Table Of ContentTradition,Tension and Translation in Turkey
Benjamins Translation Library (BTL)
issn 0929-7316
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General Editor Associate Editor Honorary Editor
Yves Gambier Franz Pöchhacker Gideon Toury
University of Turku University of Vienna Tel Aviv University
Advisory Board
Rosemary Arrojo Zuzana Jettmarová Şehnaz Tahir Gürçaglar
Binghamton University Charles University of Prague Bogaziçi University
Michael Cronin Alet Kruger Maria Tymoczko
Dublin City University UNISA, South Africa University of Massachusetts
Dirk Delabastita John Milton Amherst
FUNDP (University of Namur) University of São Paulo Lawrence Venuti
Daniel Gile Anthony Pym Temple University
Université Paris 3 - Sorbonne Universitat Rovira i Virgili Michaela Wolf
Nouvelle Rosa Rabadán University of Graz
Amparo Hurtado Albir University of León
Universitat Autònoma de Sherry Simon
Barcelona
Concordia University
Volume 118
Tradition,Tension and Translation in Turkey
Edited by Şehnaz Tahir Gürçag˘lar, Saliha Paker and John Milton
Tradition,Tension
and Translation in Turkey
Edited by
Şehnaz Tahir Gürçag˘lar
Bog˘aziçi University
Saliha Paker
Bog˘aziçi University
John Milton
University of São Paulo
John Benjamins Publishing Company
Amsterdam / Philadelphia
TM The paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements of
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doi 10.1075/btl.118
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Table of contents
Preface vii
In memoriam Elif Daldeniz Baysan xi
By Ebru Diriker and Saliha Paker
Acknowledgements xiii
Introduction 1
Saliha Paker, Şehnaz Tahir Gürçağlar and John Milton
Section I. Ottoman conceptions and practices of translation
On the poetic practices of “a singularly uninventive people”
and the anxiety of imitation: A critical re-appraisal in terms of translation,
creative mediation and “originality” 27
Saliha Paker
Exploring tercüman as a culture-bound concept in Islamic mysticism 53
Arzu Akbatur
Ahmet Midhat’s Hulâsa-i Hümâyunnâme: A curious case of politics
of translation, “renewal,” imperial patronage and censorship 73
Zehra Toska
Section II. Transition and transformation
On the evolution of the interpreting profession in Turkey:
From the Dragomans to the 21st century 89
Ebru Diriker
Saved by translation: German academic culture in Turkish exile 107
Azade Seyhan
The “official” view on translation in Turkey: The case of national
publishing congresses (1939–2009) 125
Şehnaz Tahir Gürçağlar
vi Tradition, Tension and Translation in Turkey
Translation, imported Western legal frameworks and insights
from the Turkish world of patents 145
Elif Daldeniz Baysan
Section III. The republican revolutionary turn: Ideology and politics
The Turkish language reform and intralingual translation 165
Özlem Berk Albachten
John Dewey’s 1924 report on Turkish education:
Progressive education translated out of existence 181
Yasemin Alptekin
Pseudotranslations of pseudo-scientific sex manuals in Turkey 199
Müge Işıklar Koçak
Censorship of “obscene” literary translations in Turkey: An analysis
of two specific cases 219
İrem Üstünsöz
Ideological encounters: Islamist retranslations of the Western classics 233
Esra Birkan Baydan
An overview of Kurdish literature in Turkish 253
Selim Temo Ergül
The identity metonymics of translated Turkish fiction in English:
The cases of Bilge Karasu and Orhan Pamuk 273
Arzu Eker Roditakis
Notes on contributors 297
Index 303
Preface
The idea of editing a volume on the historical and contemporary dimensions
of translation in the Ottoman times and modern Turkey came up during John
Milton’s visiting professorship at Boğaziçi University from 2006 to 2007. In fact,
he suggested it and followed it through, proposing some of the topics covered by
the present book. His liminal position both as an outsider and insider in Turkey
provided him with a unique vantage point, which has also found its critical reflec-
tion on the essays in this book during the editing process.
