We are current and former members of the School of Arts and Humanities at the University of Stirling (Scotland) and affiliated scholars from other institutions and have closely related research interests in fields dealing with different forms of Christianity. In particular we are interested in the ways in which richly diverse ‘Christianities’ have been translated through globally diverse and significant – sometimes devastating – cultural interactions.
Little work has been done to date on critical approaches to the dominant discourses of Western Society, shaped as they are by a heritage which is frequently described as Christian. Therefore ou research focuses on issues of translation and particularly the translation of texts, practices and concepts identified as Christian, from one language and (sub)culture into another, reflecting an interest in translation both in its linguistic and in its socio-cultural sense. The texts and practices to be studied comprise a wide range of discourse types and styles, such as written texts, dramatic and ritual performances, visual representations and oral traditions. The principal objective of the Centre will be to entertain multiple perspectives and methodological approaches (religious studies, history, languages studies and linguistics, anthropology, literary and gender studies) in addressing the issue of how cultural contents such as religious canons, beliefs and/or practices found in mainstream, dominant, elite sectors of society both change and are changed in the process of translation into minority, marginalised or subaltern contexts.
So far these colloquia were held at Stirling:
- Translating Christianity (May 2008)
- Saints and Cultural Trans/Mission (May 2010)
- Translating Christianities (December 2015)
The most recent one is
Papers form the 2015 and 2017 colloquia have been published in:
Translating Wor(l)ds: Explaining Christianity across Cultural Boundaries, Sabine Dedenbach-Salazar Sáenz (ed.). (Collectanea Instituti Anthropos 51.) Baden-Baden: Academia Verlag.
For information see https://www.nomos-elibrary.de/10.5771/9783896657954-1/titelei-inhaltsverzeichnis.
Contact:
Sabine Dedenbach-Salazar – sabinededenbach[at]gmail.com
[20 July 2022]