i An-Najah National University Faculty of Graduate Studies Translating English Occurrences of Deconstruction Terminology into Arabic By Nizar A. A. Asad Supervisor Dr. Abdel Karim Daraghmeh This Thesis is Submitted in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Master of Applied Linguistics and Translation, Faculty of Graduate Studies, An-Najah National University, Nablus, Palestine. 2010 iii Dedication To my parents, who always stood behind me and knew I would succeed. Gone now but never forgotten, I will miss them always and love them forever. Thanks for all they did. This work is dedicated to them. iv Acknowledgment It is my pleasure to thank those who made this thesis possible, especially my supervisor, Dr Abdel Karim Daraghmeh, whose encouragement, guidance and support from the initial to the final level enabled me to develop an understanding of the subject. He was always there to listen and give advice. I am also heartily thankful to Dr. Odeh Odeh who supported me in many respects during working on this project. I am also greatly indebted to Dr. Nabil Alawi whose comments and feedback helped me putting things together. v قـرارإ :مقدم الرسالة التي تحمل العنوان أدناهالموقع أنا Translating English Occurrences of Deconstruction Terminology into Arabic اقر بأن ما اشتملت عليه هذه الرسالة، انما هي نتاج جهدي الخاص، باستثناء ما تمت االشـارة ثما ورد، وأن هذه الرسالة ككل، او اي جزء منها لم يقدم من قبل لنيل اية درجة علميـة اليه حي .او بحث علمي او بحثي لدى اية مؤسسة تعليمية او بحثية اخرى Declaration The work provided in this thesis, unless otherwise referenced, is the researcher’s own work, and has not been submitted elsewhere for any other degree or qualification. Student's name: : الطالب ماس Signature: : عالتوقي Date: : خالتاري vi Table of contents Dedication vi Acknowledgment vi Declaration vi Table of contents vi List of tables vi Chapter one 1 1. Introduction 1 2. Significance of the study 3 3. Limitations of the study 4 4. Methodology 5 5. Problematic areas in translation: the English-Arabic case 6 Chapter two 14 1. Deconstruction 14 2. Deconstruction in Arabic 17 3. Deconstruction and Translation 19 3.1 Derrida and Translation 22 3.2 Equivalence 26 Chapter Three 30 1. The deviation of the term 30 2. Deconstructive terminology 31 3. Deconstruction 31 4. Différance 41 5. Grammatology 47 6. Supplement 51 7. Trace 55 8. Dissemination 61 9. Indeterminacy 65 10. Logocentrism 68 Chapter Four 75 1. Translations assessed 75 1.1 Deconstruction 77 1.2. Différance 78 1.3. Grammatology 79 1.4. Supplement 79 vii 1.5. Trace 82 1.6. Dissemination 83 1.7. Indeterminacy 83 1.8. Logocentrism 84 Chapter Five 86 1. Conclusion 86 2. Recommendations 87 3. A concluding note 88 English References 91 Arabic References 97 Index: Who is who among Arab critics 101 ب الملخص viii List of tables Table Name Page 1 Deconstruction 34 2 Différance 43 3 Grammatology 48 4 Supplement 52 5 Trace 56 6 Dissemination 62 7 Indeterminacy 66 8 Logocentrism 70 9 Most Appropriate Terms Representatives 76 ix Translating English Occurrences of Deconstruction Terminology into Arabic By Nizar A. A. Asad Supervisor Dr. Abdel Karim Daraghmeh Abstract The study examined the strategies of translating English occurrences of deconstructive terminology into Arabic. To this end, Deconstruction as a thought and practice was introduced- evoking implications to translation theory. Deconstruction applications in Arabic were reviewed along with examples from Arabic literary criticism. The study took the relevant terms from Jacques Derrida’s works. Taking only professional translators, the study considered the Arabic different translations of these terms. A comparison was drawn between the terms and their Arabic translations. The translations were, then, studied and analyzed-focusing on the strategies utilized. Results showed that there is a wide divergence between the various translations. The fact that some renderings are somewhat intelligible enough and others are dissatisfying is attributed to whether the term in question was studied in its cultural context. Most of the renderings, however, accounted for at least one of the meanings each term abounds with. Interpretation as a translation strategy was found to be the most convenient procedure in dealing with Derrida’s terms. This strategy requires giving an equivalent and glossing it with as much information as possible. 1 Chapter One 1. Introduction This study tackles deconstructive concerns in literary and cultural theory as the basis for the questions relevant to translation concerns from English into Arabic. Scholars in both fields have discussed the topic and its impacts on text composition. The resulted products are manifestations of the color associated with the postmodern period. Questions have been raised and endeavors to provide adequate answers have preoccupied a good deal of scholarly works, with the core of discussion being centered on the lack of cohesiveness which figures in all kinds of texts, whether written or spoken. The present study investigates the strategies of translating deconstructive terminology into Arabic, particularly Jacques Derrida’s terminology. It examines the difficulties a translator of a deconstructive text encounters, namely the threefold dilemma: translating referential association of a deconstructive term into the target culture; finding the appropriate equivalent; and considering the diverse target cultural types of audience which might or might not recognize the options a translator has worked to render. In other words, one would consider the factors affecting decisions taken in this context and how these decisions cause a translated work to lose some elements and gain others. The study tests through empirical evidence whether the translator produces a work that preserves, rewrites, or adapts the deconstructive term. It also compares the meanings of the 2 original terms with their renderings in Arabic. More specifically, it examines and finds answers to the following questions: 1. How does a translator into Arabic deal with concepts which require an understanding of both the source and the target cultural matrices? How does awareness of the source context help the translator to decide on a strategy? How does a translator treat elements that are not available in the target scene? Which nuances are tampered with and which ones are kept? How does the gap between the Arabic and English contexts affect shaping the entire structure of the translated term? 2. How are concepts projected such that the target audience understands and accordingly communicates with the text? How much power do the target audience expectations have on translation strategies? A translator of an English deconstructive term into Arabic tends to alter, expand, add to, recap, or modify the source text term such that the translated term loses and/or gains some features. This sort of adjustment is done responding to some active parameters in the target setting, for what emerges from an assumed homogeneity in the Arab-Islamic culture is rather different from the heterogeneous post-modern western scene (deconstruction is a postmodern thought) and, therefore, in translating texts or appropriating concepts, Arab translators might engage in a sort of modification and eventually render a version matching the new contexts in which the concepts are redeployed. To do so, a translator might develop a strategy to come up with a product that matches the needs of the target 3 audience; a strategy that could result in restructuring the source text with all of its complexities and temporal and spatial elements. 