This is about people, not texts — a translator ethics secks to embrace the intercultural identity of the translatory subject, init fll arcay of possible actions Based on seminars originally given atthe Collége International de Philosophie in Paris, this translation from French has been fully revised by the author and extended to include ertical commentaries on activist translation theory, non-professional translation, interventionist practices, and the impact of new Se eee een eae into the way mediators can actively create cooperation between cultures, ee ee eee eee ea ‘one should translate or not translate, how much translators should charge, ‘or whose side they should be on, Cd et cee ei ono erat Oa Caenaea Tenia kee Uy BENJAMINS hee A Meee Eels Ethics Peery 7 ee Anthony Pym Translated by Heike Walker Revised and updated by the author - —N a > a eo) Ey LIBRARY(On Translator EthicsBenjamins Translation Library (BTL) “he Benjnins Tain Libary (BTL) sms stint earch nnn in “ana interpreting Sues taken ery boul to encompass the many difient : formsand manifestation oftansatonal phenomena, among he ural tanto, On Translator Ethics Inala, dapton erry tanton,specined renation, aos ‘raion, sil deipion tanscreaton, wensedng conference nerpreing nd ‘interpreting in comounity settings inthe spoken and signed modalities. Principles for mediation between cultures Foran vera book bled nth srs plas se haps comtntleg a Anthony Pym BST Surhsertes, Universitat Rovira i Vir ‘Te Eo Solfo Taaton Sue 5) Sues a pblion chanel hn be Lert opine EST famalon a frum rhe toned ‘rpg eet cometh proms ne ends nrc ge more buy young sch we, plc ew seach nto ko ssl {document from EST, and eiucs clasical work in translation studs which do not ‘A version of Pour une éthique du traducteur ‘st in Englh r which are now ot of rn. ‘Translated by Heike Walker Revised and updated by the author General Editor Associate Editor Honorary Editor ‘Yes Gambier Miriam Shlesinger Gideon Toury ‘Translated and edited with assistance j Univers of ark Baran Univers ael_— Te Avy University cae Rida Wetite fod sili scholeslp | Advisory Board SZ Rosemary Anjo aan femarovd shee simon inghamion Universty Charles Univers of Prague Cond Uniesy ; Nipa INSTITUTE Michel Cronin ‘let Krug Sena Tahle Gorcaglar FOR MINICALSCHOL | Dublin iy Universty ——_UNISA, South Alea Boga Univesity sPannniiae Baste | Disk Delaastta John Mikon Maria Tymossko UNDE (Unive of Sun) Univers of So Paulo Universi of Masschusets| j Danie Gile Frans Pochacker ares Universit Farie3-Soronne Univers Vienna Lawrence Vet ‘Nowell Antony Pym ‘Tempe Uaiersy Amparo Hurtado Albie ——aiverstat Ros Vig Michaela Wolf Universitat Anbnomsde Ra Rabadén Univers af Gr Barons Univers of Lad Volume 104 Cn Tiandator Bhi. Principles for mediation between curs John Benjamins Publishing Company bby Anthony Amsterdam Philadelphia yy Anthony nlsz!" The paper ued in thi pabication meets the minimum requlrements of Othe American National Standard for Information Sciences Permanence of Pape for Printed Library Materials, ans 23948-1984, ary of Congres Cataloging in-Paiaton Data Fy Anton Pour one hig dada Exh) ‘Onan ac: peor mediation between cakes Antony Pym. em (Beran Tati Libvar 980929796; 200 lon sinar gal ge the Clg trations de Posie in Fas html oF seen ily eva by te tho, ncaer iogrape rere nine 1 Talaingen iepating Morland apc. Tae Prosaoen 302 rsa 7224s (Hb sak paper) sm ar890 7070097 CE) © 2013 John Benamins [No pat of this book may be reproduced in any form, by rit, photopsint, mlcrofm oF any ‘other ans, without writen permision from the publisher. Job Benjamins Publishing Co.» PO. Box 36224» 020 me Amsterdam The Netherlands Joa Benjamins North Ameria RO. Box 37519 Philadelphia ra 1938-019 Usa “The duels began, but since the ground was clready litered with carcasses and corpses, they could only move with dificulty,and when they could reach each other they had to use insults. The important thing was the degree and intensity of. the insult, since depending on whether it was mortally offensive just wounding, ‘medium oF light, a diffrent response was required, lest implacable hate be passed ‘down to future generations. So the important hing was to understand each other, wwiich is no easy thing between Moors and Christians, with so many languages ‘on both sides. If you wete insulted and could not understand it, what you could do? You just had to accept it, and perhaps