27.1485, Review: Translation: Klinger (2014)
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Subject: 27.1485, Review: Translation: Klinger (2014)
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Date: Tue, 29 Mar 2016 16:10:14
From: Simo Määttä [simo.maatta at helsinki.fi]
Subject: Translation and Linguistic Hybridity
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Book announced at http://linguistlist.org/issues/25/25-5219.html
AUTHOR: Susanne Klinger
TITLE: Translation and Linguistic Hybridity
SUBTITLE: Constructing World-View
SERIES TITLE: Routledge Advances in Translation Studies
PUBLISHER: Routledge (Taylor and Francis)
YEAR: 2014
REVIEWER: Simo K. Määttä, University of Helsinki
Reviews Editor: Robert Arthur Cote
SUMMARY
This volume entitled ‘Translation and Linguistic Hybridity: Constructing
World-View’ and written by Susanne Klinger explores linguistic hybridity in
narrative fiction by explaining this hybridity as stemming from an act of
translation performed by the author or a textual agent (the narrator or the
character). The focus is narratological rather than sociolinguistic. The book
is based on the distinction between “representational hybridity,” i.e.
hybridity ”on the level of text that does not have a representational function
within the narrative”, and “representational hybridity,” motivated by the
narrative and entailing the presence of a fictional translator (Klinger 2015:
19). Representational hybridity is further divided into “symbolic” and “iconic
hybridity.” The study is motivated by the fact that “the absence or presence
of linguistic hybridity interrelates with the narrator’s identification with
and allegiance to one culture rather than another” (ibid. 3).
As explained in Chapter 1, the volume deals with translation in two ways. The
author examines the representation of linguistic hybridity in the source text
as resulting from an act of translation. In addition, she analyzes the ways in
which shifts affecting linguistic hybridity in “translation proper,” i.e. the
translation of the source text into a target text, may affect the meaning
potential of the text. The examples provided come from Nigerian narrative
prose in English and translations of these texts into German. This material is
chosen because cross-cultural texts within postcolonial writing are perfect
examples of the ways in which translation is an object of representation
(ibid. 5).
Apart from narratology, some of the concepts used in this study are taken from
cognitive poetics, stylistics, and film studies. The goal is to provide an
approach that takes into account the relation between language as medium of
expression and language as object of representation. This explores “whether
and how linguistic hybridity potentially has an impact on the mental
representations the reader constructs when interacting with the text, and
hence, whether and how target text shifts in linguistic hybridity can affect
the text’s meaning potential” (ibid. 1-2). In particular, the volume aims at
investigating “how linguistic hybridity interrelates with (i) the reader’s
construction of the perspective from which the story events are perceived,
(ii) the narrator’s attitude towards the narrated cultures (and the implied
author’s attitude towards different languages), and (iii) the narrator’s and
the characters’ cultural identity and affiliation” and their world-view (ibid.
2-3). According to this volume, translation shifts affecting the
representation of linguistic hybridity may have a major impact affecting the
interpretation of texts and the reader’s world-view. In addition, due to
social and practical consequences the schemata affected by translation shifts
may have, translation shifts affecting world-view may also “have an impact on
the world we as community construct for ourselves and therefore on the way we
live our lives” (ibid. 3).
Chapter 2 is concerned with the definitions and typologies of linguistic
hybridity and proposes “a new tripartite typology of linguistic hybridity
based on its relation to the reality portrayed in the narrative” (ibid. 10).
The author claims that current terminology related to hybridity in
cross-cultural writing focuses too much on language-based categories such as
linguistic forms and discourse modes. Such approaches are insufficient when
the goal is to “describe the relation between the language(s) on the level of
text on the one hand and the language(s) on the level of narration and on the
level of story on the other hand” (ibid. 38). The author argues that it is
necessary to describe this relationship in order to examine the role of
linguistic hybridity in the “construction of the perspective from which the
story events are perceived, the textual agents’ cultural identity, and the
narrator’s ideological perspective and allegiance” (ibid.). Such an analysis
is necessary in order to decipher the ways in which shifts occurring in the
translation process affect these categories. Therefore, the author proposes a
typology based on representational function rather than form.