2. Significance of the study One might question the significance of a research into translating deconstructive terminology. However, in philosophy, literary criticism, cultural studies, politics and political media, deconstructive terminology should be made clear so that misunderstanding is eliminated. Critics who study a text using deconstructive terminology know well what the Arab critic is dealing with; even if there are different versions of the same deconstructive term. Yet average ordinary receivers, non-critics, or even the educated reader who has no adequate background in postmodern arguments, are likely to miss the point. Suppose that an Arabic text refers to one of Derrida’s terms as, say, (X); another text refers to the same term as (Y); a third text refers to it as (Z); still another may refer to it as (N) - actually the list of renderings of the same term, as we will come to see, is much more longer- then, how will the reader be able to know that all these texts are dealing with the same term? Here comes the value of this work: it collects all renderings of the terms concerned, so that the reader will be able to match Derrida’s term with the Arabic equivalent(s). The existence of so many variations between translations can be rather confusing. We cannot expect that the Arab reader has already had access to Derrida’s works and that s/he is able to separate the wheat from the chaff. Scholars who are familiar with deconstructive 4 terminology know that there are roughly ten renderings of the term Aporia, for example, and not one of them is identical to any of the others; they are all different. The difficulties in translating terminology are attributed to the fact that the same term might be used in different senses by scholars in different approaches. The meaning of a term is not definite; it is entirely enigmatic even to the originator. “Every word instantly becomes a concept precisely insofar as it is not supposed to serve as a reminder of the unique and entirely individual original experience to which it owes its origin; but rather, a word becomes a concept insofar as it simultaneously has to fit countless more or less similar cases - which means, purely and simply, cases which are never equal and thus altogether unequal” (Keith Ansell Pearson & Duncan Large, 2006: 117). 3. Limitations of the study This study has certain limitations that need to be taken into account when considering the study’s contributions. The study is narrowed in scope: it is limited to philosophy and literary criticism, while other domains are in evidence and could therefore be addressed by future studies. The extent to which interpretations of the results may be generalized to people or situations other than those observed in the study could be validated by other studies dealing with translation in other postmodern approaches. One should always bear in mind that translation is an ever-evolving domain, and the sites that are presently problematic could one day be overcome. 5 4. Methodology The study took eight terms that Derrida used to introduce his deconstructive school. Some of these were introduced into French- and later on into English- for the first time. Others were reemployed by Derrida- endowed with new dimensions and with more or less different connotations. Taking only professional translators and critics who are renowned for transferring English works into Arabic, the researcher gathered as many translations of these eight terms as could be traced. The usage and meanings of these terms in Arabic are compared with Derrida’s usage. The purpose is to see how much of Derrida’s original meaning, if any, is delivered in the target context. To this end, the componential- analysis technique- which was developed by Nida (1982) was adopted. It means “comparing an SL word with a TL word which has a similar meaning but is not an obvious one-to-one equivalent, by demonstrating first their common and then their differing sense components” (Newmark, 1988:114). This method identifies features of words that are connected, but not necessarily identical in meaning. Componential analysis is useful in analyzing conceptual terms. If a concept word becomes a key word, it may be useful to analyze the concept componentially. Thus Gramsci’s egemonia could be analyzed as ‘hegemony in the sense of cultural leadership and consensus exercised by the intellectuals over a country’s institutions, complemented or contrasted with political leadership and control’ (Newmark, 1988: 121-122). 6 This is what this study did: it gave a componential analysis of each of the eight terms before reviewing the translations into Arabic. The researcher broke down the terms into all their conceptual and connotative meanings in the source language, paring them down to whatever concepts they signify. Then he reviewed the Arabic occurrences of the eight deconstructive terms in question, listing the strategies used. And finally, a clear stand was introduced on the best translation of each term- based on the researcher’s understanding of the basic premises of the deconstructive thought. 5. Problematic areas in translation: the English-Arabic case Interest in Western culture, American in particular, in the Arab world appears to be on the rise. Part of the interest is in evidence, as knowledge of English is sometimes considered a prerequisite to get a job, to join an educational institution, or to succeed in the job. Academically, translation from English into Arabic highlights a variety of issues of cultural differences and intercultural communication. Therefore, research into translating postmodern texts into Arabic has lately proliferated. Translation has always contributed to the formation of Arab intellectual work which seeks universality, but, at the same time, strives to retain its privacy, heritage and cultural characteristics. Yet transferring knowledge into Arabic is still subject to insoluble problems. The difficulties are multiple, some of which are due to the nature of translation itself: mainly the inability to transfer the original text from one language into another, accurately and faithfully. This problem is often attributed to the lack of 7 corresponding terminology in the target language. There is also the scarcity of dictionaries. Further, texts are often translated in isolation from their theoretical context: for example, translating Derrida’s Writing and Difference in isolation from his other works, i.e. overlooking the element of intertextuality. The problem of cultural matrix differences is another major obstacle to a successful translation. All these factors have resulted in the multiplicity of the Arabic equivalents for the same term. Though considerable efforts have been made to overcome these difficulties, it is not easy to resolve and eliminate, once and for all, these hindrances to successful translation. Translation is not a cognitive