The Caribbean in Translation

Translating African thought and literature: postcolonial glottopolitics

“…But, of course, it is difficult to disentangle what is strictly linguistic from what is strictly cultural; and it is equally important to stress that these limitations, whatever they might be and imply (culturally, linguistically, and politically), are never absolute, for translation need not be conceived of as a servile exercise: the act of translation “allows a measure of linguistic experimentation and innovation and highlights the polyvalencies and plurivocities of the source text” (Bandia 2008: 239). Translating and thinking about the multifaceted implications of translation force us to examine the boundaries between the vernacular and the universal; reconsider the place of notional centres and their peripheries; and, significantly, envisage the possibility of other translational connections between some peripheries and other peripheries (Saint-Loubert 2017). Translation is a process “calling into question the politics of canonization and moving resolutely away from ideas of universal literary greatness” (Bassnett and Trivedi 2002: 2).…”

“…Colonial violence, as examined by the contributors to this special issue on “Translating African thought and literature”, has had long-term effects on language usages and global translational practices and the consolidation of what the French literary scholar Pascale Casanova (2007) called the “Greenwich Meridian of Literature” in The World Republic of Letters (on this notion in a translational context, see Saint-Loubert 2017: 205–6). Indeed, ethnic violence and identity politics can often be traced in linguistic determinism and chauvinism.…”