Cette entrevue trace des chemins de Boris Brummans, ethnographe en communication organisationnelle, dans une conversation avec Marie-Claude Plourde.

This article, which continues ideas developed in the context of the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft: Graduiertenkolleg 1876—215342465 (GRK1876), examines how animals are used in medieval texts to (re)present, shape, and develop the literary representation of emotions. On the basis of selected examples, it shows how diverse the literary functions of animal imagery can be and how many different poetic and aesthetic strategies can be found for staging animals, connecting them with human characters and the recipients of the tale. In this way, animals (...) can serve as objects of cultural self-reflection and as models for philosophical orientation. (shrink)

The purpose of this manuscript is to educate scholars about emerging approaches to critical quantitative research. We begin by providing our positionalities as scholars to situate ourselves within this content. Next, we overview quantitative criticalism and explore tensions inherent within this approach. Following, we discuss quantitative criticalism examples in education research to highlight specific quantitative methods and critical theories and to overview opportunities for using quantitative criticalism. We close by providing implications for our intended audiences, primarily directing our recommendations to (...) scholars who employ quantitative methods and/or critical perspectives in education research. (shrink)

This interview on Meta-Education, published in the Theory and History of Education International Research Group’s Open Monograph Series, is conducted by Prof. Nicholas Burbules of the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign with the author, James Scott Johnston. The interview is wide-ranging and discusses topics and issues arising from the monograph. Chief among these include the importance of a philosophy of education that resists dominant political ideologies. The nature of ideologies and their role in politics is also discussed. The importance of resistance (...) in each of the main functions of education – teaching and learning, the curriculum, and schools and schooling – is addressed. Finally, certain ways of introducing students to philosophy of education are critiqued for their subtle invocations of ideology. (shrink)

The decline of public education and the concomitant loss of the commons are increasingly recognized as significant and interwoven issues. Like other prevailing societal problems, such as the tenacity of institutionalized racism, classism, and patriarchy, these conditions are rooted in the ways growing numbers of people have come to think and act – socially, economically, politically, and intellectually. In a word, they are structural problems. As such, they require educators and others concerned with the health of society and well-being of (...) the planet to address not only the observable symptoms but also the underlying factors that have spawned and perpetuated the systems in the first place. Critical scholars generally understand that problematic structural conditions are produced and maintained by prevailing systems of thought and action, that they evolve within particular social and historical contexts, and that they have often been instituted through oppressive mechanisms of persuasion and control. Less understood are the ways these intersecting systems, contexts, and mechanisms are perpetuated via largely “invisible” perceptual and temporal factors that obscure the processes at play. Understanding the relationships between these various factors is essential to effectively addressing the challenges we face. This paper synthesizes the literature in critical theory, ecological philosophy and living systems theories, Indigenous studies, and the sociology of knowledge to examine these intersecting factors and to consider implications for theory and practice in education. (shrink)

I begin this essay with an autobiographical introduction to explain why I studied philosophy and how I came to work in bioethics. I then consider three ethical frameworks and practices that I adopted in my work in bioethics. I begin with the framework that John Rawls makes explicit, where the purpose of ethical theory is to set out aims and objectives to guide our responses to the world. Since this approach did not provide the guidance that I was looking for, (...) I took up writing haiku as an ethical practice. I present here many examples of haiku that I wrote to pay attention to situations in life and bioethics. The hope was that paying attention would lead me to respond in better ways. Since this practice helped me more with attending than responding, I turned to a third framework. Here I explore John Dewey’s ethical framework. After characterizing this framework, I consider features that an associated practice needs to have. In a brief conclusion, I note some affinities between the second and third ethical approaches, and note that the last ethical framework adopted may just be the latest stage in trying out frameworks and practices. (shrink)

This article articulates some of the historic as well as the main philosophic contributions to the transitional period in educational thought in America, 1866-1895. This is a period in which the movement away from idealism towards pragmatism as the basis for educational thought began. Contemporaneous with the development of pragmatism was a development in educational thought that stressed naturalism, functionalism, and the organic nature of mind and behaviour. As idealism laid claim to the dominant philosophy in America in the period (...) 1866-1895, so too did it lay claim to being the dominant philosophic presupposition of educational thought. It was the first American philosophy of education: America’s first philosophy of education was not pragmatist; it was idealist, though this would change, beginning in the mid-1890’s. As pragmatism began to take hold of philosophy at the fin de siècle, so too did it begin to take hold of, and later dominate, the philosophic presuppositions of educational thought. (shrink)