A key aspect within representational hybridity is the distinction between
medium and object. In “iconic hybridity,” hybridity is represented as an
object, the product of a self-translation performed by an embodied narrator or
a character (ibid. 12, 20). “Symbolic hybridity,” however, “is the product of
translational mimesis occurring in the narration and within one language—it
symbolically represents one language within another” and hybridity is a mere
medium (ibid. 19-20). Thus, the language on the level of text is not identical
with the language on the level of story but merely symbolizes or symbolically
represents it (ibid. 137).
An example of iconic hybridity is the following passage from Chinua Achebe’s
(1994 [1960: 82]) novel No Longer at Ease: “He now spoke in English. ‘You know
book, but this is no matter for book. Do you know what an osu is? But how can
you know.” This form of hybridity is labelled iconic because it is based on
the illusion of a verbatim, immediate representation of self-translation by a
textual agent. The language as medium and language as object are the
same—iconic hybridity represents itself and “the language as medium is
identical to the language as object” (Klinger 2015: 12, 137).
An example of symbolic hybridity is the following passage from the same novel
(Achebe 1994 [1960]: 46-47): “Call it what you like,” said Joseph in Igbo.
“You know more book than I, but I am older and wiser. And I can tell you that
a man does not challenge his chi to a wrestling match.” In this excerpt,
hybridity or translation are not represented as an object; rather, hybridity,
occurring on the level of narration, is only a medium (Klinger 2015: 12).
Chapter 3 deals with the interchangeable terms of perspective, focalization,
or point of view. The chapter discusses various typologies of focalization and
speech and thought representation (e.g. Genette 1988, Bal 2009, McHale 1978,
Leech & Short 2007) and analyzes several examples from the corpus and
concludes that when linguistic hybridity is erased or diluted in translation,
the perception shifts from figural to narratorial. Contrarily, the shift may
also be directed towards figural perception in cases in which linguistic
hybridity is added to the text in translation (Klinger 2015: 81). Such shifts
affect the perceived reliability of the information, the empathy the reader
feels towards the characters, and ironic distance. In conclusion, “shifts in
perception thus affect the reader’s construction of the narrator’s attitude
towards the characters and events presented—in other words, the narrator’s
ideological perspective” (ibid. 81). The narrator’s ideological stance is also
linked to that of the author, for according to text-world theory “readers have
a tendency to map their knowledge of the author onto the narrator” (ibid. 82,
Gavins 2007: 129). As a result, readers think that the narrator’s world-view
equals the author’s world-view unless the narrator is discordant or unreliable
(see Cohn 2000).
Chapter 4 applies Murray Smith’s (2005) three-level typology of audience
engagement (recognition, alignment, allegiance) in the context of film to the
literary material of this volume: “thought and speech representation, for
example, are strategies of alignment, as they grant us access to a character’s
feelings and states of mind” and “linguistic hybridity can signal alignment”
(Klinger 2015: 85). According to the author, the reader’s world-view and the
way he or she constructs the narrator’s stance are more important than “the
text-dependent degree of the language-facet of perspective (i.e. discourse
mode)” in determining the reader’s response: “target text shifts in the verbal
actualization of the allegiance […] will depend not on target text shifts in
the degree of alignment on the language facet of perspective (i.e. target text
shifts in discourse category) but on whether the alignment is erased in the
target text, for example by shifting the language facet from figural to
narratorial, or whether indicators of allegiance are erased or altered in the
target text” (ibid. 90). Such shifts can affect the target text reader’s
“attitude towards the narrated culture.” Typically, such shifts are the result
of the mismatch between the intentions the translator has inferred from the
source text and “actual intentions” (ibid. 132). If the translator’s
world-view clashes with the world-view inferred from the source text, the
translator may also deliberately or unconsciously alter the world-view of the
text (ibid. 133).
Chapter 5 deals with the translation of the characters’ world-view. According
to the author, since linguistic hybridity can indicate perspective, it has an
indirect influence on characterization (ibid. 134). The author makes a
distinction between representational hybridity in the character’s discourse
pertaining to the mind-style either of an individual or a community, setting
them apart from other individuals or other communities respectively. The
argument is that iconic representational hybridity reflects the mind-style of
an individual whereas symbolic representational hybridity reflects the
mind-style of a community, for example an ethnic group. Thus, iconic hybridity
signifies a norm departure and underscores in-betweenness whereas symbolic
hybridity signifies a norm and underscores otherness (ibid. 136-7).
Furthermore, while iconic hybridity represents a language variety, symbolic
hybridity represents another language (ibid. 139).
