Critical Translation Theory

This course introduces one of the fastest growing fields of Critical Translation Studies. We will examine the conditions of comparative work across the disciplines of literature, anthropology, philosophy, political theory, and information technology and ask how “value” functions with respect to linguistic and economic circulations and why philological investments in translational/transnational exchange matter to social life and geopolitics. Readings in the first half of the semester center on cultural translation, fetishism, colonial encounter, material and symbolic exchange, and we will pay special attention to the insights that non-literary disciplines bring to bear on the episteme of translation within broadly conceived categories of inscription, materiality, temporality and eventfulness. In the second half, we will examine the ways in which theory and technoscience are mutually embedded in literary modernismand consider where translation stands in relation to the growing hegemony of imperial coding machines.Our goal is to remap the conceptual terrains of translation theories through innovative thinking and critical self-reflection. The seminar serves as the starting point for an open-ended discussion of the methods and aims of critical translation theory and its implications for comparative literature as a discipline.