Translation through the Prism of Habermas ’ Sociological Theory

1. Translation through the Prism of Habermas’ Sociological Theory Sergey Tyulenev (Durham University, UK)

3. Why Study Translation Sociologically?

4. …the most important German philosopher of the second half of the 20th century.

5. Jürgen Habermas Born June 18, 1929 (age 89)in Germany NOTABLE WORKS •“The Theory of Communicative Action” •“The Structural Transformation of the Public Sphere” ARIAS OF STUDY Sociology, philosophy HAS WON PRESTIGIOUS INTERNATIONAL AWARDS and HONOURS John W. Kluge Prize For Achievement In The Study Of Humanity (2015); Erasmus Prize (2013); Kyoto Prize (2004); Theodor W. Adorno Award (1980)

6. TWO MAJOR WORKS • In The Structural Transformation of the Public Sphere (1962), Habermasdemonstrated how modern European salons, cafés, and literary groups participate in democratizing the public sphere. • Habermas took a linguistic-communicative turn in The Theory of Communicative Action(1981), in which he looked closely into one of the most fundamental sociological concepts –social action.

7. WHAT IS SOCIAL ACTION? Difference between social and physiological action:

8. WHAT IS SOCIAL ACTION? Social action aims at communicating some information from one person to another

9. Social action constitutes society The social is about two or more parties interacting. The term ‘social’ comes from the Latin word socius, meaning ‘friend’ or ‘ally’. The social is woven of communication units. Communication units are interactions of social agents.

10. Communicative Action Communicative action (CA) is viewed by Habermas as the most productive type of action for social integration because, as is clear from the term, CA presupposes genuine communication, i.e. sharing information.

11. Strategic Action The contrasting type of action is strategic action (SA) which is aimed exclusively at achieving success in action. Strategically acting agents live in society and therefore they willy-nillyhave to coordinate their actions but each of strategic communicants “is oriented to his own success.”

12. A Three-World Social Universe A fundamental difference between CA and SA is their relation to the worlds in which they unfold. A three-world social universe: • the objective world out there or reality whatever it is • the subjective world in the actor’s mind • the world of cultural conceptualizations of the objective and subjective worlds. The third world is LIFEWORLD, i.e. the cultural background shared by a collectivity and influencing individuals’ behaviour.

13. Strategic Actors: One-World Behaviour STRATEGIC ACTORS, STRIVING TO ACHIEVE THEIR PERSONAL GOALS, DEAL WITH THE OBJECTIVE WORLD IN WHICH THEIR GOALS ARE ACHIEVABLE. They do, to an extent, consider other actors BUT THEY DO NOT BECOME ENRICHED BY THE OTHER ACTORS’ SUBJECTIVE WORLDS. They start and end within the same ontological picture of the one (objective) world.

14. Communicative Actors: Two-world Behaviour COMMUNICATIVE ACTORS TAKE INTO CONSIDERATION THE LIFEWORLD, A SET OF SHARED TRADITIONS, THEIR CULTURAL INTERPRETATIONS AND BEHAVIOURAL PATTERNS, WHICH LIE AT THE BASIS OF SOCIAL NORMS. CA IS AT THE INTERSECTION OF THE TWO WORLDS – THE OBJECTIVE AND THE SOCIAL WITHIN THE PURVIEW OF THE PSYCHOLOGICAL WORLD. CA IS A TWO-WORLD ACTION.

15. Lifeworld The horizon within which communicative actions are “always already” moving.

16. The uncoupling of system and lifeworld

17. Originally: Lifeworld=System

18. Now: S Y S T E M Lifeworld

19. WHERE DOES TRANSLATION STAND in relation to communicative and strategic actions?

20. Translation at Linguistic Ruptures Hans-Georg Gadamerviewed translation as a means of coping with the situation when “understanding is disrupted or made difficult,” thus explicit mediation in the form of interlingual translation “is undoubtedly not the norm in a conversation” (ibid.: 346).

21. Bridging Social Ruptures But translation happens not only when lingual ruptures occur, translation is necessary for all social communication because every time ego steps outside his/her ‘bubble’ they experience a rupture and they have to use translation in one of its forms to bridge the gap.

22. DISCUSSION in Society Debate in PS implies discussion and exchange of viewpoints. Discussion is a dialogue, i.e. the process of joining what is otherwise separated by the nature of things: minds in separate brains and their idiosyncratic views of reality.