The Canadian province of Ontario introduced philosophy as a secondary school subject in 1995 (Pinto, McDonough, & Boyd, 2009). Since publicly-funded Catholic schools teach approximately 32% of all students in Ontario (Ontario Ministry of Education, 2022), the question arises regarding how teachers in those schools coordinate philosophy and Catholic teachings. This study employs a secondary analysis of interviews with six teachers from Ontario’s Catholic schools, and employs two of Avery Dulles’ (2002) conceptions of church (institution and mystical communion) to determine (...) how they consider the choices available within their own tradition that could answer this question. Rather than looking only at the shortcomings of treating magisterial teaching as philosophy, this paper argues that there are also conceptual problems that these courses must address in order to improve their ecclesiological adequacy, and illustrates how an apparent null curriculum privileges the institutional ecclesiology. (shrink)

Preparing students to deal with and tolerate uncertainty or ambiguity is a major issue in medical education. There are many English-language scales to assess tolerance of uncertainty and ambiguity but no French-language scale has ever demonstrated validity evidence for its scores. We selected the Tolerance of Ambiguity in Medical Students And Doctors (TAMSAD) scale. Through a structured process, the original questionnaire was translated, culturally adapted, and assessed after being administered to a sampling of medical students. Test-retest reliability was verified by (...) presenting the questionnaire to the students again after two months. The assessment of internal consistency revealed satisfactory value. Test-retest reliability is assessed by intraclass correlation that presents good reproducibility of scores obtained by students in first completion and second completion. These results indicate that the French version of the TAMSAD scale can be used to assess French medical students’ tolerance to ambiguity. (shrink)

In this article, we advance preliminary theoretical reflections on Manfred Max Neef’s thoughts related to the human scale development. From an and transdisciplinary perspective, we argue that Max-Neef moves beyond the field of Ecological Economics towards developing a Deep Economic framework, linked to the Deep Ecology framework outlined by the Norwegian philosopher Arne Næss. We elaborate our argument around two dimensions: a) Biocentrism, based on the conviction that ecology is not limited to reflections and actions toward a balanced and healthy (...) environment to achieve humans´ well-being, but involves all forms of life and ecosystems. b) The intrinsic value of life, a complex idea that Max-Neef expressed in his conviction that the “reverence for life” cannot be solely subjected to human economic activity or interest. Biocentrism and the intrinsic value of life must be approached from a transdisciplinary and organic perspective that demands a dialogue between science-academics, non-combining reason with intuition, ethics, and beauty. this way, these two dimensions become principles that articulate Max-Neef´s Deep Economy, different to other critical approaches in the field of economics. (shrink)

Locke is generally taken as promoting an ethics of belief. For him, we must apply a doxastic norm so that we properly conduct our understanding. Thus, he forcefully highlights one key epistemic norm, the norm of evidence, that prescribes that we adjust the strength of our assent to the available evidence. I shall argue that Of the Conduct of the Understanding constitutes the framework within which Locke’s remarks in the Essay must be inserted. Far from promoting a mere ethics of (...) belief, Locke actually promotes a virtue epistemology, or an ethics of virtuous thinking. Contrary to doxastic anti-voluntarism, this new way of apprehending Locke’s remarks does not downplay the role of the will. But compared to doxastic voluntarism, it gives its due role to the will (it is not devoted to the control of our assent, but to the ordering the consideration of an idea, or the forbearing to consider it, which is at the bottom of the acquisition of intellectual habits). Moreover, it takes into account important aspects of our intellectual life, namely diachronic and social aspects. (shrink)

When metadata becomes knowledge, opportunities for multiplicity and risks of harm and exclusion arise. As GLAM institutions contribute to the Semantic Web, we must pay attention to the implications of participation. While the Semantic Web grew out of the flourishing of web technologies in the 1990s, recognizing its roots in classical/symbolic AI —in particular, expert systems and knowledge representation—encourages critical questions like: which problems from knowledge representation and expert systems does the Semantic Web inherit? Are GOFAI failures really failures, or (...) does the gap between rhetoric and practice point to generative possibilities? What can we learn from AI critics, feminist approaches, and the unmasking of encyclopedic neutrality? This research article will explore how critiques of AI expert systems and Cyc, an ongoing project to create a common sense knowledge base, might apply to Semantic Web efforts like Wikipedia, Wikidata, DBpedia, and Schema. org. (shrink)

A discussion of Robert Hahn’s The Metaphysics of the Pythagorean Theorem: Thales, Pythagoras, Engineering, Diagrams, and the Construction of the Cosmos out of Right Triangles.

