Lost in translation: The power of language

Abstract

This paper brings together ideas about culture, difference and the importance of translation and interpretation in educational contexts. A key component of this paper is the promotion of curriculum based on a dialogical framework.The paper developed an argument of the impossibility of perfect translation, and points towards linguistic hospitality as the ethical dimension to the inadequate representation of the ‘other’. It highlights the complex role of teacher as translator – an activity that is relational and creative - and the child in translation as a process of metamorphosis rather than reproduction. We were asked to submit this paper to a special Special Issue on Power and Language for Education Philosophy and Theory after presenting a paper on a similar theme at the Philosophy of Education Conference, Brisbane, December, 2008. This special issue is to be re-published in book form in 2012. Educational Philosophy and Theory has an ERA research journal ranking of A+ and a Q score of 19.93. This paper brings together ideas about culture, difference and the importance of translation and interpretation in educational contexts. A key component of this paper is the promotion of curriculum based on a dialogical framework.The paper developed an argument of the impossibility of perfect translation, and points towards linguistic hospitality as the ethical dimension to the inadequate representation of the ‘other’. It highlights the complex role of teacher as translator – an activity that is relational and creative - and the child in translation as a process of metamorphosis rather than reproduction. We were asked to submit this paper to a special Special Issue on Power and Language for Education Philosophy and Theory after presenting a paper on a similar theme at the Philosophy of Education Conference, Brisbane, December, 2008. This special issue is to be re-published in book form in 2012. Educational Philosophy and Theory has an ERA research journal ranking of A+ and a Q score of 19.93. My contribution Each author contributed equally to the structure, organization, development and writing of the paper. Peter Fitzsimons contributed the writing on Nietszche, and I contributed the writing on linguistic hospitality. We worked equally on the theorizing of translation in regard to Foucault and Derrida. My specific contribution develops Ricoeurean concepts in particular the writing on linguistic hospitality. This concept promotes the importance of shared understandings, the role of metaphor in creating new understandings, and the critical role of readership in interpretation.