secondary activity based merely on knowledge of language. It is not only a conversion of the ST into the TT. Translators think in several dimensions: technically, ideologically, contextually, textually, culturally and structurally. Terry Eagleton, Britain's famous cultural critic, observes that it takes a decade to transmit the ideas through the Channel from France to England (Eagelton 2008: 16). If Eagleton had this to say on two overlapping cultures like the British and the French, what can be said about other cultures that not only lack sufficient communication, but also have entirely different orientations? The cultural gap between the western culture and the Arab culture has occasioned a discontinuity in translation work. Some masterpieces of western literature are translated into Arabic long after being circulated in their original context. The questions that arise are numerous: What has not 8 been translated? What has already been translated? When have the translated works been translated relative to the time of publishing the original? Raymond Williams's Drama from Ibsen to Eliot (1952), to mention some, was translated by Fayez Iskandar in October 1973, i.e., after 23 years of the issuance of the original; Raymond Williams’ Modern Tragedy (1966) was translated by Sameera Breik in 1985, i.e., 19 years after the publication of the original work; and Derrida’s Writing and Difference was translated by Kazim Jihad in 1988, while the first edition of the French version was published in 1967. It is noticed that the time elapsing between the original texts and translations almost always exceeds fifteen years. “Translation is a kind of activity which inevitably involves at least two languages and two cultural traditions” (Toury 1978:200). The question of how to deal with the aspects implicit in a source text and to find appropriate equivalents in the target language has been addressed by numerous studies. The problems vary in scope depending on the cultural and linguistic gaps between the two languages involved (Nida 1964:130). “As for translation, differences among cultures represent an area of difficulty, the degree of which depends on whether the languages involved are close or remote culturally” (Bahameed, 2008). This means that translation between languages of unrelated cultures is more difficult than translating between related or similar cultures. “This does not imply, however, that translation between languages that are culturally related or similar is a straightforward activity. In fact, it embodies some serious 9 pitfalls from the translators as well, though to a lesser degree compared with translation between languages of different cultures” (Ilyas, 1989: 123). Translators today are confronted with the asymmetry of cultural systems and the relativity of concepts. They have to deal with inconsistent categorizations and classifications. Their task as cultural mediators is to adequately communicate information about foreign cultures, taking into account the background knowledge of the target audience in order to avoid any misunderstandings. “The translator is a mediator between two cultures, with the task of decoding information from the ST and encoding it into the TL. Any obstacles to understanding of the ST meaning through lack of awareness of the SL culture on the part of the TT reader are to be removed through the mediation of the translator” (Adab, 1996: 20). When there is no cultural overlap between the source and the target cultures, lots of references and cultural terms hinder the translation flow and the translator is to search and work hard to settle on an equivalent. “Differences between cultures may cause more severe complications for the translator than do differences in language structure” (Nida, 1964:130).The most challenging references are those referring to people, literature, art, history, geography, folklore, pop culture, ecology, everyday life, material culture, religion, habits, entertainment, etc. and those that clash with cultural values. Translators from English into Arabic, therefore, often complain about the difficulty of finding the appropriate terms. The translators’ awareness of the paramount role of culture has given rise to new paradigms: As translators we cannot take anything for granted. We must be involved in a constant process of unlearning, because the 10 realities and expectations of our own culture are not necessarily the same in the other culture. Not only that, we don't even know whether our own cultural and social situation wants to open itself up to an influx of ideas and perspectives that are prominent in another culture (Rainer Schulte, 1994). Lately, and specifically since the late 1970s, with the emergence of Translation Studies, the focus of attention of translation has mainly been placed on the readership and the issue of culture. In this perspective, the role of the translator has shifted into a more intricate process regarding maintaining the message and the meaning and creating a response in the receiver; hence the need for reassessing the role of the translator by analyzing his/ her own broad knowledge of the source culture and setting. This sort of knowledge is particularly relevant for translators because they need to know the source language culture and related sub-cultures very well before translating a particular text. Awareness of the translation process, thus, entails a corresponding realization of the culture underlying a text. "Since the Cultural Turn in Translation Studies, translation is viewed as a cultural transfer, strategies to render possible an effective communication between cultures" (Pommer, 2008). As is the case in all areas of humanities and social sciences, context has been a contentious issue between those who see thoughts evolve according to fixed laws not affected by the cultural context in which they are created, and those who view human ideas as a reflection of the cultural vision which necessarily includes - explicitly or implicitly - perceptions of the self and the other. Many Arab translators and critics believe that the Western 11 concepts are context specific. These concepts, they say, are loaded with historical and ideological specificity. This is, in particular, outlined by critics Abdulwahhab Al-Misiri, Sa’d Bazi’i and Abdulaziz Hammouda. Al- Misiri (1999), for example, has highlighted the locality of the western concepts and their context-specificity. The locality of the signifier, he says, is twofold: that of the context, and that of the writer. Carl Jung (1981) attributes the disparity between any different settings to what he names ‘the immediate unconscious’: My thesis then, is as follows: in addition to our immediate consciousness, which is of a thoroughly personal nature and which we believe to be the only empirical psyche (even if we tack on the personal unconscious as an appendix), there exists a second psychic system of a collective, universal, and impersonal nature which is identical in all individuals. This collective unconscious does not develop individually but is inherited. It consists of pre-existent forms, the archetypes, which can only become conscious secondarily and which give definite form to certain psychic contents (Jung, 1981: 43). People’s views of the world are shaped by the surroundings, space, time, education, norms and cultural values they grow up with. Their thinking is therefore adapted to these parameters. When reading a text, a receiver unconsciously refers to these matrices to evoke a given meaning: “The matrix of a text decides the meaning that a reader may elicit. The place, the time, the surrounding conditions of the reader and his/her individual and collective subconscious are responsible for building the intertextual relations that are needed to relate, interpret, understand and then translate a text” (Alawi, Translation and intertextuality, 2010. http:// www.najah.edu). 