We build this work from the memory of the time we stumbled into tulips at city hall. As guard sirens fled off into the night, we wondered, “Maybe we can borrow some.” We ripped handfuls from the ground and ran. “Don’t worry,” we said, “they are too busy to catch us stealing tulips.” Likewise, we get away with this useless project because others are busy doing useful work: exigent, coherent, important work. We support much of that busyness, and at the (...) same time wonder what is lost with all that attention towards usefulness. What we offer here, through a hybrid of reflective, poetic, essayistic and scholarly forms, may be an attempted escape from the obligations of scholarship. It may be indulgent. It may tell the reader nothing, or only what the reader already knows. Yet it is oriented towards an enduring promise. This is the promise of a literary experience, understood as a kind of resonance, ineffable primarily, but nevertheless one that matters. Such a promise is found in the power and possibility of story, through poetic lines that must be broken and conceptual tethers left incommensurable. We enter this space of breaking and unfurling through an inquiry into use.The question of use and uselessness is one way of holding human contradictions in both hands. By this we mean that we make and leave space for literary and philosophical inquiries considered useless—in that they do not resolve anything—but nevertheless matterful. We suggest that readers meander these curated pages as they \ meander through an art exhibition or a museum. Within a literary exhibition one can wander through pages, spaces, and ideas. Pause. Dwell. Think. We curate a literary home beyond the demands of making something of use and we invite the reader to sit with us. As with an exhibition, possibility cannot be controlled for and so we exist in potentiality acknowledging both its positive and negative potential. Through our use, misuse, and abuse of literature and philosophy, we make ourselves a home in a possibility that can only be offered, not demanded. We manifest this literary home through fragments of philosophy evoked through a series of microfictions.As scholars, learners, teachers, and writers we are often asked to defend what our writing does. And it is implicitly suggested that knowledge creation is the result. What is the use of a work that cannot promise new knowledge? Literary knowledge may only be one gorgeous possible ordering. It is a practice which produces a kind of knowledge which is no knowledge, which is useless. If we must answer what it is that our writing does we suppose that—if anything—it offers up fictions for philosophizing. We explore a home for this work in scholarly contexts which too often find it useless, which is to say we position uselessness as a concept of value for our work as scholars, writers, and teachers. In the end we name no new uses but fiction; we steal tulips. (shrink)

A series of recent legal and policy developments in Canada have potential to contribute to reconciliation efforts, particularly related to the overrepresentation of Indigenous children in child welfare systems. However, systematic collection, analysis, and synthesis of research knowledge—particularly, research that is locally grounded—on Indigenous child welfare involvement is notably missing from these efforts. With the aim of collating existing research knowledge on this topic, this scoping review of literature includes a broad swath of literature spanning decades (1973-2018) and countries with (...) similar settler colonial histories (Canada, the United States, Australia, and New Zealand). Our search yielded 881 unique research publications. There was an increase in the number of publications over time in all four countries and a trend toward more empirical literature than non-empirical literature. We found that a plurality of publications focused on programs and services (n = 191), and policy or legal (n = 168) themes. While our review highlights a large base of literature on Indigenous child welfare involvement, it also illustrates the limits of the academic literature in representing the knowledge and experience of Indigenous Peoples and the need for more comprehensive synthesis and broader dissemination of the research related to Indigenous child welfare. These limitations restrict the extent to which existing research can inform the meaningful development of Indigenous child welfare policy in Canada. Due to these gaps, we advocate sustained investment in efforts to synthesize diverse sources of knowledge, support for open source publications, and structural support for Indigenous control of knowledge collection and dissemination regarding policy development related to their communities. (shrink)

