Lawrence Venuti: The scandals of translation (Towards an ethics of

difference)
I've read a book titled The scandals of translation by Lawrence Venuti. In his book, he
represents an examination, a research of the marginalization of translation and
translation studies by the current ruling social and political powers (mostly UK and US).
At the very beginning of his book he points out that the scandals of translation are
cultural, economic and political. He then continues that the translation nowadays is
stigmatized as a form of writing, discouraged by copyright law, depreciated by the
academy, exploited by publishers and corporations, governments and religious
organizations. His goal through the book was to expose these scandals of translation,
find the practices that contribute to the marginal status of translation, examine ethical
questions and improve the current thinking about translation.
He also talks about the strategic focus on the marginality of translation and that it can be
assumed that a study of the periphery in any culture can illuminate and ultimately revise
the center. Here he talks about the relationship or a cross-cultural exchange between
dominant cultures over developing cultures.
The book is divided into eight chapters, or we could also say factors that are crucial for
the marginalization of translation and need to be reformed. These eight factors are:
heterogeneity, authorship, copyright, the formation of cultural identities, the pedagogy
of literature, philosophy, the bestseller and globalization.
In his first chapter – HETEROGENEITY, he questions himself about the theorist's
capability of bringing translation to the attention of a larger audience. This concern
guides his own theory and practice of translation and he later on discusses some of the
characteristics of a good translation. A good translation is demystifying (»it manifests in
its own language the foreignness of the foreign text«) and a good translation is also
minoritizing (»it releases the remainder by cultivating a heterogeneous discourse,
opening up the standard dialect and literary canons to what is foreign to themselves, to
the substandard and the marginal«). A good translation is also the one that adheres to
the current standard dialect, while avoid any dialect or register or style that calls
attention to words as words, to present translation as readable (fluent translation). He
then also points out the concept of remainder that is left over in a sense (here we talk
about the transition of the foreign language into domestic language) that gives evidence
to what degree a translated text has retained or lost his original form. He shows us that
the foreign languages remain intact when remainder is retained.
He also points out his preference about translating foreign texts that possess minority
status in their cultures. This preference is based on a political agenda that is broadly
democratic: an opposition to the global hegemony of English (English is the most
translated language worldwide but at the same time one of the least translated into).
In the second chapter he defines AUTHORSHIP as originality, self-expression in a unique
text and at the same time points out that translation is derivative and not unique
because it imitates another text. He questions himself whether the translator should
take over the role of the new author and make new literary text or should he stay
invisible and let the original speak through the translated text. Here rises a problem of
academic community not wanting to acknowledge or approve the translated text but
they rather assume that the translated work is actually an original (translation is
ignored and rarely considered as a form of literary scholarship, it does not constitute a
qualification for an academic appointment in a particular field or area of literary study).
He also talks about scholar's »Don't-tread-on-my-path« attitude when texts of foreign
literature are translated by non-specialists. They correct errors in conformity with
scholarly standards and interpretations. That means that academic specialists or
scholars can reject any new interpretation of a specific work because it does not
coincide with a particular translated text. There is a blurred distinction between the
translation and the original authorship. He talks about double allegiance to the foreign
text and the domestic culture. So translation is scandalous because it crosses national
and also institutional boundaries.
In the third chapter on COPYRIGHT he talks about translators translating for cultural
and political reasons. Even though the translator has freedom, at the same time he/she
has the least legal freedom and little or even no economic incentive. Publishers and
capitalists control output of translations and shape cultural developments at home and
abroad (an increasing trend has been to invest in the translation of foreign works
because dramatic or film adoption promise wider reader recognition and greater sales).
So although translations have a high cultural value they have a low profit value and this
means little value to the publisher. The only way the status of translation will change is if
the legal status of translator and translated texts get clarified and improved.
In next chapter he examines the enormous power in constructing representations of
foreign cultures. He shows that the colonizers' ruthless effort to force English literacy
upon its conquered population has actually worked against the colonizer.
In his chapter on PEDAGOGY OF LITERATURE he shows his disapproval of the academic
community's massive contribution to the marginalization of translation. He again points
out the importance of English language as the most translated language worldwide, but
at the same time one of the least translated into. The marginality of translation reaches
even to educational institutions, where it is manifested in a scandalous contradiction: he
claims that scholars knowingly neglected translation studies, even though a big amount
of their classes are based on translated texts. He then adds that studying translation can
make students more aware of the domestic interests to which any translation submits
the reader, as well as the foreign text.
In the next chapter scholars have claimed that philosophy is a scientific language based
on logical formulations and that is why the translation as such is accurate because of its
scientific nature. [He then says that philosophical translation should become more
literary so as to release an appropriate domestic remainder for foreign concepts and
discourses. At the same time translators are required to respond creatively to the
stylistic pressures exerted by the philosophical project of concept formation]. For the
translator a more literary approach turns the philosophical translation into minor
literature within the literature of philosophy. The experimental translation creates a
philosophical language that challenges the domestic hierarchy of philosophical
languages.
Another factor in the current marginality of translation is its tenuous economic value.
Publishers keep the volume of translation low because such books are financially risky.
In his book he is criticizing an American academy, more precisely on American
publishers and scholars for their ignorance and neglect and marginalization od
translation studies. He is trying to point out that they should depart from their ethics
and sameness and adopt a new ethics of difference.