Lerninhalte |
This class offers a hands-on approach to exploring whether the concept of transculturality can be better defined and understood when seen in relation to translation, a practice which, by definition, accepts the possibility of transformative cultural transfer but which, at the same time, necessarily recognizes the coexistence of distinct languages and cultures, however permeable they may be. Although the course will offer students an introduction to the relation between transcultural studies and translation theory, it primarily seeks to give students practical insight into how translators mediate between cultures, that is to say, how they negotiate between the foreign text and domestic readers in a manner which, ideally, not only transports a text into another culture but also de-centers and desacrilizes the target language in order to open up a space in which the foreign can recognized on its own terms. To gain such practical insight, we will look at numerous English and German translations to determine how translators have dealt with the difficulties of making the foreign understandable. And, most importantly, we will translate relevant German and English texts, both functional and literary, in order to feel the strains of being faithful to two languages and to determine to what extent translation provides an opportunity and site of cultural interaction. |