Human Untruths, about a Russian woman and her princesses, in exile, from the pen of the great French writer J. Kissel,” presumably the French novelist and journalist Joseph Kessel (1898-1979) August 20, 2014 | by Jonathan Guyer Cairo: the metal detector beeps. The security man wears a crisp white uniform. He nods and leans back in his chair. The lobby’s red oriental carpet, so worn it’s barely red, leads upstairs to the hotel tavern.
Institution, Translation, Nation, Metaphor

Institution, Translation, Nation, Metaphor

Lucas Klein LUCAS KLEIN Comparative Literature is defined in part by anxiety about its institutionality. Approaching translations as works of literary scholarship equivalent to our articles and monographs can address this anxiety and also work against the Herderian assumptions of national literatures. Ultimately, the comparison of comparative literature is a metaphorical process, putting it in the same process of negotiated familiarity and strangeness as translation. In this way, institutionalizing translation might help us de-institutionalize our other institutions.