1887
  1. Home
  2. e-Journals
  3. Target. International Journal of Translation Studies
  4. Volume 25, Issue 3
  5. Article
Translation in the Theatre
  • ISSN 0924-1884
  • E-ISSN: 1569-9986
USD
Buy:$35.00 + Taxes

Abstract

In 2006, the Dublin-based theatre company Pan Pan went to China to produce a Mandarin version of J.M. Synge’s canonical Irish play . Director Gavin Quinn chose to set the adaptation in a hairdresser/massage parlour/brothel, on the outskirts of Beijing. He originally wanted the protagonist to hail from Xin-Jiang, China’s troubled Sinomuslim province. In interview, he said he was advised against this for fear of Chinese state censorship. However, the Chinese translators, Yue Sun and Zhaohui Wang, suggest that the decision not to represent a Muslim protagonist had to do with ethnic sensitivities. In order to analyse this conflict, this article draws on translation sociology after Bourdieu, clarifying the functioning of the habitus, and formulating a global field of cultural production. It argues that analysis of intercultural processes focused on cultural capital can provide materially engaged insights into the power relations informing given intercultural situations.

© 2013 John Benjamins Publishing Company
Loading

Article metrics loading...

/content/journals/10.1075/target.25.3.06aal
2013-10-11
2024-10-16

  • From This Site

    /content/journals/10.1075/target.25.3.06aal
    dcterms_title,dcterms_subject,pub_keyword
    -contentType:Journal -contentType:Contributor -contentType:Concept -contentType:Institution
    10
    5
Loading full text...

Full text loading...

