TRANSLATION, CULTURES AND THE MEDIA

Special Issue of EJES, European Journal of English Studies, Volume 12.2

Guest-edited by Elena Di Giovanni and Rita Kothari

The cultural turn in translation studies in the 1990s was both a response to and impulse for many im/perceptible changes in the discipline. The scope of translation was redefined so that the boundaries between the study of translation and other disciplines have come to be increasingly blurred.

 

In this regard, one of the new equations has been between translation and multimedia texts, in Europe and beyond. The diffusion of multimedia texts internationally and along the axis of language and space is creating yet another revolution in translation studies. Even though it has not yet been acknowledged as such, the ‘multimedia turn’ is pushing an increasing number of scholars to turn their attention to the huge traffic generated by interlingual and intercultural adaptations of media products. Although the phenomenal number of cultural encounters which occur through the media, and the prominent role of translation in making them possible, demonstrates the great interdependence of the three domains, the dynamics of cultural interaction, multimedia communication and translation have not hitherto been the object of joint investigation. This issue of EJES seeks, then, to address precisely these dynamics. In short, what role does multimedia translation play (in Europe and beyond) to promote intercultural communication and the mutual understanding of distant cultures, or conversely does it support stereotyped, artificial images of otherness? Possible themes might include: - the translation of images into words or words into images; - the role of translation in helping media form subjectivities - translation of the non-verbal into verbal - media-generated images of the East for the West and West for the East; - the engagement of diasporic communities with multimedia translation for intercultural communication. Contributors are encouraged to discuss a variety of instances of translation which travel through contemporary media (television, cinema and the Internet, but not excluding the literary and its relation to other media) to support the fruitful exchange of cultural images, words and ideas. Detailed proposals of 500-1,000 words, accompanied by a C.V. with details of the authors' publications, should be sent by 15 October to both guest editors: Elena Di Giovanni, Advanced School for Interpreters and Translators, University of Bologna at Forlì, Italy (digiovanni@sslmit.unibo.it) Rita Kothari, Centre for Research in Translation, St. Xavier’s College, India (kotharis@iqara.net) Deadline for submitting finished articles is 31 July 2007.

Posted by The Editors on 9th Apr 2006
in Call for Papers

Go to top of page