Mobilizing prevalent themes in the fields of mathematics education, literary criticism, and philosophy, this paper contextualizes ‘the mathematical’, ‘mathematical thinking’, and ‘mathematical pedagogy’ with respect to ancient Greek concept of mathesis, modern notions of mathematical agency, the Keatsian concept of negative capability, and the analogy of ‘staging’ a dramatic/mathematical ‘play’. Its central claim is that mathematization is dramatization—that learning mathematics is an activity of setting things up and allowing things to play out. Beginning with Paul Ernest’s identification of the difference (...) between absolutism and fallibilism in the philosophy of math education, and incorporating concepts from Pythagoras, Hippasus, Heraclitus, Descartes, Kant, Keats, as well as Freud, Heidegger, and Badiou, we argue that ‘mathematical knowledge’ cannot be understood simply within the framework of logicism, formalism, or even simply as an epistemological articulation. Rather, we endeavour to show that the process of ‘learning mathematically’ allows us to gain insight into the foundations of ‘being’ itself. Learning to learn proceeds, as such, by way of staging and playing-out the half-known or unknown in the hopes of uncovering the mystery at the heart of things. (shrink)

Professor Roger T. Ames is Professor in the Department of Philosophy at the University of Hawai‘i, Manoa. The following is a short excerpt from an interview with Professor Ames that took place on the eve of 2009 PESA Conference, December 1, 2009. Heesoon Bai, Editor of Paideusis, accompanied by Avraham Cohen, interviewed Professor Ames in his office.

In teacher education programs, there is a prevalent belief that having teacher candidates compose personalized ‘my philosophy of education’ statements is a valuable exercise that prepares them for the teaching profession. This paper argues that the prevailing intentions for, and common practice of, assigning these MPE statements to teacher candidates are problematic because they distort both the discipline of philosophy and the purpose of philosophy of education courses. The argument’s first section situates the practice of assigning MPE statements within the (...) context of teacher education programs’ strong commitments to social constructivism and the reflective practitioner, and relates the problems associated with those commitments. It then reviews literature that describes the common properties and practices of assigning MPE statements. The second and third sections then develop the arguments that MPEs rely on and reinforce distortions of philosophy as a discipline and misconceptions about the purposes of philosophy of education courses in teacher education programs. Those two arguments share a theme that MPE statements reduce philosophy and philosophizing about education to declaring and clarifying an unexamined personal commitment, and hence drift toward enabling relativism. Finally, the conclusion relates how, in conjunction with those distortions, the use of MPE statements has acquired the function of certifying a teacher’s suitability to fit within the status quo. This situation, it claims, unfortunately distracts candidates and others in the teaching profession from developing their critical philosophical skills in responding to the epistemic, moral, and political realities of education and schooling. (shrink)

Recess is often a topic overlooked in pedagogical theory due to its presumed simplicity. The essence of recess connects with play as a physical counterpart to a well-rounded education. In this article we explore the relationship play has with recess and well-being and explore its pragmatikos (systematic usefulness) as regards schooling in lieu of deep ecological frameworks of systems (wholism) theory and systemic, nonlinear dynamics. We argue that recess in its current conceptualisation—in contradistinction to work or study—is a counterfeit to (...) metaphysical play based on the writings of Ananda K. Coomaraswamy who sheds light on its spiritual premise. By bringing to the forefront metaphysical Ideas of play we encounter similitudes between the Platonic doctrine of ēdūcere and anamnesis with Buddhist phenomenology, especially regarding the practice of Mindfulness (sati); both extol a “recollection” as opposed to a “memorisation” which arguably occupies much of Westernised curriculum. Finally, in traditional, premodern education, emphasis was placed on Spirit and heartfelt intuition, a remembrance of who we are, our Buddha-nature or Christhood, not on cerebral ratiocination whose mental operation, according to Plato, was tenebrous and illusory. Our aspiration is not an education that includes mindfulness, rather, a mindfulness-based education. (shrink)

This is a paper about the culture of the Inuit in the Nunavut Territory of the Canadian Arctic, and the role that education should take in preventing its slow dilution, demise, and loss. The measures to be taken are evident. Inuit philosophy (Inuit Qaujimajatuqangit) must be the framework, and Inuit must be in control, not only of policy and curricula, but also of the school system, the schools, and the classrooms. It can take decades for outsiders embedded in a different (...) culture to communicate and see through an unfamiliar worldview. Inuit do not have the luxury of time to wait for this to happen. Non-Inuit need to understand what Inuit are saying, to appreciate what they aim to achieve, and then get out of the way. If this is not done, the Inuit culture will go the way of so many other Indigenous cultures that once flourished. It’s inconceivable that we non-Inuit Canadians are willing not only to watch this happen but continue to be the cause. (shrink)

