From Language to Language - by Souleymane Bachir Diagne (Hardcover)

About the Book

"A renowned Senegalese philosopher explores the power of translation to bridge cultural divides in this engaging humanist text. Informed by his own multicultural background - African, French, and American - Souleymane Bachir Diagne interrogates the practice of translation in this thoughtful text. Although translation often produces a relationship of profound inequality between dominant and dominated languages, it can also be a source of dialogue and exchange, including in situations of asymmetry, particularly regarding colonialism, where the interpreter becomes a true cultural mediator. To praise translation, "the language of languages," is to celebrate their plurality and their equality, because to translate is to give hospitality in one language to what has been thought in another. It is to create reciprocity, a shared sense of humanity, and to imagine a positive version of the Tower of Babel"-- Provided by publisher.

Book Synopsis

In this engaging humanist text, a renowned Senegalese philosopher explores the power of translation to bridge cultural divides.

Informed by his own multicultural background--African, French, and American--Souleymane Bachir Diagne interrogates the practice of translation in this thoughtful text. Although translation often produces a relationship of profound inequality between dominant and dominated languages, it can also be a source of dialogue and exchange, including in situations of asymmetry, particularly regarding colonialism, where the interpreter becomes a true cultural mediator.

To praise translation, "the language of languages," is to celebrate its plurality and equality, because to translate is to give hospitality in one language to what has been thought in another. It is to create reciprocity, a shared sense of humanity, and to imagine a positive version of the Tower of Babel.

Review Quotes

"A broad and vital philosophy of translation as a decolonizing force that serves to build a common humanity...a seminal work that furthers translation scholarship." --Kirkus Reviews

Praise for African Art as Philosophy

"It perfectly articulates all of the answers to the questions one asks oneself when in contact with modern, postmodern, and contemporary Western arts, as well as non-Western traditional arts." --New York Times Book Review

"Diagne has further entrenched his reputation as a clear-sighted thinker." --African Studies Review

About the Author

Souleymane Bachir Diagne is Professor of Philosophy and Francophone Studies at Columbia University. His books include The Ink of the Scholars: Reflections on Philosophy in Africa, Open to Reason: Muslim Philosophers in Conversation with the Western Tradition, Postcolonial Bergson, In Search of Africa(s): Universalism and Decolonial Thought (coauthored with Jean-Loup Amselle), and African Art as Philosophy: Senghor, Bergson, and the Idea of Negritude (Other Press, 2023).

Dylan Temel is a translator and English instructor at the University of Nanterre. He currently lives in Paris.