Translating the Postcolonial in Multilingual Contexts

Abstract

This collection of essays aims to contribute to scholarship already published in Translation Studies and Postcolonial Studies, endeavouring to question the traditional divide between these two academic strands and to bring them closer together in creative ways, across several geographical regions, linguistic contexts and historical circumstances. Moving away from a binary and dichotomous approach, the authors address these questions that link linguistic heterogeneity, postcolonial resistance and border identities. How does translation as a process operate across different linguistic and cultural spaces? How do translated selves negotiate meaning simultaneously across multiple linguistic borders? For the sake of cohesion, the geopolitical zones of translational contact have been limited to two colonial/European languages, namely French and English. The regional languages involved cover postcolonial, cultural spaces where Mauritian, Haitian, Reunionese and Louisianian Creole, Gikuyu, Wolof, Swahili and Arabic are spoken.