This paper discusses how theories of definition and probabilistic theories of categorization could help distinguish between translation and adaptation, and eventually between translation and adaptation studies. Part I suggests readopting the common parlance definition of “translation” as the accurate rendition of the meaning of a verbal expression in another natural language, and “adaptation” as change that leads to better fit. Readopting these common parlance definitions entails categorical implications. The author discusses three parameters: whereas “translation” represents an invariance-oriented, semiotically invested, cross-lingual (...) phenomenon, “adaptation” refers to a variance-oriented phenomenon, which is not semiotically invested, and entails better fit. Part II discusses how theories of categorization could help distinguish between TS and LFAS. The study of the disciplinarization of knowledge involves epistemic and socio-political conditioners. This section concludes that medium specificity, i.e., the linguistic versus lit-film paradigm, plays a major role in separating TS from LFAS. Another player that deserves more attention is the Romantic as opposed to the Classicist value system. (shrink)

This paper argues that while the classical, essentialist conception of identity is appealing due to its simplicity, it does not adequately capture the complexity of professional or individual identity. The appeal to essentialism in librarianship contributes to some serious problems for the profession, such as exclusion and homogeneity in the workplace, high attrition rates of minority librarians, exploitation and alienation of an underrepresented workforce, as well as stereotyping. This paper examines the theoretical landscape with regard to the identity question and (...) proposes a more fitting alternative to essentialism, namely the relational conception of identity, and engages in a philosophical argument for the adoption of the relational account as a theoretical grounding for an understanding of the complex, fluid, and emergent nature of librarian identity within our dynamic profession. (shrink)

This paper investigates the intersection of big data and philosophy of education by considering big data’s potential for addressing learning via a holistic process of coming-to-know. Learning, in this sense, cannot be reduced to the difference between a pre- and post-test, for example, as it is constituted at least as much by qualities of experience as it is the situation, process of inquiry and its consequences. Long a perennial concern of philosophers of education, the author suggests that big data offers (...) a budding opportunity for philosophers to engage in dialogue with empirical research in order to better understand the process of learning as coming-to-know. Drawing on John Dewey’s theory of inquiry and his philosophy of experience, the author demonstrates ways that both empirical and philosophical research stands to benefit from cross-dialogue. In offering an unprecedented glimpse of empirical detail, the author proposes that big data stands to afford new insights into this most complex human process and that Dewey’s philosophy offers a vital lens of interpretation that can help philosophers of education to make use of this data in addressing the perennial question of how humans come-to-know. (shrink)

Friedrich Nietzsche is generally considered the precursor of postmodern philosophy, the basis of which are: Antichrist and a call for a re-evaluation of all values, a negation of conventional metaphysics, an insistence on perspectivism, a rejection of Enlightenment rationality and the advocation of will to power. Nietzsche’s postmodern philosophy and his thought on translation play a fundamental role in postmodern translation studies, uncrowning the author as God of the text, liberating the translator, and enlarging the space of multi interpretative signifiers. (...) Meanwhile, his insights have helped extricate translators from ethical questions about their re-creativity, encourage them to develop a translator’s subjectivity and consequently broaden the horizon of translation studies. Such radical thoughts as perspectivism in interpretation, re-evaluation of Christian values, a historical sense of the past, and the conquest of the Ancient, especially by translation, can also be applied to his thoughts on translation, though not so systematic as they are, initiating an inspiring postmodern approach to translation studies, and exerting a lasting and profound influence on his followers like Heidegger, Gadamer, Benjamin, Pound, Derrida, Steiner, Lefevere, Venuti, etc. An elaborative review of Nietzsche’s insightful ideas as such should clarify the genealogy of postmodern translation studies in general. (shrink)