be disgraced for lif. So at this tage fof the fight, in came the interpreters. They vere fast-moving troops, with light Weapons, some mounted on horses they spun around, catching insults on the fy and immediately rendering them into the language ofthe recipient. ~ Khar as-su! - Dung worm! - Mushrild ~ Sozo! ~ Moro! - Escalvao! ~ Marra = (Hijo de puta! ~ Zabalkan! ~ Exrons! Both sides had tacitly greed that the interpreters should not be Klled, Halo Calvino, I enaler inesstente (our translation)‘Table of contents Acknowledgements x Introduction 1 In-betweens 3 “The risks of rereading Schlelermacher 13 Binarism in translation theory 4 Metaphors and their strategies 16 Belonging or “the finest line” 17 Blendling and related terms 21 "The good translator according to Schleiermacher 24 “The exclusion of Blendlinge 26 “The logic of eitherlox” 29 ‘Trandators a Blendlinge 30 Update: Venuti reads Schleiermacher 32 Messengers x The tale of Sperhis and Bulls 38 ‘Things and if in Herodotus 39 Survival happiness and individualism 44 Jacobi defends the Spartans 45 Hegel eesponds 48 ‘Theresponse tothe satrap 49 Kersey decision 51 Hlements for an imtercutural decision 53 Why the translator sore hana messenger 56 Update: Mona Baker and the puity ofthe esse 57‘vit Oa Tanltr Ethics: Princpes fr Mediation ween Cultures “Table of contents conarre 3 Professionals? ‘The translation form 6 Responsibility asthe basis of ethics 67 ‘Translators responsibility within thelr own space 68 ‘his space alls fora particular ethies 69 “The translators not just anybody 70 “Three spaces forthe exclusivity of the transator 72 ‘Translation: the act of translating 74 ‘Translation: completed text 74 Concretized translation: text received as such 75, Responsibility ina historical example 76 Responsibility tothe matter 76 Responsibility tothe client 77 Responsibility tothe profession 75 Update: Professionalism in an age of democratic technology ccuarran 4 Interveners Context and agency 87 “The four causes 89 Favoring the source 91 Favoring purpose 93 avoring form 95 Favoring the translator 97 Responsibility and multiple causation 100 “The ideal moment Should I tansate? 102 An ethics for translators, im the plural 103 Update: Translation Sociology and the revolutionary subject cuapren 5 Missionaries What isnot negotiable 109 “The importance of Nida 110 ‘Thrvecrtics 2 ‘A Bible translator complains 112 Apoet complains 16 Anacademic complains 18 All things tall people 120 6 8 109 Involvement 122 Conclusions i partial defence of Nida 123, ‘Update: Spivak and doing more than translate 124 ccnarran 6 ‘Agents of cooperation ‘A question of effort 133, Collective effort 135 A model of cooperation 136 “The imits of cooperation 139 ‘Transaction cost analysis 140 ‘Translation as transaction cost 142 ‘The cost of translation and the importance of cultural stakes ‘Translation as a means of controlling tansuction costs 144 ‘Trandlation cost and knovledge-use 145 ‘Transaction costs and ethical aims 146 ‘Trust asa cost-saving measure 146 Respect for the other 147 Happiness 147 [Negative ethics and the reduction of mbunderstandings 148 Answers to some basic questions 150 Does the translator negotiate? 50 How much should the translator charge? 151 ‘Whose side isthe translator on? 353 ‘Translation and language learning 155, Again: the interests ofthe tranelator 156 Fear of commerce 157, ‘Update: The risks of seeking cooperation through intervention 159 ccuarren7 Principles for translator ethics “The passing of generations and the widening of translation References Index cy 3 165 169 a 183Acknowledgements My frst thanks go to Heike Waller, who rendered the Prench version of this text info beautiful Canadian English and whose good work Ihave trodden over with far to many subsequent additions and revisions, for which my sincere apologies. T would like to thank all those who havo helped me in this work over the years, especially Jean-René Ladmiral, who was welcoming both before and ater the seminar in Pars, and Armin Paul Frank, who opened up several paths for the Schleiermacher text. have fond memories and great respect for Nicholas “Tertulian, whose seminats on German philosephy I attended asa doctoral student {in Paris in the 1980s, Profesor Tertulian introduced me to the story of Sperthias, ‘nd Bulisin its German context and, more prfoundly led meto Lukes. My grati- tude also goes to some invaluable