12 Theorists of translation draw on intertextuality when they address the issue of rendering terminology. In line with the principle of intertextuality, a text conjures up some other texts that are familiar to the target reader. “In effect, meaning is constituted by the multiple forms and intertextual connections which the text must imply in order to say anything at all” (Hatim, 2001: 49). As a result, the translation decision is made out of interwoven net of texts that interact with one another. The intertextual sets of relations induce meanings that the author might not have had in mind: “Intertextuality names the shuttle space between texts in a universe where the outside of the text (as the author) is supposedly dead” (Orr, 2003: 162). The problem of terminology in translation is a result of the difference between the two contexts concerned. Since cultures express their views of the world differently, the terms used may also differ considerably. Individuals in different cultures also think differently. This difference appears in their language behavior as a result of differences in history, religion, setting, geography, values, traditions, etc. This has given rise to gaps in terminology; the most obvious ones are culture-specific terms and cultural references. Terms do not stand by themselves. Rather, when it comes to translation- and when terms do not have equivalents- they become problematic sites that the translator is to deal with cautiously, since they are context decidable. It has been found that to translate from, say, English into French, 13 many terms no longer have culture-specificity: a dimension which indicates the role of the culture overlap (between English and French cultures) in overcoming lots of problems in the process of transfer (Alvarez and Vidal, 1996: 52). This research is intended to compare and analyze the various translation strategies utilized by translators of deconstruction terminology into Arabic. Different translations of Jacques Derrida’s works were collected, studied and analyzed. Chapter two is divided into three sections. First, it introduces deconstruction as a thought. Deconstruction practice in Arabic is discussed in the second section- along with practical examples from Arabic literary criticism. The third section is devoted to implications of deconstructive thought on translation. Chapter three takes up the relevant terminology and compares the English terms with their equivalents in Arabic. Eight deconstructive terms have been examined to determine strategies taken and decisions made by each translator. The options have been profoundly canvassed so as to expose the influence of context. In chapter four, the researcher gives his own assessment of the translations, citing the most representative ones. Finally, the study concludes with the main findings and the recommendations for further research into translating deconstruction terminology. 14 Chapter two 1. Deconstruction Deconstruction is a term coined by Jacques Derrida to describe a reading approach which searches for the meaning of a text to the point of engaging the underlying structure on which a text is apparently founded, and that this structure is unstable or impossible. Deconstruction generally attempts to demonstrate that a text is not a conclusive unit but one of several conflicting and contradictory meanings; that any text therefore has more than one interpretation; that the text itself links these interpretations; and that the variance of these interpretations is irreducible. Davis and Schleifer (1989, 207) define Deconstruction as a strategy of reading that starts with “a philosophical hierarchy in which two opposed terms are presented as the 'superior' general case and the 'inferior' special case.” These terms include day/night, active/passive, courageous/coward, good/evil, male/female, etc. One of these pairs is generally considered superior and dominant and the other is inferior and subordinate (Green and Lebihan, 1996: 69). Derrida’s theory of Deconstruction builds on the work of the French structuralist Ferdinand de Saussure. In his Course in General Linguistics (1965), Saussure differentiates between what he calls la parole (actual speech) and la langue (language system). A linguistic sign, according to Saussure, consists of two inseparable parts: the signifier (a sound image or a graphic mark) and the signified (the concept associated with it). The 15 relation between the two is arbitrary. Another point of view he makes is that signs are deferential, since they generate their meaning only as a result of their difference from other signs. The meaning of the sign is also relational (Culler 1981:40). It is defined by its relation to its opposite. Concepts like good, day and right have meaning only when they are related to evil, night and wrong. Derrida elaborates on Saussure’s ideas on signs saying: The play of differences supposes, in effect, syntheses and referrals which forbid at any moment, or in any sense, that a simple element be present in and of itself, referring only to itself. Whether in the order of spoken or written discourse, no element can function as a sign without referring to another element which itself is not simply present. This interweaving results in each "element"--phoneme or grapheme--being constituted on the basis of the trace within it of the other elements of the chain or system (Derrida: Writing and Difference, 1981:26). Traditionally, Derrida argues, the Western thought is built on a binary structure of superior and inferior. Deconstruction questions this binary view and suggests a different reading: In a traditional philosophical opposition we have not a peaceful coexistence of facing terms but a violent hierarchy. One of the two terms dominates the other (axiologically, logically, etc.), occupies the commanding position. To deconstruct the opposition above all, at a particular moment, is to reverse the hierarchy (Derrida: Positions, 1981: 41). 