Many symposia and special journal issues over the last several decades have been devoted to concerns over the decline of philosophy in teacher education programs. I pursued an answer for my doctoral project and found institutional explanations are rarely invoked in the “decline literature.” I have sketched here the theory, and have shown it to be equally applicable to the last several decades of this literature. I argue that institutional organizational theory shows how teacher education institutions have changed over time (...) in a way that ultimately rendered the environment less and less hospitable to philosophy of education curriculum and faculty. Particular attention is paid to the educational context of Ontario, Canada, but I also include the wider American and British decline literature. In the final pages I offer de-institutionalizing solutions that, if realized, could provide a new soil in which philosophy and other humanities fields could take root again in teacher preparation programs. (shrink)

How concerned should we be about the state and status of philosophy of education? To this familiar worry, I maintain that there is no need to worry. In this essay, I try to secure this conclusion, not by shoring up the authority and identity of the discipline, but by asking the fundamental question: Who is and should be the audience for philosophers of education, and what does philosophy of education owe to whom? I argue that to be worthy of that (...) name, philosophy of education ought to have educational significance and continue being philosophical, requiring the discipline to serve the interests of all the three audiences—other philosophers of education, non-philosophical educators, and non-educational philosophers. Through a close analysis of several important scholarly materials concerning the range, quality and relevance of philosophy of education, I urge that working out its disciplinary nature in a broad context of philosophy makes the discipline capable of fulfilling that promise. (shrink)

What is at stake in high school philosophy education, and why? Why is it a good idea to teach philosophy at this level? This essay seeks to address some issues that arose in revising the Ontario grade 12 philosophy curriculum documents, significant insights from philosophy teacher education, and some early results of recent research funded by the federal Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council in Canada. These three topics include curricular disputes, stories of transformation from philosophy student to philosophy teacher, (...) and preliminary research findings. All underscore the importance and complexity of philosophy education, as well as its challenges and benefits, including the cross-curricular benefits philosophy education imparts to the study of other subject areas. Collectively, these serve as a springboard for asking some larger and broader philosophical questions about the teaching and learning of philosophy, and they demonstrate that this is a promising new area of study and of teaching for philosophers of education. I will raise some questions about philosophy that will help frame the next stage in the SSHRC research into the teaching and learning of philosophy in Ontario, and which I contend are new and fundamental questions to ask about philosophy itself. (shrink)

This article presents a perspective on the current state of transformative learning theory. It shows how the literature surrounding transformative learning caused it to evolve into a metatheory. This article then offers a definition of transformative learning as a, as well as three criteria that delimit the learning phenomena that the metatheory encompasses. To illustrate how scholars might evaluate epistemological change in terms of its part in an overall transformation, this article explores how and when epistemological change can be considered (...) transformative. (shrink)

In this study, a new model of translation as a general theoretic concept and as a social practice is outlined, drawing form Greimassian semiotics. As a theoretic concept, translation is defined by the Semiotic Square of Translation as the emergence of the general category self coming into being in relation to the category non-self, through the semio-logic operations that correlate the immanent concepts, equivalence and difference. As a social practice, translation arises from the contractual interaction between two actants, the Initiator (...) and the Translator, which operate through acts of manipulation, performance and sanction. This theoretical framework is applied to the study of a parallel corpus. (shrink)

This paper examines Shellenberger and Nordhaus’ “Evolve: The Case for Modernization as the Road to Salvation” from the perspective of psychopathology. ”Evolve” articulates an all too common denial about the severe implications of the Anthropocene. This denial, I suggest, derives from modern humanity’s wish to save itself from the threats of ecocide and apocalypse without having to change its modernist ways. Upon considering this understandable inclination towards denial, the paper unveils the resultant manic-depressive opposition between ecomodernism and deep ecology. Modern (...) humanity’s respective manic and depressive reactions to these two poles fosters a manic, escapist denial that promotes modernist expansion and limits our capacity to reform Anthropocene discourse and avoid environmental crisis. The analogy between bipolar disorder and the ecomodernism / deep ecology opposition draws from Darian Leader’s Lacanian psychoanalytic account, as well as his phenomenological-psychiatric influences. (shrink)

