On the Ethical Dilemma of Analytic Versus Ontonic Views of Words in Translation Practice and Theory

What are words? How do they behave? What are the implications for written, oral and multimodal approaches to translation?

Life is relational. People, beings, things and words are constantly relating to each other. The way this works, however, can differ considerably from one place to another. Many people see words as entities that exist in the world and do things. For others, words are symbols. In translation, people often treat words as analytical units that are composed of form and meaning. Translation practice then involves exchanging the form while seeking to maintain meaning.

Differences in what words are for people and how they view and relate to them are rarely addressed. Many languages, including biblical Hebrew and Mbelime from northwestern Benin, West Africa, are what we call “ontonic”. By this we mean that words cannot be broken down into form and meaning; rather they are and exist like other beings in the world. In promoting and using an analytic understanding of words implicit in translation theory and practice, we force a specific way of viewing words on local translators and the languages they translate. We suggest that this is an ethical issue whether we take a written or oral approach to translation.

We discuss the ethical implications of this dilemma and suggest that translation theory, especially in its multimodal approach, needs to account for it by drawing on local ideas of how translation works in ontonic languages.