References

  1. Amine, Khalid
    2010 “Taswir: Beyond East and West.” InPerforming Cultural Diversity, Critiquing Postcolonialism, ed. by Khalid Amine , Barry Tharaud , José Manuel Goñi Pérez , and George F. Robertson , 75–80. Tetouan: Abdelmalek Essaadi UP.
     [Google Scholar]
  2. Baines, Roger , Cristina Marinetti , and Manuella Perteghella
    (eds) 2010 Staging and Performing Translation. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan. doi: 10.1057/9780230294608
     https://doi.org/10.1057/9780230294608 [Google Scholar]
  3. Balme, Christopher
    1999 Decolonizing the Stage: Theatrical Syncretism and Post-colonial Drama. London: Clarendon. doi: 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198184447.001.0001
     https://doi.org/10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198184447.001.0001 [Google Scholar]
  4. Bassnett, Susan
    1991 “Translating for the Theatre: The Case against Performability.” TTR: Traduction, Terminologie, Rédaction4 (1): 99–111. doi: 10.7202/037084ar
     https://doi.org/10.7202/037084ar [Google Scholar]
  5. 2002 Translation Studies. 3rd edition. London: Routledge.
     [Google Scholar]
  6. Bharucha, Rustom
    1984a “A Collision of Cultures: Some Western Interpretations of the Indian Theatre.” Asian Theatre Journal1 (1): 1–20. doi: 10.2307/1124363
     https://doi.org/10.2307/1124363 [Google Scholar]
  7. 1984b “A Reply to Richard Schechner.” Asian Theatre Journal1 (2): 254–260. doi: 10.2307/1124575
     https://doi.org/10.2307/1124575 [Google Scholar]
  8. 1988 “Peter Brook's Mahabharata: A View from India.” Economic and Political Weekly23 (32): 1642–1647.
     [Google Scholar]
  9. 2000 The Politics of Cultural Practice: Thinking Through Theatre in an Age of Globalization. London: Athlone.
     [Google Scholar]
  10. Blommaert, Jan
    2005 “Bourdieu the Ethnographer: The Ethnographic Grounding of Habitus and Voice.” The Translator11 (2): 219–236. doi: 10.1080/13556509.2005.10799199
     https://doi.org/10.1080/13556509.2005.10799199 [Google Scholar]
  11. Bourdieu, Pierre
    1980 The Logic of Practice. Translated by Richard Nice . California: Stanford UP.
     [Google Scholar]
  12. 1986 Distinction: A Social Critique of the Judgement of Taste. Translated by Richard Nice . Harvard: Routledge.
     [Google Scholar]
  13. 1988 Homo Academicus. Translated by Peter Colier . California: Stanford UP.
     [Google Scholar]
  14. 1993 The Field of Cultural Production. Oxford: Polity Press.
     [Google Scholar]
  15. 1999 “The Social Conditions of the International Circulation of Ideas.” InBourdieu: A Critical Reader, ed. by Richard Shusterman , 220–228. Oxford: Blackwell.
     [Google Scholar]
  16. Bourdieu, Pierre , and Jean-Claude Passeron
    1990 Reproduction in Education, Society and Culture. Translated by Lois Wacquant . London: Sage.
     [Google Scholar]
  17. Carlson, Marvin
    2004 “Intercultural Theory, Postcolonial Theory, and Semiotics: The Road Not (Yet) Taken.” Semiotica168 (1): 129–142.
     [Google Scholar]
  18. Chaudhuri, Una
    1991 “The Future of the Hyphen: Interculturalism, Textuality and the Difference Within.” InInterculturalism and Performance: Writings from PAJ, ed. by Bonnie Marranca , and Gautum Dasgupta , 192–207. New York: PAJ.
     [Google Scholar]
  19. Dasgupta, Gautum
    1991 “Peter Brook's ‘Orientalism’.” InPeter Brook and the Mahabharata: Critical Perspectives, ed. by David Williams , 262–267. London: Routledge.
     [Google Scholar]
  20. During, Simon
    1995 “Postmodernism or Post-colonialism Today.” InThe Post-colonial Studies Reader, ed. by Bill Ashcroft , Gareth Griffiths , and Helen Tiffin , 125–129. Oxford: Routledge.
     [Google Scholar]
  21. Fischer-Lichte, Erika
    2009 “Interweaving Cultures in Performance: Different States of Being In-Between.” New Theatre Quarterly25 (4): 391–401. doi: 10.1017/S0266464X09000670
     https://doi.org/10.1017/S0266464X09000670 [Google Scholar]
  22. Friederich, Michael
    2007 “Uyghur Literary Translations of Xinjiang Realities.” InSituating the Uyghurs between China and Central Asia, ed. by Ildikó Bellér-Hann , M. Cristina Cesaro , Rachel Harris , and Joanne Smith Finley , 92–104. Burlington: Ashgate.
     [Google Scholar]
  23. Gilbert, Helen , and Jacqueline Lo
    1996 Post-Colonial Drama: Theory, Practice, Politics. London: Routledge. doi: 10.4324/9780203421062
