The Translatability of Texts: A Historical Overview

Abstract

This paper critically surveys the different approaches to the (un)translatability of texts, giving special attention to the theories generated in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. It analyses the views of scholars who adopted a monadist stance (such as Edward Sapir) and those who chose a universalist interpretation (Eugene A. Nida, for instance). It is argued that the shift of attention away from the concept of untranslatability, which has characterised recent theories is only superficial and that it has resulted, on the one hand, from the expansion of the concept of translation itself and, on the other, from a wish to leave behind traditional, ideologically motivated arguments which could be perceived as problematic.