16 Usually, the superior term depends on the inferior in keeping its meaning. This act of opposition and differentiation expels those which are conventionally considered inferior and doomed to be in the periphery. This allows the superior- which is in the center- to stand out and be privileged. For Derrida though, there is no such thing as pure truth that is completely independent. When you read a text, you add to it an understanding of the meaning, and it is not necessarily the same sense that the author intended. Deconstruction rejects fixed referential meanings and clearly defined cultural entities. This has had a decisive impact on the conceptualization of intercultural transfer, intercultural confrontation and translation. Thus cultures are no longer regarded as homogenous entities, but refracted by variation and blending with foreign cultures. “Research on interpretation, translation, and mediation between cultures can be thought of as the core of the humanities. Cultural encounters and translations are becoming ever more conspicuous aspects of the human reality” (Skylv, 1993). Cultural critic Eagleton (1983, 133) says: “perhaps what is outside is also somehow inside, and what is alien is also intimate. The absolute frontier between the two realms may always be transgressed, has always been transgressed already, and is much less absolute than it appears.” This way, the logic of structuralism/centrism is questioned and the equation of inside and outside is reversed. 17 Deconstruction calls into question the credibility of theoretical scenarios that assume an original meaning. Derrida’s basic assumption is that there is no fixed thing against which other things are judged. Instead, he builds his theory of Deconstruction on the mismatch and the non-existence of an origin. What really exists, according to Derrida, is different links of signifiers- including the original work and its translations- that are connected in a symbiotic relationship, where both the original and the translated version supplement one another. 2. Deconstruction in Arabic It might be plausible to note that Deconstruction- as a term and as a practice- has preoccupied a good volume of scholarly work in the last three decades among the Arab intellectuals. In particular, it has been addressed by translation and literary scholarship. It is, however, interesting to note that most of these scholarly works have focused mainly on the theoretical aspect of Deconstruction, while the practical aspect has regrettably been neglected. Anyway, this study will not be judging on the extent to which or how or when the concept has been used to analyze texts (in the realm of literary criticism in Arabic). The main concern is with how the Deconstruction terminology has been used and reused by translators and literary critics. In the Arabic context, the controversy over Derrida’s ideas has generated a wide range of critical commentary, from literary criticism to the theory of translation. By some accounts, the western thought and canon works, 18 traditionally thought of as cosmopolitan, have now been undermined by Derrida. The nineties of the last century, Albanky (2005) says, witnessed a remarkable interest in deconstructive works and their strategies in dealing with texts. He names a number of writers and critics who took the Deconstructive thought as a frame in their writings. These include Mustafa Nasif, Abdulaziz Hammouda, Abdussalam Bin Abdulali, Kamal Abu Dib, Bakhti bin Odeh, Ali Harb and Abdullah Al-Ghathami. The first scholar to tackle Deconstruction in the Arab World was Abdullah Al- Ghathami, when he wrote his book Alkhatia wa Attakfir (lit: Sin and Penance) (1985) and then his book Tashrih Annas (lit: Anatomy of the Text) (1987). In the former, he describes Deconstruction as a reading strategy that is free but serious, through which the old and the new unite by means of context (p55). In the latter, he devotes the first chapter to track down signs and symbols in Abu Qasim Al-Shabi’s poetry. Al-Shabi was known for putting together contradictory concepts (e.g., life: death, night: day, prison: freedom). In chapter three of this book, Al-Ghathami addresses Deconstruction in detail. “Language is a system based on difference not harmony” (p106). In 1994, he published Alqaseeda wa Annas Almodhadh (The Poem and the Counter-text), in which he spilled out the reason why he adopted deconstruction. It, he says, highlights the beauty of the text and shows the resourcefulness of the writer (98) (my translation). Kazim Jihad was the first translator to translate two entire works by Derrida (Writing and Differance in 1988 and Plato’s Pharmacy in 1998). 19 Mona Tolba and Anwar Mugheeth are two other translators who translated Of Grammatology (1976). Other writers are either translators who translated books written on Deconstruction (Osama Alhaj, Sabri Hasan, Thaer Deeb, Sameer Masoud, Abdulmaqsoud Abdulkarim, Mohammed Anani, Farid Alzahi, Huda Shukri, Alhusein Sahban, Fatima Jayoushi, Somaya Sa’d, Khamisi Boghrara, Mohammed Asfour, Khalida Hamed, Husam Nael, Umayma Abu Bakr, Izziddin Al-Khitabi, Fadil Tamir and Mohammed Abdullatif), or critics who wrote books or articles in Arabic addressing Deconstruction ( Sa’d Bazi’i, Mijan Rweili, Inad Ghazwan, Ali Harb, Taha Abdul Rahman, Abdulaziz Bin Arafa, Abdulwahab Al-Misiri, Muhyiddin Ali Hamidi, Abdulsalam Binabdulali, Mohammed Abdullatif, Abdulmalik Murtad, Yousef Waghlisi, Abdulrahman Almansour, Abdulaziz Hammouda, Mohammed Salem Sa’dallah, Yomna Alkhouli, Nabeel Suleiman, Subhi Hadid, Abdullah Ibrahim, Jabir Asfour, Mohamemd Banki, Bassam Baraka, Hazim Qirtajanni and Aqeel Mahdi Yousef). 3. Deconstruction and Translation In Being and Time (1978), and Early Greek Thinking (1985), Heidegger talks about the theory of translation. His works were one of the first attempts to break the lethal force of the metaphysical approaches in translation, where one can identify the beginnings of the practice of Deconstruction in translation (Gentzler, 1993). According to the deconstructionist approach, people think at the margins of the language and 20 follow the language sub-corridors, rather than follow the main road agreed upon. In translation, people should not search for the original message, but for multiple forms and points of time and space that casually overlap. According to this view, the theory of translation aims to protect the differences and revitalize language and thus opens new horizons of thinking (Gentzler, 1993: 160). Deconstructionists view differences, slips of the tongue, additions and deletions as part of each text. Both deconstruction and translation theory focus on real, not imaginary, texts when they put forward a theory or propose a solution. One of the inherent properties of things is the inability to cover everything and detect all details, and language is not an exception. There is always something more to be done or to be said: After I write my book for a particular purpose and a particular audience, someone else can give a straightforward interpretation of it with that purpose and audience in mind. Once I have published the book, it is no longer simply mine. It may be taken up by other audiences or used for other purposes. The point of deconstruction is to show where something has been omitted, not because of the blindness of the author, not because the critic is smarter or better, but because that is the way things are. There are always things I don't know, though in a very real way that I don't know them is part of what I know (Faulconer, 1998). Interpretive reading as a theoretical concept was highlighted by Stanley Fish in his book Is there a text in this class? (1982). He argues that the meaning of a text does not exist outside of a given set of cultural 21 assumptions, which often encompass the intention of the author, though it is not limited to