     https://doi.org/10.4324/9780203421062 [Google Scholar]
  24. 2007 Performance and Cosmopolitics: Cross-Cultural Transactions in Australasia. New York: Palgrave Macmillan.
     [Google Scholar]
  25. Gouanvic, Jean-Marc
    2005 “A Bourdieusian Theory of Translation, or the Coincidence of Practical Instances: Field, ‘Habitus’, Capital and ‘Illusio’.” The Translator11 (2): 147–166. doi: 10.1080/13556509.2005.10799196
     https://doi.org/10.1080/13556509.2005.10799196 [Google Scholar]
  26. Heilbron, Johan , and Gisèle Sapiro
    (eds) 2002 Traduction: les échanges Littéraires Internationaux (Actes de la Recherche en Sciences Sociales 144). Paris: Seuil.
     [Google Scholar]
  27. 2007 “Outline for a Sociology of Translation.” InConstructing a Sociology of Translation, ed. by Michaela Wolf , and Alexandra Fukari , 93–107. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. doi: 10.1075/btl.74.07hei
     https://doi.org/10.1075/btl.74.07hei [Google Scholar]
  28. Hung, Eva
    2005 “Cultural Borderlands in China's Translation History.” InTranslation and Cultural Change, ed. by Eva Hung , 43–64. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. doi: 10.1075/btl.61.06hun
     https://doi.org/10.1075/btl.61.06hun [Google Scholar]
  29. Inghilleri, Moira
    2003 “Habitus, Field and Discourse: Interpreting as a Socially Situated Activity.” Target15 (2): 243–268. doi: 10.1075/target.15.2.03ing
     https://doi.org/10.1075/target.15.2.03ing [Google Scholar]
  30. Knight, Nick
    2006 “Reflecting on the Paradox of Globalisation: China's Search for Cultural Identity and Coherence.” China: An International Journal4 (1): 1–31.
     [Google Scholar]
  31. Knowles, Ric
    2010 Theatre and Interculturalism. London: Palgrave.
     [Google Scholar]
  32. Lefevere, André
    1998 “Chinese and Western Thinking on Translation.” InConstructing Cultures: Essays on Literary Translation, ed. by Susan Bassnett , and André Lefevere , 12–24. Clevedon: Multilingual Matters.
     [Google Scholar]
  33. Lei, Daphne P.
    2011 “Interruption, Intervention, Interculturalism: Robert Wilson's HIT Productions in Taiwan.” Theatre Journal63 (4): 571–586. doi: 10.1353/tj.2011.0118
     https://doi.org/10.1353/tj.2011.0118 [Google Scholar]
  34. Lipman, Jonathan N.
    2006 “A Fierce and Brutal People: On Islam and Muslims in Qing Law.” InEmpire at the Margins, ed. by Pamela Kyle Crossley , Helen F. Siu , and Donald S. Sutton , 83–110. Berkeley: University of California Press.
     [Google Scholar]
  35. Lo, Jacqueline
    2006 “‘Queer Magic’: Performing Mixed-Race on the Australian Stage.” Contemporary Theatre Review16 (2): 171–188. doi: 10.1080/10486800600587138
     https://doi.org/10.1080/10486800600587138 [Google Scholar]
  36. Lonergan, Patrick
    2009 Theatre and Globalization: Irish Drama in the Celtic Tiger Era. London: Palgrave.
     [Google Scholar]
  37. Marinetti, Cristina
    2013 “Transnational, Multilingual and Post-dramatic: Rethinking the Location of Translation in Contemporary Theatre.” InTheatre Translation in Performance, ed. by Silvia Bigliazzi , Paola Ambrosi , and Peter Kofler , 27–37. London: Routledge.
     [Google Scholar]
  38. Millward, James A. , and Laura Newby
    2006 “The Qing and Islam on the Western Front.” InEmpire at the Margins, ed. by Pamela Kyle Crossley , Helen F. Siu , and Donald S. Sutton , 113–134. Berkeley: University of California Press.
     [Google Scholar]
  39. Min, Tian
    2008 The Poetics of Difference and Displacement. Hong Kong: Hong Kong UP.
     [Google Scholar]
  40. Moukhlis, Salah M.
    2010 “Agents of Change, Critical Theory and New Geographies of Postcoloniality.” InPerforming Cultural Diversity: Critiquing Postcolonialism, ed. by Khalid Amine , Barry Tharaud , José Manuel Goñi Pérez , and George F. Robertson , 89–110. Tetouan: Abdelmalek Essaadi UP.
     [Google Scholar]
  41. Newby, Laura
    1996 “Xinjiang: in Search of an Identity.” InUnity and Diversity: Local Cultures and Identities in China, ed. by David Faure , and Tao Tao Liu , 67–81. Hong Kong: Hong Kong University Press.
     [Google Scholar]
  42. O’Toole, Emer
    2011 “Towards Best Intercultural Practice: An Analysis of Tim Supple's pan-Indian A Midsummer Night's Dream.” Journal of Adaptation in Film and Performance4 (3): 289–302. doi: 10.1386/jafp.4.3.289_1
