Ideas Roadshow conversations present a wealth of candid insights from some of the worlds leading experts, generated through a focused yet informal setting. They are explicitly designed to give non-specialists a uniquely accessible window into frontline research and scholarship that wouldnt otherwise be encountered through standard lectures and textbooks.
Over 100 Ideas Roadshow conversations have been held since our debut in 2012, covering a wide array of topics across the arts and sciences. All conversations in this collection are also available separately.
See www.ideas-on-film.com/ideasroadshow for a full listing.
Copyright 2021 Open Agenda Publishing. All rights reserved.
ISBN: 978-1-77170-104-4 (eBook)
ISBN: 978-1-77170-103-7 (pb)
Edited by Howard Burton; preface and all introductions written by Howard Burton.
All Ideas Roadshow Conversations use Canadian spelling.
Contents
Textual Note
Preface
China, Culturally Speaking
A conversation with Michael Berry
Introduction
I. From New Jersey to Nanjing
II. Found in Translation
III. Freedom of the Press
IV. Contemporary Voices
V. A Glimpse Behind the Lens
VI. Business and Art
VII. Flourishing
Continuing the Conversation
Babbling Barbarians
How Translators Keep Us Civilized
A conversation with David Bellos
Introduction
I. Introductory Musings
II. An Illustrative Capture
III. Getting the Joke
IV. Probing the Foreign
V. Films in Translation
VI. The Varieties of English
VII. Asserting Our Individuality
VIII. Translation and Meaning
IX. Mathematics and Music
X. Language and Thought
XI. Paying Respects
Continuing the Conversation
Sign Language Linguistics
A conversation with Carol Padden
Introduction
I. Choosing Languages
II. Distance Education
III. Signing as Language
IV. Diversity and Structure
V. Distinctiveness
VI. Embodiment
VII. A Cultural Window
VIII. Predictions and Proclivities
IX. Examining Diversity
X. Making Comparisons
Continuing the Conversation
Perspectives on Mass Communication
A conversation with Denis McQuail
Introduction
I. Plunging into the Media
II. Getting Rigorous
III. Journalism and Society
IV. Bringing It Home
V. Towards the Future
Continuing the Conversation
The Value of Voice
A conversation with Nick Couldry
Introduction
I. Round the Houses
II. Deconstruction
III. Investigating Power
IV. The Future of Media
V. Ever Onwards
Continuing the Conversation
Textual Note
The contents of this book are based upon separate filmed conversations with Howard Burton and each of the five featured experts.
Michael Berry is Professor of Contemporary Chinese Cultural Studies and Director of the UCLA Center for Chinese Studies. This conversation occurred on September 19, 2014.
David Bellos is the Director of the Program in Translation and Intercultural Communication at Princeton University, where he is also Professor of French and Comparative Literature. This conversation occurred on June 14, 2012.
Carol Padden holds the Sanford I. Berman Chair in Language and Human Communication at UC San Diego. This conversation occurred on September 25, 2014.
Denis McQuail (1935-2017) was Emeritus Professor at the University of Amsterdam and Visiting Professor at the University of Southampton. He is one of the most influential scholars in the history of mass communication studies. This conversation occurred on April 28, 2014.
Nick Couldry is Professor of Media, Communications and Social Theory in the Department of Media and Communications at LSE. This conversation occurred on April 29, 2014.
Howard Burton is the creator and host of Ideas Roadshow and was Founding Executive Director of Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics.
Preface
Language, it is often said, is the thing that makes us humanthe one feature that truly sets us apart from our fellow non-human travellers on the planet. But it is not so much language per se, of course, that distinguishes us, but rather what we do with it.
Because it is one thing to examine the human brain and try to deduce how it is so particularly hard-wired for languagewhich, as it happens, occurs quite frequently within Ideas Roadshow conversations with cognitive scientists such as Ellen Bialystok, Victor Ferreira, Greg Hickok, Martin Monti and othersand quite another to look at how our biological predilection for words and phrases manifests itself in the cultural realm, which is the subject of this collection.
We begin with two scholars: Michael Berry, Director of the UCLA Center for Chinese Studies and David Bellos, Professor of French and Director of Princeton Universitys Program in Translation and Intercultural Communication. Both are highly regarded literary translators whose manifold experiences respectively translating French and Chinese masterworks into English have naturally influenced their appreciation of the subtleties of language that would otherwise be taken for granted.
Michael gives us a revealing, first-hand glimpse of what a translators day job is really like:
When Im translating dialogue, for example, Ill often speak aloud just to double-check whether people actually talk like that in English, and try to figure out what the perfect equivalent is for capturing the nuance of the original. I think that you have to have a sensitivity of both languages to really capture how someone would express that idea, or thought, or emotion, in the other language. I think thats key to being successful as a translator.
A lot of people talk about faithful translations or literal translations. Often, to create the most faithful translation you have to betray the literal meaning in order to get at that faithful spirit. In Chinese, for example, a very common greeting that people will say to each other is literally, Have you eaten? But you wouldnt say that in a Western country. If I saw you on the street, I wouldnt say, Howard, have you eaten? It would sound very weird. A far better translation would be something like, Hows it going? because you want to capture that spirit. They werent actually asking if you had eaten. Its just a greeting.
You always have to constantly navigate between being faithful to the original and making it readable. Thats the tightrope that youre always walking as a translator: between faithfulness to the original and readability to your target audience. Some translators are more on one side than the other. Theres no one answer to this.
David, meanwhile, intriguingly describes how the very act of translating French literature has led him to re-evaluate and re-assess his understanding of his native language.
Its a dialogic experience, it goes two ways. Im sure that my command of the English language and my ability to write has been formed by all these foreign writers that Ive had to translate. Theyve made me learn different things and different nooks and crannies of English.
