Translation and Cultural/Contextual Constraints

This book aims to illuminate the different cultural and contextual constraints of translation through the analysis of certain translated works and the study of the intense relationship between translation and culture. It is motivated by two research questions: firstly, to what extent does context determine the final outcome of translation? Secondly, in what way does culture intervene in the process of translation? To examine these questions, the study raises the issue of translation as an act of thought in precise spatiotemporal contexts. We suggest that a new generation of research in this area needs to address the extended question: if translation goes beyond the normative restrictions of linguistics and rigorously adheres to spatiotemporal circumstances, how does translation deliberately unfold cultural and political dimensions to exert material influence on both source and target cultures? Thus, two hypotheses are offered: firstly, it considers translation as an act of thought; secondly, for the sake of delineating the relationship between translation and culture, it adopts the material definition of culture, explicitly explaining the place and role of culture in translation.