Chapter 16 A Comment on Translation Ethics and Education GERARD MCALESTER Peter Newmark has stated that a valid text should among other things be ethically sound. He argues that a text containing words like bent, broad, dusky, yid used pejoratively is thus deficient, and that consequently it is the translator's job to correct or gloss the text. While it is difficult to imagine immediate contexts in which some of these words (for example yid) could be used in any other way than pejoratively, except as citation forms, it is of course the larger context, and particularly the purpose of the translation, that counts. There surely can be no objection to a translator putting such words into the mouth of a character in a work of fiction or drama who is intended by the author to be obnoxious. The innocence of words as forms is amusingly illustrated by Gore Vidal in his (to some tastes pornographic) novel Myron, when he replaces taboo words with the names of justices who supported a Supreme Court ruling that allowed each community the right to decide what is and is not pornography. Thus describing a sex-change operation: ‘This large artifi- cial relinquist was then attached to what had been my - or rather Myra’s — whizzer white.’ (My emphasis.) If a non-fiction text does contain the words cited above in a pejorative sense, then surely the moral question that arises is not so much whether the words should be avoided, improved, or translated with or without a gloss, but whether such a text should be translated at all. This raises the whole question of the moral responsibility of translators for their work. Is the translator morally responsible for the content of the text being translated, and if so to whom? Over the centuries there has been a debate about where the responsibilities or loyalties of the translator should lie - with the author of the source text, the reader of the target text, the com- missioner of the translation? Recently Antony Pym (1997) has suggested that translators’ loyalty lies with the profession to which they belong, and that the value of a translation is the degree to which it contributes to intercultural relations. If this is so, then it can certainly be argued that 22522% Translation Today: Trands and Perspectives translators should not connive in the dissemination of ideas that they regard as reprehensible. Although the meaning is not completely clear, it is perhaps this that the Translator’s Charter (1996) published by the International Federation of Translators is referring to in Clause 3, which states under the General Obligations of the translator that he ‘shall refuse to give a text an interpretation of which he does not approve, or which would be contrary to the obligations of his profession’. In practice, however, the situation is not so simple. A freelance trans- lator perhaps has the luxury of being able to refuse a commission to translate a text which offends her/his principles, but translators who are employed in full-time positions by firms, institutions, or translation. agencies probably cannot do that if they wish to keep their jobs. This kind of situation can perhaps most easily arise ina totalitarian state, where a translator employed in the government service may well be forced to translate texts whose ideological content is obnoxious to her/him or face loss of employment, disgrace, or worse. On the other hand, it is not appropriate in such cases for the rest of the translating community to adopt a holier-than-thou attitude — and the situation comes much nearer home with some of the translated ‘information’ put out by multinational corporations, for example. Of course, the translator is essentially in the same position here as the creator of any product — for example, someone working in a munitions factory. In the case of translators, the situation can be exacerbated because they can easily become associated with the end use to which the product is put when their name is attached to that product. Yet it is not always possible for the translator to know to just what ends their translation will ultimately be put. The same text can be used in very different ways. Mein Kampf can be translated as an informa- tive text to be used by non-German speaking scholars to learn exactly what Hitler wrote. There is nothing reprehensible in this. The same trans- lation can be employed by some neo-Nazi organisation in order to dis- seminate racial hatred. This is obnoxious, but surely the translator cannot be held responsible for the use to which her/his work is ultimately put in such a case? Where translators do knowy, or strongly suspect, that the use to which. the translation will be put conflicts with their principles, then it is up to them to decide whether or not to follow the dictates of their conscience. Insuch circumstances the translator cannot disclaim responsibility for her/ his text (‘Iwas only obeying orders’). Ultimately translators’ responsibility is not to the author, or the reader, or the commissioner, or to the translating. profession but to themselves. One environment where the moral dimension. of translation can, and must, be accorded a more prominent position is in educational institutions that provide translator training, This was brought home to me recently in a translation course I was teaching in my own.A Comment on Translation Ethics and Education 227 university. I had (perhaps rather carelessly) set my students the task of translating a brochure that was distributed to visitors to a nuclear power plant. On deeper examination it turned out that the text, which posed as informative, was in fact a piece of special pleading on behalf of the nuclear energy industry. One of my students, although she did the assignment, commented that in real life she would have refused to translate this text because it conflicted with her own deeply held Green convictions about the dangers to the environment posed by nuclear power. She further commented that, were she employed by a translation agency that had been engaged to translate the brochure, she would be extremely troubled. about having to translate it. I felt that her comments were not only justified but also an important reminder that particularly in education we should not forget the moral aspect of translation. Peter Newmark draws attention at the end of his paper to the conflict in values between the university and the market. It seems to me as one working in a university department of translation studies that academia, too, in an effort to rid itself of its ivory tower image is becoming so obsessed with the values of the market (i.e. with vocational training) that we sometimes forget that there is an ethical aspect contained in the etymology of the word vocation (a calling). It remains one of the fundamental tasks of the university to concern itself with education in the fullest sense. This means that we must aim to educate translators who are not mere automata reproducing the ideas of others, but who are thinking individuals whose ultimate responsibility for what they do is to their own conscience. References Pym, Anthony (1997) Pour une Etique du Tradecteur. Artois: Presses universitaires Artois. The Traslator’s Charter (1996). Paris: FIT.