This paper presents findings from qualitative interviews with five Jewish people — two Rabbis and three workers in various community service capacities — about their understandings and practices of the Jewish principle of tikkun olam. Tikkun olam is a Hebrew phrase that means “the repair of the world,” has its roots in Rabbinic law, the Kabbalah and the ‘Aleinu prayer, and became a mainstream term for Jewish social justice work and community contribution in North America following the Shoah. In this (...) study, participants spoke to the imperative to act and responsibility; external tikkun and internal tikkun; collectivity and interconnectedness; the presence of Jewish history in their work, particularly in the case of the Holocaust; and the spiritual dimension of working with people. This study was undertaken with a narrative approach, to honour and preserve understandings of tikkun olam across Jewish communities. This study indicates the continuing influence of tikkun olam in settings both within and outside the Jewish community. Potential future areas of research are the role of spirituality in social workers’ commitment to social justice and the commitment expressed by several participants to work with Aboriginal people based on a shared history of cultural genocide. (shrink)

This article discusses how, in addition to providing a definition for translation, the concept of equivalence may explain why we can say that sentence S in language L is a translation of sentence S1 in language L1. It analyzes two main kinds of equivalence that are used in analytical philosophy to define translation: semantic equivalence and functional equivalence. This analysis shows that drawing a distinction between semantic and functional equivalence is a way to understand the distinction between different levels or (...) aspects of meaning. Both semantic equivalence, introduced by Gottlob Frege, and functional equivalence, proposed by Wilfrid Sellars, were developed in Donald Davidson’s theory of meaning. After discussing the limits of Davidson’s definitions of equivalence, this article will argue that functional equivalence is a reason for comparing Davidson’s philosophy to positions such as those expressed by Hans-Georg Gadamer’s hermeneutics. (shrink)

Translating culture poses fundamental problems of perception and conception far deeper than matters of linguistic expression. This essay explores some of these problems by examining Fusheng liuji (Six Records of a Floating Life), a Chinese autobiographical text that has been translated into fourteen Asian and European languages. Even without going into the details of the rendered versions, one can notice various forms of intercultural mediation and reshaping in the translated titles and added subtitles. At one end is direct, partly helpless (...) substitution: lexically flawless “float” cannot encompass the rich matrix of philosophical connotations and artistic resonances of fu in the source culture. At the other end is active reshaping: recasting, addition and omission based on interpretive (mis)reading, including a reduction of imagistic language into abstract concept (e.g., fu becomes “fleeting”). Through examining 17 renditions of the title of Fusheng liuji, this essay offers a case study that helps to cast light on the unavoidable factor of intercultural mediation in the translation process, with special focus on the translation of philosophical and aesthetic concepts. Some forms of mediation carry more significant effects than others, and there may be differences in verbal resources and orientations in various languages worthy of notice. (shrink)

Walter Benjamin’s essay “The Task of the Translator,” the most widely cited twentieth century philosophical statement on translation, is commonly seen as one of the most opaque and misunderstood essays in the field. This paper uses a close reading of Benjamin’s doctoral thesis, “The Concept of Criticism in German Romanticism,” to throw light on his thoughts on translation. I argue that the German Romantics’ definition of art, and art’s relation to criticism, are crucial to understanding why Benjamin conceived of translation (...) as an “afterlife” of the work of art, why he believed that translatability is an innate quality of the work of art, and why he speaks of translation as moving the work of art onto a higher plane. I read Benjamin’s own essay on translation as a sort of “criticism” which seeks to “translate” the philosophical ideals of the Romantics, and thus give them an afterlife, and then reflect upon the implications for translation studies today. (shrink)

Simultaneous conference interpreting represents a highly complex linguistic task and a very delicate process of information transfer. Consequently, the notion of truth – which applied to the field of simultaneous interpreting entails an accurate rendition of the original message – is of pivotal importance. In spite of that, an analysis of experimental transcripts and corpora sometimes seems to suggest that interpreters betray the speaker by deliberately altering the original. While we cannot exclude that such instances do exist, we argue that (...) sometimes what looks like betrayal may in fact be a rendition based on a sound ethical decision. In this paper we take a closer look at these situations in an attempt to shed more light on the potential motivations underlying the interpreter’s decisions and actions. Using examples from real life interpreting situations, we take the interpreter’s output and put what at first sight appears to be a betrayal of the speaker on the ethical test bench, both from a deontological and a teleological perspective. Based on this analysis we propose a model suggesting that the interpreter uses three principal message components, verbal, semantic and intentional, in order to come up with an accurate interpretation of the original, which we call “truthful rendition.”. (shrink)