Navigating Language and Power: Insights into Translation in Political Theory

Session Submission Type: Full Paper Panel

Session Description

This panel comprises four papers centered on the theme of translation at different levels within political theory.
At a broader level, “Native American Ethics and the Tradition of Virtues” by Samuel Piccolo (Gustavus Adolphus College) explores translation as an understanding between different intellectual traditions. Piccolo argues for compatibility between Native American political thought and neo-Aristotelian virtue ethics, seeking to facilitate cross-cultural dialogues. Conversely, in “Yan Fu’s translation of the concept of liberty,” Hyemin Park (UW-Madison) challenges assumptions in comparative political theory regarding equivalents in different traditions. Park draws from Wittgenstein and Quine’s philosophy of language and argues that the seemingly ‘devious’ translation of the concept of liberty by Yan Fu is a conscious maneuver to create room for a new way of theorizing politics in an intellectual tradition with different ‘language-games.’
On the other hand, in “Stories for the Empire: The Translation of Conquest in Colonial Spanish America,” Mauro J. Caraccioli (Virginia Tech) illuminates the power dynamic within the task of translation and explores how translators have facilitated the establishment of particular standards for understanding imperial conquests. Through this endeavor, he unravels the crisscrossing point between language and politics, examined from the perspective of the colonized. Continuing Caraccioli’s problematization of power in translated ideas, Murad Idris (University of Michigan) examines the politics of translation surrounding jihad in “Holy Wars of the Philosophers: Jihad and Justice.” Idris begins with a historical survey of how the idea of jihad was translated within a colonial context, emphasizing the nuanced distinctions between mujahideen and jihadiyin as “good jihad” and “bad jihad,” rather than the oversimplified categories of “good Muslim” and “bad Muslim.” He then examines the discursive practices of Michael Walzer, John Rawls, and Leo Strauss on Islamic violence, underlining the impact of translation on the structure and perception of ideas.
Joshua Simon (Johns Hopkins University) will serve as the chair and discussant of the panel.

Sub Unit

• Division 1: Political Thought and Philosophy

Individual Presentations

• Holy Wars of the Philosophers: Jihad and Justice - Murad Idris, University of Michigan

• Stories for the Empire: The Translation of Conquest in Colonial Spanish America - Mauro J. Caraccioli, Virginia Tech

• Native American Ethics and the Tradition of Virtues - Samuel Piccolo, Gustavus Adolphus College

• Yan Fu’s Translation of the Concept of Liberty in "On Liberty" - Hyemin Park, University of Wisconsin, Madison

Chair

• Joshua Simon Johns Hopkins University

Discussant

• Joshua Simon Johns Hopkins University