Self-Identification and Alterity in Belgian-German Literary Translation. A Processual Discourse History (1945 to the Present).

Description

This study of the reception mechanisms of Belgian literatures in the Federal Republic of Germany casts a new light on the complexity of the cultural and historical interconnections between the neighboring countries of Belgium and Germany. The two World Wars led to ruptures in the bilateral relationship. After 1945, a new beginning of relations took place, which is still little explored in cultural and translation studies. This study starts at this historical moment and follows the traces of discursive developments in the years that followed until today. The research interest lies in the question of how established or changing notions of the self and the foreign are discernible in the reception and translation strategies of Belgian novels in the Germany, or how these works can also run counter to them.
The basis for this study is a parallel text corpus of Belgian novels in the two source languages French and Dutch as well as the target language German. This exemplary panorama includes works by the authors Marie Gevers, Louis Paul Boon, Hugo Claus, Fikry El Azzouzi, Thomas Gunzig, and Amélie Nothomb. Based on comparative translation analyses, the study provides information about epistemic configurations valid in the German target context. These are mapped via images of alterity and self-identification, and combined into tendencies of translational dynamics.

Period	23 Sep 2022
Event title	Belgien, Deutschland und die 'Anderen'. Bilder, Diskurse und Praktiken von Diskriminierung, Ausgrenzung und Verfolgung
Event type	Workshop
Location	Berlin, Germany
Degree of Recognition	International