it. Fish contends that texts are open to interpretation because receivers are considered part of a community, which gives them a particular way of reading texts. This idea has been very influential in reader-response critical thinking. This doesn’t imply that words have no meanings, rather, they have meanings, but these meanings are culturally constructed. This is consistent with Roland Barthes’ idea of the death of the author (which was later on used by Derrida) - overturning the idea that the author is the originator of something original and bringing author intention into question. Once a text is published, it is no longer the author’s property and the traces of the author cannot be found. Therefore, meaning is always lacking and deferred. This Meaning of a text is not associated with the author him/herself. Thus assigning one interpretation to a text deprives it of its multiple perceptional responses. Kathleen Davis’ Deconstruction and Translation suggests methods in which many practical and theoretical problems of translation can be rethought in the light of insights from Derrida. “If there is no one origin, no transcendent meaning, then there is no stable source text. Derrida’s ideas are used to build new approaches to translation within translation studies. In these new contexts deconstruction becomes a translation theory” (Davis, 2001: 2). 22 With regard to translation, Deconstruction considers all possibilities: how people get to meaning comes from their knowledge of multiple meanings attached to a word. Deconstruction gives translation an aspect of relativism through which people can choose the most appropriate option for a particular context. The interpretations of a text, therefore, multiply over and over and the meanings grow endlessly. With every new reading, there is a new meaning. 3.1 Derrida and translation Andrew Benjamin begins his Translation and the Nature of Philosophy (1989) by citing and translating Derrida: “With the problem of translation we are dealing with nothing less than the problem of the passage to philosophy” (p1). Though Deconstruction does not provide a theory of translation, it uses translation in two situations: first, to ask questions about the nature of language and second, to come as close as possible to the concept of difference. Thus, the nature of such thinking becomes important for theorists of translation. The whole project of Deconstruction has a complex relationship with the theory of translation. Jacques Derrida claims that translation and Deconstruction are intertwined and cannot be separated. The elusive presence of Différance is quite clear: “translation practices the difference between signified and signifier” within the possible limits where this is 23 possible or at least seems possible, (Derrida: Writing and Difference, 1981:xv). Derrida addresses problems relating to the possibility or impossibility of translation. According to Derrida, all philosophy is mainly concerned with the concept of translation: “The Origin of philosophy is translation or takes the thesis of translatability” (Derrida, McDonald, Kamuf & Ronell, 1988: 120). This means that philosophy and translation hold similar assumptions as to what things mean. In the deconstructionist thinking, translation occupies a primary position that effaces the traditional ways of thinking that historically dominated the perceptions of translation and philosophy. The key to applying deconstructive thought to translation is shown in the process which moves beyond a hierarchical opposition of original and translation. According to this process, the difference is not an obstacle to translation. The translator presupposes an existence of plurality which multiplies with every new reading of a text. “By denying the existence of truth, origin and center, deconstruction deprives us of the comfortable fallacy of living in a simple and understandable world. We lose security, but we gain endless possibilities, the unlimited play of meanings” (Koskinen 1994: 446). The relationship between the source text and the target text is reciprocal- one of mutual transformation. As such, the borderlines between the ST and the TT are concealed as the existence of the ST becomes intertwined with 24 that of the TT. The idea of originality, therefore, becomes obsolete and is no longer sustainable. This is because every reading of a text renders a different meaning, which, in turn, triggers other meanings. The product of this chain of change is open-endlessness. For Derrida, this means that every reading requires a different translation. For deconstructionists, the original texts are rewritten over and over through translation which re-builds the original. Derrida is trying to demolish the traditional concept of originality and unified entity and, instead, proposes that critics focus on relations between texts and contexts. According to him, an author’s work is bound by some factors including time and space which the author doesn’t have control over. Derrida would prefer not to think of the author as an individual, but as a series of self- attitudes not determined by harmony as much as by gaps, lack of continuity and interruptions. In such an approach, translators will learn how to focus on gaps and differences to get to the possible meaning. Translation augments and modifies the original, which, insofar as it is living on, never ceases to be transformed and to grow. It modifies the original even as it also modifies the translating language. This process--transforming the original as well as the translation--is the translation contract between the original and the translating text (Derrida: The Ear of the Other, 1985: 122). In his article titled Derrida's Deconstructive Philosophy, Sa'dallah (2006) says that the process of play is free and infinite. It refers to the act of ever- changing process of switching between different signifiers. Traditionally, a 25 signifier has a limited number of signified concepts, but in this new perspective, the meaning and associations of a signifier are subject to interpretation. Each reading of a text has its own signifiers, and a reader is likely to deliberately change the signified (i.e., the meaning). Derrida's undertaking “is one of trying to unveil a play of covered-up but subconsciously discernible traces without referring to some sort of deep underlying meaning” (Gentzler 1993:160). However, the play process, Sa’dulla says, has some constraints, known as laws or mechanisms. These include Enigma, Adumbration, Allegory, Illusion, Ambiguity, Montage, Collage, Myth, Nonsense, Paradox, Burlesque, Pastiche, Hoax, Puns, Quotation, and Symbols. Indeterminacy is closely associated with Play. It means that a word has an elusive nature, and for a reader to get access into the meaning, s/he needs to fix the floating signifier. Each reader fixes the signifier according to his/her own understanding. Deconstructionists propose that the theory of translation should expand its borders and reconsider its dereliction. In any text there is nothing but the interaction of language with itself. This openness to the absolute nothingness dismantles the metaphysical theories of translation and opens the way to thinking about something that is denied by the