University of Vienna
Department: Asian Studies
Course Information:
Seminar Course
SECONDARY TRANSLATION IN THE PROCESS OF WORLD LITERATURE
This seminar is addressed to advanced postgraduate students in all
philologies/literary studies programmes, not least in comparative literature,
translation studies, and literary theory. It intends to unfold the role of
intermediary languages in the translation history of various languages. The
following hypotheses shall guide the inquiries: 1) Secondary translation is
earlier than primary translation; 2) earlier translation displays a more lasting
influence in reception history; 3) the (foreign) literary canon in the target
language is distinctively different from the canon in the (original) source
language.
It is obvious that a number of sociological issues are at play, among them
foreign language education in the cultural environment of the target
language, and differing traditions of canon formation processes in the source
language, intermediary language and target language environments,
respectively. The ideal working procedure would result in working
complementarily in various fields defined by the specialized linguistic and
methological (sociological, historical) skills among the audience, thus
bringing together in-depth case studies to give a sharper profile to the
complexity of interliterary and intercultural prcesses, and finally leading to
verify or falsify the hypotheses pronounced above.
Public Lecture
AN ATTEMPT AT A SOCIOLOGY OF LITERARY HOLDINGS
IN THE HEBREW UNIVERSITY AND NATIONAL LIBRARIES
Probably as nowhere else—with the exception of the Library of Congress—,
holdings of the two big Jerusalem libraries in the intermediate languages
relevant not only for intermediate translation into Chinese are particularly
rich, due to migration since the early 20th century and ensuing donations. As
an ailing project, this lecture is intended to be an outcome of my sojourn,
giving not only an overview of the topic of mediated translation, but also
taking particular donations examples. To my knowledge, the field has not yet
been studied, even less under the perspective of global translation history