According to the author, the distinction between text, narration, and story,
and the distinction between language as medium and language as object, are
useful when approaching linguistic hybridity in cross-cultural writing. Such
analyses can guide both the practice and the study of translations of such
texts – something that existing approaches fail to do (180).
EVALUATION
This book is a valuable contribution to the increasing body of research on the
translation of linguistic hybridity. Apart from translation scholars,
narratologists and researchers interested in the interfaces between
linguistics and literature will find it a useful addendum to existing
scholarship. Non-specialists may find the book quite challenging to read, and
sociolinguists might find it puzzling because the way this volume uses terms
such as “iconic,” “representation,” and “symbolic” is very different from more
common usages in sociolinguistics and linguistic anthropology. Graduate
students will find the book useful, but it might be too demanding for other
classroom settings. However, the examples analyzed by the author can be very
useful instructional tools.
The volume certainly reaches its goals within its conceptual framework. Its
major merit is to offer new insights into the interplay of form and function
and provide fresh categorizations of speech, thought, and world-view
representation. The discussion regarding the impact of the unconscious mapping
of the figure of the author onto the narrator and the ways in which this
mapping may change due to shifts occurring in the translation process is
particularly intriguing. The interpretation of hybridity itself through the
metaphor of translation is refreshing.
At the same time, the volume raises a number of questions. First, while the
author claims that she investigates function rather than form and the
construction of stance rather than the language-facet of perspective or the
discourse mode, the typologies presented remain largely dependent on
differences visible in linguistic choices. After all, it is difficult to see
to what extent stance in a text can be analyzed without basing at least part
of that analysis on the linguistic features of the text. Do form and function
not go hand in hand? Can alignment be erased without modifying the “language
facet” in translation? Can there be function without form? These questions
remain unanswered.
Second, the ways in which the concept of hybridity itself is linked to
attitudes, allegiance, alignment, ideology, stance, and intentions appears to
be somewhat problematic as well. Indeed, is it even possible to know what the
“actual” intentions of a text and is the presence or absence of hybridity
sufficient when deciding whether there is alignment/allegiance or not? How can
one prove that the representation of the speech of a character represents a
group in some instances (symbolic hybridity) and that of an individual on
other occasions (iconic hybridity) if what we have in both cases is the
representation of the speech (or thought) of one character? And since the
concepts mentioned above and world-view in particular are quite central in
this volume, it would have been useful to discuss the meaning of these terms
and provide clear definitions. Such definitions would contribute to avoiding
the dangers of linguistic essentialism that often accompany linguistic
relativism.
As these questions and concerns show, the volume is certainly
thought-provoking and is therefore likely to contribute to create interfaces
between cognitive approaches to text, text-world theory, narratology, and the
linguistic study of literature.
REFERENCES
Achebe, Chinua. 1994 [1960]. No Longer at Ease. New York: Anchor.
Bal, Mieke. Narratology: Introduction to the Theory of Narrative, 3rd ed.
Toronto: University of Toronto Press.
Cohn, Dorrit. 2000. Discordant narration. Style 34(2). 307-316.
Gavins, Joanna. 2007. Text World Theory: An Introduction. Edinburgh: Edinburgh
University Press.
Genette, Gérard. 1998. Narrative Discourse Revisited. Trans. Jane E. Lewin.
Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University Press.
Klinger, Susanne. 2015. Translation and Linguistic Hybridity: Constructing
World-View. New York: Routledge.
Leech, Geoffrey & Mick Short. 2007. Style in Fiction: A Linguistic
Introduction to English Fictional Prose, 2nd ed. London: Longman.
Smith, Murray. 2005. The Battle of Algiers: Colonial struggle and collective
allegiance. In J. David Slocum (ed.), Terrorism, Media, Liberation, 94-110.
New Brunswick: Rutgers University Press.
ABOUT THE REVIEWER
Dr. Simo K. Määttä is Senior Lecturer of French (translation track) at the
Department of Modern Languages, University of Helsinki. His research interests
include language policies, translation studies, sociolinguistics, and critical
discourse studies. He has worked on EU and French language policies regarding
regional or minority languages, the translation of linguistic hybridity,
language ideologies and the interpreter's agency in community interpreting,
and hate speech. Määttä's research has always focused on the representation
and interpretation of linguistic variation. He also works as a translator and
legal and community interpreter.
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