intermediaries: to Debbie Folaron forthe news from Quebec, and Kyriaki Kourou for checking Herodotus. The basic research forthe original French version ofthis book would not have been possible without the financial assistance ofa research grant from the Humboldt Foundation in 1992-94 and the hospitality uf de Special Research Center on Literary Tranation st Gottingen University in Germany. The English translation of the text has ben efited from the support ofthe Nida Insitute fr Biblical Scholarship, particularly Phil Towner, Charles House, James Maxey, and Eric Yost. In recognition ofthat support, have been pleased to add a chapter on the work of the Bible scholar and translation theorist Eugene Nida, although Ihasten to add that the Nida Institute has made no request for that chapter and hasin no way attempted to influence the nature of my work (no doubt much tothe chagrin ofa few conspiracy theorist). Invaluable critical comments have been received from the Nida Institute, Yves ‘Gambier, andthe various reviewers ofthe French version of this text (mentioned in the Introduction). he criticisms have beea well received, even when profound disagreements remain ~ Ihave given plenty of criticism in my time, and freely accept the same, in the spirit of intellectual éebate. Tam grateful to the following people and institutions forthe various permis- sions that have enabled this book: ~ To Artois Presses Université for generously assigning the translation rights to(0» Traslator Bice Principles for Mediation between Cltres, ~ Tothe journal Translation and Literature and particularly Stuart Gillespie for [permission to reproduce pars of my text “Schleieemacher and the Problem of BBlendinge? reworked here as the “update” to Chapter ~ To the Université per stranieri di Siena and LIT Verlag for permission to re- produce parts of my paper “The translator as non-author, and Iam sorry about that” (Pym 2010b), reworked here asthe beginning of Chapter 3 = To the journal Localisation Focus and the Centre for Next Generation Localisation (CNGL) for permission to reproduce Figure 1 “Possible loal- ization workflow integrating paraprofessional translators” from Carson- Berndsen etal. (2010:60). ~ To Christian Balliu and Jean-Marie Van Der Meerschen at Editions du Hazard, Brussels, for permission to reproduce parts of my paper “All things to all people. On Nida and involvement” (Pym 20094), which has become the basis ‘of Chapter 5, = To Ahmad Ayyad for permission to reproduce parts of the a Roadmap for Peace translations (Ayyad and Pym 2012). ~ ToJohn Benjamins Publishing for permission to reproduce Figure2 “Compar: {son of translation and language learning as transaction cost ver time! from Pym 20046, ysis ofthe ‘The opinions expressed in this book ae evidently my oven and do not reflect the views ofthe people or institutions mentioned above Introduction “This text reworks sees of talks I gave at the Collie International de Philosophie in Paris in March 1994, ten yeas after the seminar on “Translation and the Letter” seminal in every sense, given atthe same institution by Antoine Berman. At the time I was a peshaps-still-young scholar completing postdoctoral research in Gottingen, Germany, I had no claim to fame, and certainly no right to compare ‘myself no matter how implicitly to Berman, who had ded in 1991. remain grate~ fal to the Collie, and to its director at that tine, Jacques Derrida, forgiving me the chance to speak, and I am stil fairly sure that the opportunity was due more to the intellectual intrigues of my topic, transition, than to anything I personally, had to ay. "Now, in 2012, things are perhaps lite ferent. Part of my gratitude unfor~ tunately goes to those who are no longer with us (Derrida passed away in 2004); I no longer fel any pressing need to position myself in terms of French thought; it no longer seems quite so urgent to upset te conventional wisdom of ides re (ies — we ysow old “The French version of thistextcame out in 1997. I'sold well enough but never ‘ined stats a a serious statement in intellectual terms (despite much-appreci~ sted critical reviews by Alexis Nous, Daniel Smeoni, Sebnem Bahadir and Henri -Meschonnie) In seeking the ethics ofa profession, ofthe translator asa profes- sional subject, put myself a coision coure with alot of armchair philosophy. “That perhaps crossed too many battle-lins inscribed not justin French thought, ‘but