Politics of Translation

Abstract

Current research finds the label “translation” an apt characterization of diverse communicative practices. This review argues that the term points to a whole family of semiotic processes. Writings on translation share a key insight: Different social worlds—including those of scholars—emerge through forms of communication in which practices, objects, genres, and texts are citable, recontextualizable. This generative process mediates among the domains of knowledge and action that the communications themselves play a role in separating. The connections and differentiations, as framed by metadiscourses, construct relations of power and politics. I seek to highlight a widening, productive conversation about translational practices among studies of science, in medical, legal, and linguistic anthropology, in research on Christianities, and in advocacy. The translation rubric gathers together practices of transduction, (in)commensuration, circulation, enactment of reference, standardizations, and various forms of boundary making. Recent work on semiotics clarifies how such practices achieve their effects.