From Discourse to Practice: Rethinking “Translation” (Terceme) and Related Practices of Text Production in the Late Ottoman Literary Tradition

Abstract

The aim of the present thesis is to explore and analyze on various levels concepts of translation in Ottoman culture in the late nineteenth century. Cemal Demircioğlu’s From Discourse to Practice: Rethinking “Translation” (Terceme) and Related Practices of Text Production in the Late Ottoman Literary Tradition investigates on one level the implications of various discourses on the literary translation activity carried out in this period from the historical-descriptive and systemic perspective in Translation Studies. It also examines the ways in which translation/s contributed to the making of Ottoman literary repertoires in connection with European culture and literature. On another level, it examines culture-specific aspects of Ottoman translation practices, with a special focus on terms and concepts, and suggests rethinking terceme as a culture-bound and time-bound notion of Ottoman translation tradition.

As an exemplary corpus for rethinking “translation” in terms of diverse writing practices, a number of works by Ahmed Midhat Efendi, a significant Tanzimat novelist, translator and journalist, are analyzed with an eye demonstrating diversity, culture-bound and time-bound notions in his translation discourses and practice. The present thesis also offers a comparative analysis of Ahmed Midhat Efendi’s summary translation, Sid’in Hulâsası, of Pierre Corneille’s Le Cid as a case study. The summary translation was chosen because it combines in a single work both paratextual and translation discourse that lend themselves to the analysis of a particular kind of Ottoman text production via translation.

The present thesis is also the first extensive academic research on the history of Ottoman/Turkish (a) translational terms and concepts, and (b) translational practices. It proposes a genealogy and lexicon of translational terms which is intended for the use of researchers. Most importantly, the thesis emphasizes the importance of the distinctions between time-bound and culture-bound practices of translation as terceme in the study of Ottoman translation history. As a result, the present thesis suggests rethinking “translation” in Ottoman culture not in terms of the modern concept of çeviri but of terceme and related practices, without overlooking historical continuity.