language. For Derrida, translation is not merely a crossing over to understand something, but also a forum to exercise that crossing. “Instead of translations fixing the same meaning, they can also allow a further room for play; extend 26 boundaries and open up new avenues for further difference” (Gentzler, 1993: 160-161). If the translator neither restitutes nor copies an original, it is because the original lives on and transforms itself. The translation will truly be a moment in the growth of the original, which will complete itself in enlarging itself. And if the original calls for a complement, it is because at the origin, it was not there without fault, full, complete, total, identical to itself. (Derrida, Psyche, 2007: 211). As Davis (2001:14) outlines, “meaning is an effect of language, not a prior presence merely expressed in language. It therefore cannot be simply extracted from language and transferred.” Since this meaning is deferred in the original text, it also remains postponed in the translated work. Translation is approached not in terms of signifiers and signification, but in terms of what words produce by means of a free play. Derrida reclaims the power of signifiers: “at the beginning of translation is the word. Nothing is less innocent, pleonastic (extra) and natural, nothing is more historical than this proposition, even if it seems too obvious” (Derrida: What is a relevant translation, 2001:180). 3.2 Equivalence Translation theory has always involved one specific problem in translation: that translations are not the same as their originals. This is why translation scholars have always been preoccupied with the notion of equivalence (formal, dynamic, functional or cultural) when assessing translation. Deconstruction has changed all these dynamics by questioning the issues on which the translation theory was founded. Rosemary Arrojo is one of 27 the proponents of applying the deconstructive mechanism in translation: “As we regard translation as a form of transformation, we finally begin to move beyond the old stalemates which have paralyzed reflection on the area for at least two thousand years” (Arrojo 1998: 25). Deconstruction questions the notions of equivalence and faithfulness in translation. Equivalence is no longer a norm or a purpose in translation practice. The aim of translation cannot be reduced to producing a TT that is equivalent to the ST. In practice, translation focuses on the sets of relations between the ST and the TT without claiming to calculate the precise underlying meaning because such a meaning does not exist: A translation is never quite 'faithful', always somewhat 'free', it never establishes an identity, always a lack and a supplement, and it can never be a transparent representation, only an interpretive transformation that exposes multiple and divided meanings, equally multiple and divided. (Venuti, 1992:8). This view of translation as difference is congruous with that of Philip Lewis's (1985) concept of abusive fidelity, which developed as a consequence of problems associated with translating deconstruction terminology. In a reading of Derrida’s Margins of Philosophy, Lewis (1985: 61) devises a translation strategy of deconstructive terminology that accounts for the concept of meaning as a differential plurality that shifts the focus away from the signified “to the chain of signifiers, to syntactic processes, to discursive (digression) structures, to the incidence of language mechanisms on thought and reality formation, and so forth.” 28 What is in question here is the idea of fidelity: the translator looks for features that abstain from cultural values in the source context. These features are dual: resisting dominant values in both source and target cultures, and supplementing the source text by rewriting it in the target language: “the real possibility of translation points to a risk to be assumed: that of the strong, forceful translation that values experimentation, tampers with usage, seeks to match the polyvalencies or plurivocities or expressive stresses of the original by producing its own” (Lewis, 1985: 41). Unfaithfulness, thus, is to be applauded not denounced. The elements of multiplicity, faithfulness, equivalence, indeterminacy and cultural context involve several implications to translation into Arabic. These implicatins figure in many forms: loss vs. gain, deciding on a strategy, considering the target audience, the lexical choices, foreignizing vs. domestication, the purpose, term associations, etc. To sum up, the study has looked at Deconstruction as a school of thougt- the way it reads texts and the mechanisms it utilizes to get to a text’s meaning. It has aslo discussed how Deconstruction has been received by the Arab academia. Finally, the study considered the implications of deconstructive thought on translation theory and the impact it has on strategies and procedures taken. In the following chapter, we will take up some deconstructive terms and go over their translations into Arabic- correlating and comparing them to the original terms. 29 30 Chapter Three 1. The deviation of the term Terms like modernity, post-modernity, deconstruction, stylistics and phenomenology- to name some- are commonly used when scholars discuss modern literary theory. The usage in the Arab world has different meanings and connotations from that intended and used by the originators of such terms (Matloub, 2002: 3). In his article Deviation of the Term, Ahmed Weis (1997) addresses the issue of translating postmodern texts into Arabic with regard to how some of the culture-bound terms are eliminated or modified when translated into Arabic. Weis discusses the deviation of the meaning of a term. Taken as an example, deviation, he argues, is a term borrowed from the West, and it has an array of equivalents in Arabic. Since these equivalents are not culturally acceptable in the Arab world ( e.g., distortion, transgression, subversion, madness), Weis marks them out in his explanation of the term deviation saying that these terms do not fit with the target literary criticism norms, though they are influentially used in English texts. These terms accordingly violate decency and translators into Arabic do not have to copy them, in an endeavor to remain compatible with the tendency of gate-keeping and protectionism. Weis says that, traditionally, for a translated term to get stabilized in the target culture, the translator must keep in mind two considerations: 1. every 31 concept should have an independent term; and 2. a concept should only be expressed by a single term. However, he continues, this is not always attainable because a term can cover many concepts and a single concept could, in turn, be presented by many terms, hence the rise of 'deviation' in varied contexts and local target communities. 