Native American Communities on Health and Disability A Borderland Di
This volume examines concepts of disability and wellness in Native American communities, prominently featuring the life's work of Dr. Carol Locust. Authors Locust and Lovern confront the difficulties of translating not only words but also entire concepts
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Issues of Translation Foundational Concepts of Translation While translation of data is common in society, the process of how words and ideas become translated is often given little thought. Even those involved in translating information from one culture to another tend to pay little attention to the foundations of how translation takes place. Instead, translation becomes no more than a matter of substituting one word or phrase for another. Unfortunately, the lack of attention to the subtle foundations of translation may lead to mistakes that can carry consequences ranging from simple misunderstandings to extreme cases of discrimination. When dealing with borderland translation, paying attention to the subtleties of cultures becomes extremely important. Sweeping generalizations in language translation may fail to account for regional constructs, the sacred or religious variances, and the social or economic institutional differences within the community being translated. While the translation of words and phrases is necessary for communication, it is not sufficient to the understanding of the information being communicated. As will be discussed in this chapter, language is inseparable from the community in which it is used. So the dynamics and subtleties of the given community must be taken into account when attempting any translation. One of the first steps in unpacking the subtleties of translation requires the exploration of an often held assumption that all languages contain the same key to unlocking language usage. In other words, one must deal with the assumption that languages are at their base construction the same. Western academics often identify this key as the logical foundation, or the logical supervenience. The logical foundation for languages is considered
10.1057/9781137312020.0005 - Issues of Translation, Lavonna L. Lovern and Carol Locust
Copyright material from www.palgraveconnect.com - licensed to University of Toronto - PalgraveConnect - 2014-12-22
Chapter
WESTERN ACADEMIC VOICES
to be the same for all, which explains why people of different languages can come to understand each other. According to this model, logical constructs offer the organization by which language in general functions. The logical constructs then set the rules for things such as word order and consistency that allow the members of the community to communicate. So while the word order, for example, may change in terms of where to put the verb in a sentence, the foundational logical constructs remain the same for all languages. One problem with this assumption is that while it may indeed hold for family groups, it seems to fall apart when applied to languages outside the family. Responses to this concern often take the form of “these other languages do have the same logical foundation, they just haven’t realized it yet” or “we need only to study them more to find the same logical foundation”. Regardless of how the response is formulated, the idea seems to be that all languages can be fit into this model of “same logical
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