more profoundly in the French language: professional concerns are tradition: ally the stulf of déontolgie, roughly "codes ofethics” which is held to operatein a ‘uit different dimension from the mare philesophicaléthique, where intellectuals strike elegiac poses and pronounce noble prinsiples concerning solidarity, human ity, plurality, opennes, justice, and sometimesa few human rights to things equally as abstract. For example, déontologi could talk about commerce and quantities (e.g. how much a mediator should be paid) hique generally would not (a ifin & ‘world of pure qualities). That distinction was not one I wanted to make, and iti still distinction tha this text consciously refuses. The results that some readers will nevitably think this book talks about two diferent things: the fist chapters for philosophy and éthigue, the last chapters for professionalism and dontolagi.(On Trasator Bhi Principles for Medlation between Cures Introduction ‘My intention, despite that progression, has been more simply to tll about the translator’ professionalism in philosophical terms ‘A certain unity in the project might come from the repeated use of "extreme casestudies ~ sometimes tel, sometimes more fictional, bt the difference does ‘not matter much. This has been traditional enough as a method of ingury in philosophical ethics, where great negative examples or even traditional paradoxes, ‘commonly serve as ideological orientation for intellectuals if Hitler did some- thing then itis unethical if Nelson Mandela sai it, then it stands a much bet- ter chance of passing muster ~ all our professional cultures are oriented by such ‘extreme examples. Meschonnic was particularly disparaging of this methodol- ‘ogy:".al because ‘Nazi translator’ ofan American negationst ext was sued...” (20071201140). Ire fellow such dismissive sareasm, the extreme examples would ‘be opposed to something like everyday life, asf the extreme test case had nothing tall to do withthe humdrum dally practice ofthe vast majority of translators, “The evident danger of that opposition is that, in refusing to analyze and draw lessons from the extreme cases, we force ourselves ether to quantify the masses, thus reducing ethics ether to descriptive sociology, oto no more than our per- sonal assumptions about "the translator” (asf we knew them all), or indeed about “poetics” in the case of Meschonnic (as if hythms were enough forall) In the second cas, the non-empirical ideology of practice riske doing nothing but re cycle prejudices, without any complication on the basis of evidence. In the present project Tscek to break with at dies ~ withthe choice between sociological empiricism and the outpouring of presupposition - by working and reworking the extreme cases, pursuing their complesity, drawing ou the human quandaries, ‘This methodology hopefully escapes the reductionism by which “if Mandela did It it was good; if Hitler didi, it was bad” The method consciously thickens the ‘case studies ~ sometimes quite perversely so particularly through comparing ‘numerous readings and adopting range of epistemological standpoints, to evince complex humanity. IFthere are deceptively simple principles that can eventually ‘be applied to everyday practic, then they must carry with them the scars of the intellectual struggles they took to achieve In adopting this method, more than anything els, have sought to overcome the polemical distinction Antoine Berman made between his ovn philosophi- ‘al ethics and professional practice. Berman saw that his seminars occasionally {g8ve rise to what he criticized as ‘persistent misunderstandings, especially with ‘some participants who were professional translators” (1984:35), with quotation ‘marks around the word “profesional” The tone, and the quotation marks, were ‘ot to surprising coming from Berman. His principles were decidedly not those ofthe professional translator: he was questioning, rightly, the many apparent ce. ‘ainties that attach themselves to this term “professional.” Berman tried to use philosophical discourse to mave beyond the endemic principles of commercial ‘aims; he sought to raise questions that the professionals simply did not see a5 ‘questions. One might imagine a short dialogue: — Respect the integrity and exactitude ofthe foreign expression? Nosir, wedon't do that ~ we improve texts, to make them sound bette, since that’s what our clients want