At the time, the editors were aware of the proliferation of interest and research
in various aspects of translation in Turkey. Three pioneering PhD dissertations
in the Turkish translation and interpreting context were published in book form
by international publishers in the 2000s (Diriker 2004; Susam-Sarajeva 2006;
Tahir Gürçağlar 2008) and others were completed, while an increasing number
of articles on translation by Turkish academics appeared in international journals
and books. Research-related developments were accompanied by a growing inter-
est in translated Turkish literature abroad, partly triggered by the Nobel Prize
for Literature which went to Turkey’s first laureate, Orhan Pamuk, in 2006. The
political climate had also turned in favor of Turkey, which started accession talks
with the EU in 2005 as the country became more and more visible in the global
political and cultural context. So when we met at a coffee shop in Istanbul near
the now famous Gezi Park one rainy afternoon, we all agreed that it was the right
time to situate Turkey’s important translation landscape and legacy on the world’s
translation studies map. It was a happy coincidence that the editors of the journal
Translation Studies were also thinking along similar lines at around the same
time, producing a special issue titled “Contemporary Perspectives on Translation
in Turkey,” guest-edited by the late Elif Daldeniz, who incisively wrote in her
introduction: “The Ottoman Empire and contemporary Turkey are certainly
fruitful sites for research incorporating different perspectives from translation
studies and providing a variety of case studies to test and develop methodologies”
(Daldeniz 2010: 129).
We chose to invite contributions from a number of established and emerging
scholars representing diverse facets of translation research on Turkey. Needless to
mention, not all areas we wished to cover found a place in this volume. However,
viii Tradition, Tension and Translation in Turkey
we believed that it could introduce a spectrum broad enough to reflect the diver-
sity and dynamism of the long tradition of translation in Turkish culture. The
dynamics of change were so prevalent that new translational issues continued
to develop and emerge even during the writing and editing of this volume. For
instance, as political and cultural developments unfolded and the Kurdish lan-
guage gained political and cultural “legitimacy” in the public sphere, we were very
happy to have included an essay on translations from Kurdish literature. Likewise,
censorship pressures on translated literature in Turkey, which became more acute
from the late 2000s, made our choice of an essay on this topic even more perti-
nent. Ever-changing dynamics, including the political, also meant that it was dif-
ficult to keep up with and cover all aspects of contemporary translation practice.
For instance, the very interesting example of translation activism displayed dur-
ing and after the anti-government Gezi Park protests in May-June 2013, a critical
moment in Turkey’s modern history, began to emerge only recently as a field of
research for scholars and students of translation (see Ergil and Tekgül 2014).
Court interpreting and the right to use Kurdish (or not) in the courts became a
topical issue especially in 2012–2013, creating a rare moment when interpreting
became a hot topic on the public agenda. In the meantime, medical interpreting
involving Kurdish has also started attracting scholarly attention during the past
few years (Schouten et al. 2012; Ross 2014). These and similar topics will continue
to evolve and serve as fruitful grounds upon which new research and scholarship
will flourish.
Despite many lacunae, the volume we intended, and hopefully managed to
produce, is the most comprehensive one ever concerning translation in Turkey.
We believe that it will serve as a point of reference for international and Turkish
readers alike who wish to acquaint themselves not only with the trajectories in
translation practice and research in the modern cultural and political context but
also with at least a few of those traditional ones, now almost forgotten. The volume
will provide a critical overview for both readerships, by laying bare diachronic and
synchronic tensions in the Ottoman/Turkish translation tradition(s) and high-
lighting continuities and discontinuities, as well as networks, among concepts and
agents hitherto unexplored.
The Editors
Preface ix
References
Daldeniz, Elif. 2010. “Introduction: Translation, Modernity and its Dissidents: Turkey as a ‘Repub-
lic of Translation’.” Translation Studies 3 (2): 129–131. DOI: 10.1080/14781701003647327
Diriker, Ebru. 2004. De-/Re-Contextualizing Conference Interpreting. Interpreters in the Ivory
Tower? Amsterdam & Philadelphia: John Benjamins. DOI: 10.1075/btl.53
Ergil, Başak, and Duygu Tekgül. 2014. “Visibility through Anonymity: The Case of TfJ, an Inter-
net-based Community Translation Project.” Paper presented at the International Conference
on Non-Professional Interpreting and Translation, Mainz University, 29–31 May.
Ross, Jonathan. 2014. “Informal Interpreting in Hospitals in Eastern Turkey: The Perspective of
Doctors.” Paper presented at the International Conference on Non-Professional Interpreting
and Translation, Mainz University, 29–31 May.
Schouten, Barbara, Jonathan Ross, Rena Zendedel, and Ludwien Meeuwesen. 2012. “Informal
Interpreters in Medical Settings: A Comparative Socio-cultural Study of the Netherlands
and Turkey.” The Translator: Non-Professionals Translating and Interpreting. Participatory
and Engaged Perspectives 18 (2): 311–38.
Susam-Sarajeva, Şebnem. 2006. Theories on the Move. Translation’s Role in the Travels of Literary
Theories. Amsterdam & New York: Rodopi.
Tahir Gürçağlar, Şehnaz. 2008. The Politics and Poetics of Translation in Turkey, 1923–1960.
Amsterdam&New York: Rodopi.