     https://doi.org/10.1386/jafp.4.3.289_1 [Google Scholar]
  43. Pan Pan Theatre Company
    Pan Pan Theatre Company 2006 The Playboy of the Western World Dubl in Programme. Dublin, 13–16December 2006.
     [Google Scholar]
  44. Quinn, Gavin
    2009 Personal Interview. 5Aug 2009.
     [Google Scholar]
  45. Said, Edward
    1978 Orientalism. London: Penguin.
     [Google Scholar]
  46. Sela-Sheffy, Rakefet
    2005 “How to be a (Recognized) Translator: Rethinking Habitus, Norms, and the Field of Translation.” Target17 (1): 1–26. doi: 10.1075/target.17.1.02sel
     https://doi.org/10.1075/target.17.1.02sel [Google Scholar]
  47. Shevstova, Maria
    1997 “Interculturalism, Aestheticism, Orientalism: Starting from Peter Brook's Mahabharata.” Theatre Research International22 (2): 98–104. doi: 10.1017/S0307883300020502
     https://doi.org/10.1017/S0307883300020502 [Google Scholar]
  48. Simeoni, Daniel
    1998 “The Pivotal Status of the Translator's Habitus.” Target10 (1): 1–48. doi: 10.1075/target.10.1.02sim
     https://doi.org/10.1075/target.10.1.02sim [Google Scholar]
  49. 2007 “Translation and Society: The Emergence of a Conceptual Relationship.” InOn Translation: Reflections, Refractions, Transformations, ed. by Paul St-Pierre , and Prafulla C. Kar , 13–26. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. doi: 10.1075/btl.71.05sim
     https://doi.org/10.1075/btl.71.05sim [Google Scholar]
  50. Singleton, Brian
    1997 “The Pursuit of Otherness for the Investigation of Self.” Theatre Research International22 (2): 93–97. doi: 10.1017/S0307883300020496
     https://doi.org/10.1017/S0307883300020496 [Google Scholar]
  51. 2003 “Interculturalism.” InThe Oxford Encyclopedia of Theatre and Performance, ed. by Dennis Kennedy , 628–630. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
     [Google Scholar]
  52. St-Pierre, Paul , and Prafulla C. Kar
    (eds) 2007 On Translation: Reflections, Refractions, Transformations. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. doi: 10.1075/btl.71
     https://doi.org/10.1075/btl.71 [Google Scholar]
  53. The Playboy of the Western World
    The Playboy of the Western World 2006 Dir. Pan Pan Theatre Company. Perf. Xia Zi Xin, Liao Wei, Zhang Wan Kun. Pan Pan: DVD.
  54. The Playboy of the Western World
    The Playboy of the Western World 2007 Dir. Pan Pan Theatre Company. Available at Youtube.com (Accessed 14 April 2010).
     [Google Scholar]
  55. Venuti, Lawrence
    1998 The Scandals of Translation: Towards and Ethics of Difference. London: Routledge. doi: 10.4324/9780203269701
     https://doi.org/10.4324/9780203269701 [Google Scholar]
  56. Wolf, Michaela
    2007a “Introduction: The Emergence of a Sociology of Translation.” InConstructing a Sociology of Translation, ed. by Michaela Wolf , and Alexandra Fukari , 1–38. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. doi: 10.1075/btl.74.01wol
     https://doi.org/10.1075/btl.74.01wol [Google Scholar]
  57. 2007b “The Location of the ‘Translation Field’: Negotiating Borderlines between Pierre Bourdieu and Homi Bhabha.” InConstructing a Sociology of Translation, ed. by Michaela Wolf , and Alexandra Fukari , 109–122. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. doi: 10.1075/btl.74.08wol
     https://doi.org/10.1075/btl.74.08wol [Google Scholar]
  58. Wolf, Michaela , and Alexandra Fukari
    (eds) 2007 Constructing a Sociology of Translation. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. doi: 10.1075/btl.74
     https://doi.org/10.1075/btl.74 [Google Scholar]
  59. Xie, Shaobo
    1997 “Rethinking the Problem of Postcolonialism.” New Literary History28 (1): 7–19. doi: 10.1353/nlh.1997.0009
     https://doi.org/10.1353/nlh.1997.0009 [Google Scholar]
  60. Yue, Sun , and Zhaohui Wang
    2010 Personal Interview. 25Nov 2010.
     [Google Scholar]
  61. Zatlin, Phylis
    2005 Theatre Translation and Film Adaptation: A Practitioner's View. Clevedon: Multilingual Matters.
     [Google Scholar]
/content/journals/10.1075/target.25.3.06aal
Loading
  • Article Type: Research Article
Keyword(s): adaptation; Bourdieu; capital; interculturalism; postcolonialism; theatre; translation

Most Cited

This is a required field
Please enter a valid email address
Approval was successful
Invalid data
An Error Occurred
Approval was partially successful, following selected items could not be processed due to error