Memes of Translation : The Spread of Ideas in Translation Theory. Revised Edition

This revised edition of __Memes of Translation__ includes updates that relate the book's themes to more recent research in Translation Studies. The book contributes to the debate about whether it is worth seeking a coherent theory of translation, by proposing an approach based on norms, strategies and values, which are all seen as kinds of memes, i.e. ideas that spread. The meme metaphor allows us to see translation in the context of cultural evolution, and also highlights similarities with the philosopher Karl Popper's analysis of another kind of evolution: that of scientific knowledge. A translation is, after all, itself a theory – a theory about the source text. And as Popper stressed, theories of all kinds are like nets we make in order to catch something of reality: never perfectly, but always in the hope of better understanding. Table of Contents 6 Preface 10 Update 13 Acknowledgements 13 1. Survival machines for memes 14 1.1 Introducing memes 14 1.2 Five translation supermemes 16 1.2.1 Source-target 16 1.2.2 Equivalence 17 1.2.3 Untranslatability 19 1.2.4 Free-vs-literal 21 1.2.5 All-writing-is-translating 22 1.3 The locus of memes 23 1.4 A Popperian meme 25 1.5 Update 26 2. The evolution of translation memes 30 2.1 Words 31 2.2 The Word of God 32 2.3 Rhetoric 34 2.4 Logos 37 2.5 Linguistic science 40 2.6 Communication 44 2.7 Target 47 2.8 Cognition 51 2.9 Theory in the current meme pool 53 2.10 Update 57 3. From memes to norms 62 3.1 Normative vs. prescriptive 63 3.2 Norm theory 65 3.3 Norms of language 67 3.4 What counts as a translation? 69 3.5 Translation norms 74 3.5.1 Toury’s norms 74 3.5.2 Expectancy norms 75 3.5.3 Professional norms 78 3.6 General translation laws and normative laws 81 3.6.1 Translation laws 81 3.6.2 Normative laws 84 3.6.3 Explanations 85 3.7 Norms as constraints 88 3.8 On expectancy norms for English 92 3.9 Update 95 4. Translation strategies 98 4.1 General characteristics of strategies 98 4.2 A classification 102 4.2.1 Syntactic strategies 104 4.2.2 Semantic strategies 111 4.2.3 Pragmatic strategies 117 4.3 Motivation 122 4.3.1 The significance threshold 123 4.3.2 Compensation 125 4.4 Update 125 5. Translation as theory 128 5.1 Tentative Theory, Error Elimination and translational competence 128 5.2 Retrospective assessment 134 5.3 Prospective assessment 138 5.4 Lateral assessment 143 5.5 Introspective assessment 146 5.6 Pedagogical assessment 148 5.7 Mind the gap! 151 5.8 Update 154 6. The development of translational competence 158 6.1 Stages of expertise 158 6.2 The significance of memes 161 6.3 Suggestions for teaching 163 6.4 Ontogenetic = phylogenetic? 169 6.5 Bootstraps 176 6.6 Update 177 7. On translation ethics 180 7.1 Background issues 180 7.2 Norms, actions and values 183 7.3 Clarity 186 7.4 Truth 188 7.5 Trust 191 7.6 Understanding 194 7.7 The Translator’s Charter 197 7.8 Emancipatory translation 199 7.9 Update 205 Epilogue 208 Appendix 210 References 214 Author index 232 Subject index 236 The revised edition of Memes of Translation includes updates that relate the book's themes to more recent research in Translation Studies. The book contributes to the debate about whether it is worth seeking a coherent theory of translation, by proposing an approach based on norms, strategies and values, which are all seen as kinds of memes, i.e. ideas that spread. The meme metaphor allows us to see translation in the context of cultural evolution, and also highlights similarities with the philosopher Karl Popper's analysis of another kind of evolution: that of scientific knowledge