But we must recive the foreigner asa foreigner; we must open our culture to the other; we must cease to impose our vice on the rest ofthe world. We must give our clients and readers the high professional standards they demand, We are translators, not border-geards or shapers of French culture And if you were a professional translator [they always say that; they always “assume that theorists have never translate professionally), ifyou were inthe real world [professionals love that expression too}, you would know what we talking about ‘And soon, ‘Now, what if those kinds of misunderstandings were in some way due tothe academic, abstract nature of Berman’ ethics oto intellectual ethics in general? Berman broadly defended foreignizing translations of great literary or philosophi- cal works, but what if there were actually relatively few professionals working in ‘uch field, or even interested in such strategies? In seeking to open translators to questions on a wis level, academic discourse ofthis kind paradoxically risks prodiacing a narrow, marginal ethics: that ofthe academic. That paradox is surely ‘ot sufficient reason to drag entre professions into quotation marks, into a sort of non-authentic, socially degraded activity. Berman's was not ~ and he did not intend it to be ~ an ethics of the profession. He had little to say about the com ‘mercial considerations that inform most professional activity; his wasan ethics for translators with alternative means of support In that context, the prime aim of my ‘own seminars was to show that commerce also had to be part of ethical thought. If not, how was philosophy ever going to dalogue with the profession? And to ‘ada insult injury, was quite prepared to draw on much the same philosophical tradition as Berman himself, denying the implicit authority of Germanic thought. “The attempt certainly filed: the resulting principles were too commercial forthe academics, and the discussions were simply oo dificult forthe professional. But it was made nevertheless "Now, many yeas later, ina different language and a new communicative situ ation, my doubts goin almost the opposite rection, The professionals that were ‘once self-confident enough to reject academic criteria are now facing another threat, this time from technology. Free online data-based machine translation ‘now enables almost everyone to produce a translation of some kinds electronic(On Trantor Ethics Peacpls for Mediation between Cultures, social networking is enabling a wide range of volunteers to engage in collective ‘translation projects (collaborative translation," "community translation’ “crowd sourcing” and other names). My discussion of commerce might once have un ambiguously offered to defend the translation professions now, however, we have to address a far wider range of translation activities; we have to recognize that the translator is often not a “professional translator.” This opens up new terrain for ethical inquiry. The discussion of commerce still very relevant, but we now have to recognize that the kind of value for which effort is exchanged isnot just «economic: translators also work, legitimately, for value ofa social, symbolic, and cultural kind (we take the categories from Bourdieu, eg 1972/1977) The sense ‘of the term “professional” has to be reconsidered, as do the assumptions of fall- time dedication to the task, or some kind of exclusive competence. I have thus shifed from an “ethics ofthe translator” which would normally translate the tile ofthe French book (Pour une éhigue du traducteur), to “translator ethics? intended to embed the notion of “ating as translator” more fully into the mode of ethical thought itself rather than stand there as an external abject about with this just happens to talk That syntactic shift is perhaps not as eloquent as 1 ‘would like, but it does respond toa significant ses change in the problematic 1 want to address. In addition to upsetting philosopher, I wil now probably upset «few professionals as well Asa specifically “translator ethics” the mode of thought presented here does not attempt to take position on universal principles of right and wrong, cases ‘An “ethics for the translator” might attempt to do that, applying principles to a particular socal group. In a “translator ethics” however, any principles should ‘ideally be involved inthe activity itself and can in some way be drawn out of ts