23. Connecting Bubbles Dialogue is a way of socializing in the sense that it is getting out of one’s own ‘bubble’, one’s own worldview, the picture of the world in his/her mind, and contacting another person who is also revealing what s/he has in his/her mind. Discussion, or dialogue, therefore, requires a means of bridging the gap between the two or more ‘bubbles’.

24. Translation as a Social Catalyst Translation’s work can be described as social catalysis (Tyulenev 2011: 134–45). As a social communication catalyst, translation is as omnipresent as its chemical counterpart.

25. Catalysts and Inhibitors / Poisons Catalysts differ in how they affect chemical reactions. Mostly catalysts INCREASE the rate of the reaction. Some catalysts, called INHIBITORS, on the contrary, slow down the catalytic reaction. Some inhibitors form such strong bonds that the reactants are virtually excluded from bonding with each other. Such inhibitors are called POISONS.

26. Interlingual translation is usually viewed as positively influencing interaction between different social parties. Hence, TRANSLATORS ARE METAPHORICALLY CALLED BUILDERS OF BRIDGES BETWEEN NATIONS. Yet, translation may be ‘too strongly bonded’ to one of the interacting parties. Ideologically distorted translation or translation as it is used in international controversies when translation openly takes sides are the examples of TRANSLATION ACTING AS AN INHIBITOR OR EVEN A POISON.

27. COMMUNICATION: REAL or VIRTUAL FACE TO FACE or ACROSS TIME AND SPACE HUMANS or NON-HUMANS (animals or technology)

28. DOUBLE CONTINGENCY When two parties meet, when a social communication unit is formed, the situation known in sociology as DOUBLE CONTINGENCY arises. Neither of the parties knows how the other party intends to act. Communication is the way for the parties to get out of their respective bubbles and, step by step, or rather action by action learn each other’s intentions as regards the possibility of a joint action and adjust their own actions in order to achieve their personal goals within the framework of the socially determined and socially possible common goal.

29. Applied to the situation of double contingency, translation is the only socially available instrument for ego to learn about alter and about alter’s intentions. Translation is also the only socially available means for alter to learn about ego’s plans and to negotiate a compromise in achieving the goal that would be the closest to both ego’s and alter’s own goals.

30. Communication can pursue different goals and arguably translation which is ever present (although not always taken into consideration) may help or thwart communication’s goals. To discuss this aspect of translation’s influence of the PS communication, some of the elements of Habermas’ theory of communicative action will be used.

31. Translation Ethics Translation may act neutrally or move along either the positive or negative axis: the translator may take advantage of his/her expertise in a destructive way – s/he may cause the parties be separated not only by a language barrier, but also by misinformation about the other party’s intentions. Such negative translation may cause a CA devolve into a SA.

32. Practicality: If translation cooperates with the communicative nature of the social action, it contributes to the communicative efforts of the involved parties. It can do that either passively or actively. In the former case translation tries its best to remove linguistic problems while in the latter case it can take a step further and actively contribute its expertise whenever necessary by adding comments and necessary clarifications enabling the parties to communicate as efficiently as possible. Translation may provide any additional information at the level of the linguistic codes involved, thereby making sure that utterances are understood ‘correctly’ (according to his/her interpretation, perhaps soliciting additional clarifications about unclear utterances from the party which made them, perhaps editing them so that they would be understood by the other party), or at the level of cultural features without which utterances cannot be ‘correctly’ appreciated. This active agency of translation can be practiced only when it is taken as an equal participant of the discussion, rather than merely as a conduit of the exchanged utterances responsible for carrying them across the linguistic barrier.

33. Conclusion Interlingual translation is an instrument of intersocietal translation which takes place through instances of interpersonal translation. Interlingual translation itself can be performed as a CA, that is, by encouraging the interacting parties’ understanding one another on the intentional/preference level. This will foster intersocietal communication and, ideally, intersocietal understanding and orderliness in intersocietal relations (and ultimately a ‘better’ socially integrated world). Alternatively, interlingual translation may be conducted as a strategic action unfolding as an incentive-led system integration. The translator/interpreter may be interested only in fulfilling his/her ‘duty’ as a facilitator of interlinguistic transaction.

34. Translation through the Prism of Habermas’ Sociological Theory Sergey Tyulenev (Durham University, UK)