Learning Outcome : Translation Studies

Hello readers...

On 3rd January 2022 we have  workshop on practical translation by Dr.vishal Bhadani sir. 

We have a paper in our syllabus of : Comparative Literature and Translation Studies so this workshop is for that Beacuse it helps us in our better understanding on that paper.

It was the best session on translation studies. When I heard the first time about the translation at that time I was thinking that it's not a big deal.

એમાં શું મોટી વાત છે ? dictionary છે , google છે...it's help us but when i attend thay session than I realised that it's not an easy to translate anything.

Vishal Bhadani :-

He is the director at International_Center_for_Applied_Gandhian_Studies. He is a very good translator.He has translated many books from Gujarati to English such as અકૂપાર - The Blue Marble , તિમિરપંથી - The Pilgrims of Darkness.Apart from this he has translated many books.

Vishal sir said that "Translation is mental gymnastics."

It was an amazing session. He presented his translator journey as his love story.He is a very creative person. He gave a seven metaphor for better understanding. And also talk about the myths on the translation studies.

So let's see what kind of learning outcomes from that workshop:-

1) Has your understanding of translation improved?

Yes my understanding of translation is improved after this workshop. Before that workshop I think that translation of any text it's easy that if we have proper dictionary and proper sense that we can do it but I was wrong.  In the first session sir talk about the how his love story started with translation. And he very significantly explained all that approaches. 

Gayatri Spivak said,

"Translation is the closest reading of text".

 

And yes I have one believe that all we can  translate all the words but I was wrong. It's difficult to find a perfect meaning of some religious words and some ancient words. For that we have to go for another search in deeply.  

They gave one example like:

1) ડામ દેવો:-

There is no perfect meaning of this word ડામ on Google.

For that we have to go for sardar patel's biography because in thier childhood they faced that problem. So that's the thing. 

It's really amazing session which is totally changed my mindset towards the translation studies.

2) મા તે મા બીજા બધા વનવગડા ના વા:-

There is no change in the translation on Google.

Sir translated this sentence like...

Mother is Mother બાકી બધું other

2) Can you write about translation in terms of metaphors? 

Yes we can. Sir gave a seven metaphors and it's help us to understand translation in better way. Metaphors like nature, mythology, epic, culture, music.

1] The Moon :- 

The moon's calmness is the translation of the sun's light. And that's like translation of any text is the reflection of real text .

2] Ganesha's head :- 

This is the very significant metaphor it's reflecting that to put the similar thing instead of the original; it means we can use the similar words in place of the original words. That looks similar to the original. 

3] Kevat :- 

We know that famous scene of Rama and Kevat. So Rama is a text and that woman is a dictionary and kevat is a translator. It means while translating you need the help of a dictionary.

4] Western - Eastern Culture :- 

Exchange of one another's culture. It means that while translating any of text we accept that culture of anywhere.

5)Chess_Cat :-

 Be a cat who sit infront of chess like when you try  translated something than you have to decide the next step of your move.

6) Music Notation:-

There is rythem in music like સા રે ગા મા પા ધા ની સા. we have to translate some songs than we don't sing in that rythem it will change in translation.

7) Panghat:-

This is picture you see the both side evil and good side. So in the translation we have to careful about the words.

3) What according to you is the most difficult aspect of practical translation?

 I find most difficult aspect is to find a most significant word instead of real word in the text. It's happen that we not find a proper meaning of particular word in the dictionary and Google also. So that's thing I find difficult in the translation.

4) learning outcome from the workshop :- 

It was an amazing session. We really learnt a lot from this session.

Translation is an epistemological excercise.

(Science of Knowledge)

In practical translation you have to play with words. 

Sir said that "It's neck of translation."

You have to be poetic.

In the machine translation there is lack of playfulness. You can't play with words.

 first thing is that translation doesn't seem to work in the one single field.:

There is various fields like:

1)Humanities and fine Arts

2)Journalism and mass media 

3)Commerce

4)law

5)Education

6)Science

7)Social work

8)Engineering

9)Architecture

10)Management

Sir suggested some reading website :

1)scroll.com.in

2) The wire

3)The Washington Post

4)Big think

5)MIT

6) Service Space

In sir's translation he find some ancient words and it's difficult to find their meaning so he used the visuals for some words:-

1) ગણેશિયો

2) દંગો

3) ભારંડ

4) નેહડો

5) કરમણ

G.N.Devi in his article mention that..

In western metaphysics translation is an excile , a fall from the origin and the mythical excile.

We also aware about myths about translation:

1)Untranslatability 

2)Translation is a small industry

3)Most translators translate book

4)Machine translation is crushing the demand for human translation

5)Translation is either beautiful or faithful. 

So these are all myths, there is scope in the translation field, machines can not translate regional words. So my understanding of translation has improved. 

Sir also gave sentence for translation in study:-

1) મે મારી બેન ને પરણાવી.

2) જે આનંદ બધા સાથે વેહચતો નથી એ અપૂર્ણ છે.

                                            - Shree Aurobindo

3)ઝેર તો પીધા છે જાણી જાણી

4) મારા લોકભારતી ના શિક્ષણે મારી કેળવણી કરી.

So I would request you try to translate this sentences. 

So it was an amazing session. We really learnt a lot from that workshop.

Thank you to Vishal sir providing a unique perspective. And we can also grateful to Dilip sir for arranging such a wonderful workshop.

 Some glimpse:-

Thank you.....