Translation, Translanguaging and Creativity: A Translating Cultures Workshop

To coincide with the visit to the UK of Dr Tong King Lee (University of Hong Kong), author of the recent Experimental Chinese Literature: Translation, Technology, Poetics (Brill, 2015), the AHRC translating cultures theme has organized an afternoon workshop on translation, translanguaging and creativity.

The event has been arranged in collaboration with and is hosted by the Institute of Modern Languages Research, University of London.

Date: Monday June 13^th 2016

Time: 2.00-5.00

Place: Room 246, IMLR, Senate House South Block

Directions: http://modernlanguages.sas.ac.uk/node/46

Programme

 2.00: introduction (Charles Forsdick, University of Liverpool; Translating Cultures)

2.05:

Jess Bradley (University of Leeds; Translation and Translanguaging), ‘Translanguaging from studio to street: resemiotizing the narrative in production and performance’

Katja Frimberger (University of Glasgow; Researching Multlingually), ‘Arts, pedagogy & becoming’

James Hadley (IMLR), ‘Creativity in indirect literary translation and its constraints’

3.00:

Mike Baynham (University of Leeds; Translation and Translanguaging) and Bruno Duque (Leeds key participant TRANSLANG sports phase)

Fieldwork Conversations: A conversation with Bruno

3.30: coffee

4.00:

Derek Duncan (University of St Andrews), Loredana Polezzi (Cardiff University) and Naomi Wells (University of Warwick)

Transnationalizing Modern Languages: Transnationalizing Creative Practices

4.40: final reflections (Tong King Lee)

5.00: close

Spaces are limited, so please register here by Monday June 6^th. For information about the seminar, please contact: tracul@liv.ac.uk.

The seminar will be followed by a lecture on ‘Translation, Translanguaging and Literary Art’ by TK Lee at Birkbeck College, University of London:

Date: Monday June 13^th 2016

Time: 6.00-7.00

Place: Room 416, Malet Street, Birkbeck Main Building (Malet Street, London, WC1E 7HX).

Directions: http://www.bbk.ac.uk/maps/

This talk explores how translation and translanguaging feature as both conceptual theme and visual trope in contemporary literature and art. Based on the multilingual cyberpoetry of the sinologist and translator John Cayley and the text-art installations of transnational artist Xu Bing, we will look at the material effects of translation and translanguaging in the opening up of new (inter)semiotic spaces in mixed-media artefacts; these spaces are also creative grounds for the sensuous engagement of the embodied reader and critical engagement with language ideologies. Two themes are in focus: first, the dialectic between translation/translanguaging and signification/communication in aesthetic art, bearing in mind that translation and translanguaging are broadly defined, and relate to both verbal and non-verbal modalities; second, how translation and translanguaging draw readers into cognitive-perceptual – alongside hermeneutic-interpretive – participation in the unravelling of the works in question, thereby turning readers into viewers as well as players. Through a close reading-viewing-playing of Cayley’s and Xu Bing’s works, the talk demonstrates how translation and translanguaging function as performative resources in some of the most exciting experiments in multimodal literary art.

For enquiries about the lecture in Birkbeck, contact: linguistics@bbk.ac.uk

Tong King Lee will also lead a seminar on ‘Negotiating Chinese Soft Power Through Translation’ the previous week at the University of Leeds

Date: Thursday June 9^th 2016

Time: 2.00-3.30

Place: The Coach House, School of Education, University of Leeds

Directions: The School of Education is building 71 on http://www.leeds.ac.uk/campusmap#

This talk examines the cross-cultural operations involved in the discursive construction of China, with a focus on how translation, alongside other textual practices, serves as a strategic instrument in advancing ideological causes. The talk is divided into two parts. The first part revolves around the theme of “Chinese soft power”. It explores how contemporary China constructs and projects its own (positive) cultural image through the systematic translation of select Chinese titles into foreign languages and the dissemination of these titles through rigorous publication programs. The second part examines Anglophone representations of contemporary China in both literary and non-literary texts, both translated and non-translated writing. With an eye on interculturality, we seek to elucidate two issues here: first, how British and American publishers consciously shape the image of China through the translation, publication, and paratextual marketing of select Chinese titles; second, how these translations, together with (non-translated) English-language writings on China, generate a powerful discourse that in turn governs the way China is perceived by Western audiences. By investigating how China is manipulated in translated texts and their paratexts, as well as whether and how China’s self-representation is mitigated by Anglophone representations of China, we draw implications for understanding the geopolitical relations between China and its Western Other from the perspective of intercultural discourse.

For information about the Leeds seminar contact: Mike Baynham (Mike.Baynham@education.leeds.ac.uk) or Jess Bradley (J.M.Bradley@leeds.ac.uk)

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