Translating the “little narratives”: Mediation, Negotiation and Historiography

Abstract

Translation has always facilitated the dissemination of knowledge and literature, across linguistic, geographic and cultural borders. We in India live in a society that uses and understands the language of division, discrimination and fission. The worst kind of discrimination happens when one is segregated for what one is born as. Not only is there discrimination against groups who belong to the lower rungs of the social hierarchy, members of such groups are victims of social constructions by being characterized and stereotyped. 75 years of Indian Independence is a long time and also the perfect time for re-evaluation of our social structures. This paper intends to explore some issues involved in the translation of writings by members of such discriminated groups, specifically Dalit writers from Bengal, from my own experience as a translator. These are writings from the margins, the “little narratives” that usually tend to get disregarded and brushed under the carpet. I strongly believe that translation of such narratives helps to propagate the voices of resistance. Through this paper I also intend to identify the processes of mediation and negotiation that happen in such translations, and the importance of translation as historiography as far as Dalit writing is concerned.