2. Deconstruction terminology Deconstruction uses a number of terms coined or deployed by Derrida, such as Jean Jacques Rousseau’s supplement, Mallarme’s dissemination, Ignace Gelb’s grammatology, Plato’s pharmakon- stuffing them with new senses that sometimes seemingly contradict one another. This study cannot do justice to all the terms that crop up in Derrida’s works. However, it seems appropriate to consider few deconstructive terms as it is unnecessary to enumerate all. The study can only address the key terms in Derrida’s discourse and use them as examples of the other terms that illustrate the deconstructive thought. In particular, this chapter will deal with deconstruction, différance, trace, supplement, indeterminacy, grammatology, dissemination and logocentrism. These are the most challenging terms for translators, as the reader will come to see. 3. Deconstruction Derrida used this term without giving it a definition. This might be attributed to the fact that Derrida intentionally didn’t want to close off the openness of the term. However, some scholars and references tried to produce approximate definitions of the term: 32 1. Paul de Man (1986, 156) was one of the scholars who tried to give a definition to this elusive term. His main concern was with textual gaps: “It's possible, within a text, to frame a question or undo assertions made in the text, by means of elements which are in the text, which frequently would be precisely structures that play off the rhetorical against grammatical elements.” 2. John Caputo (1996, 32) defines Deconstruction as a destabalizing force: “Whenever Deconstruction finds a nutshell-a secure axiom or a pithy maxim-the very idea is to crack it open and disturb this tranquility. Indeed, that is a good rule of thumb in Deconstruction. That is what Deconstruction is all about, its very meaning and mission, if it has any. One might even say that cracking nutshells is what Deconstruction is.” 3. David Allison (1973, xxxii) gives a definition which focuses on taking apart any truth: “Deconstruction signifies a project of critical thought whose task is to locate and 'take apart' those concepts which serve as the axioms or rules for a period of thought, those concepts which command the unfolding of an entire epoch of metaphysics.” 4. “In popular parlance to deconstruct is often used with the sense of dismantling the opinions, legitimacy, or value of other groups or individuals; by deconstructing your opponent, you lay bare their inferiority or their subconscious or ill motives” (New World Encyclopedia). 33 5. Language is incomplete: “Deconstruction is not a dismantling of the structure of a text, but a demonstration that it has already dismantled itself. Its apparently-solid ground is no rock, but thin air” (Miller, 1976: 34). Illustrating his term Deconstruction, Derrida emphasizes that it is “the undoing and decomposing of structures, in a certain sense more historical than the structuralist movement it called into question, was not a negative operation. Rather than destroying, it was also necessary to understand how an ‘ensemble’ was constituted and to reconstruct it to this end” (Derrida: Acts of Literature, 1991: 21). The translator might adopt the function intended by the ST writer or s/he might take the ST term out of its context (isolating it from its theoretical background and time and space setting), giving it a new realization, thus manipulating the source text term. All, however, are treated as translations, regardless of how the translator, driven by context, employed the term. In a nutshell, there is no such yardstick to judge a translation in terms of how much literal or how much dynamic it was. Table (1) shows how the term Deconstruction was rendered into Arabic. 34 Table (1) Deconstruction Rendering (s) Transcription Back Translation Translator Critic Strateg y التشريحية، Tashrihiya, Anatomy Abdullah Al- Ghathami Interpre- tation التفكيكية Tafkikiya Decomposition Mohammed Anani Kazim Jihad Taha Abdul Rahman Literal Taqwidhiya التقويضية Demolishing Mona Tolba Sa’d Bazi’i Interpre- tation التھديمية، التشريحية، التفكيكية Tahdimiya, Tashrihiya, Tafkikiya Demolition, Anatomy, Decomposition Inad Ghazwan Interpre- tation, Interpre- tation, Literal Hadhm Demolition الھدم Ali Harb Interpre- tation The controversy between critics over what it means “to deconstruct’ is congruous with Derrida’s concept of indefiniteness and multiplicity of meaning. It is no wonder then to find so many versions of the same term. Since a term is open to populous interpretations, its meaning is never definite. It is cumulative, built up in the form of layers in which one layer of meaning elaborates on the former and adds to the one to come. As the table demonstrates, strategies used to render this term were mainly literal and interpretive. These strategies, however, were used along with another procedure: description. Translators, as we will see below, introduced the term and added as much explanation as they could by way of illustration. 35 Before embarking on the analysis, we should note, as we said before, that the first Arab critic to address Deconstruction was Abdullah Al-Ghathami in 1985. This critic, however, did not translate any of Derrida’s works. What he did was to present a study of Derrida’s school of Deconstruction. Whenever encountering terms coined or reused by Derrida, he gave them Arabic equivalents. Al-Ghathami’s Tashrihiya (1985) does not account for demolition itself; it only takes it as a means to build a new text. This Tashrihiya (Anatomy) ultimately leads to reconstructing the text at hand. In his article Ishkaliyat Tarjamat Mostalahat Attafkik (The Problem of Translating Deconstructive Terminology into Arabic), Ali Saddiqi (2008) addresses the issue of translating the term Deconstruction citing Al- Ghathami saying: “I was puzzled over how to translate the term Deconstruction, since nobody before had given it a try. First, I tried Annaqdh wa Alfak (Demolition and Breaking down), but later I found these terms inappropriate as they might involve negative connotations that are offensive to the idea. Then I thought that the term Tahleel (Dismemberment) might be the right choice, but again I was afraid that it could be confused with the word Tahleel which means Analysis1. Finally I settled on Tashrihiya (Anatomy). This technique 1 - The words ‘decomposition’ and ‘analysis’ have the same root in Arabic (hal). Saddiqi speculates that this reflects the confusion of the critic over the term. 36 dismantles the text in order to re-structure it, thus enabling the reader to interact with the text” (58) (all translations mine). But Saddiqi refutes the option that Al-Ghathami took, saying that Tashrihiya is completely different from Derrida's Deconstruction. Tashrihiya tries to dismantle the text in order to rebuild it. This, he argues, is incompatible with the principles of Derrida's Deconstruction which does not involve reconstruction, of whatever sort. Saddiqi wonders whether Al- Ghathami was really trying to find an equivalent to the term or attempting to create a new one: “I tried to interpret Al-Ghathami’s intention, and found out that what he addressed was completely different from Derrida’s Deconstruction” (my translation). Al-Ghathami’s Tashrihiya not only missed Derrida's point, but spoiled it too. It was as if the critic- rather than helping the Arab reader understand the concept- preferred to efface the identity of the original term, creating a new one that obliterates the characteristics of the original and undermines the radical thrust of Derrida's term (my translation). Saddiqi goes on to say that Al-Ghathami’s version is a misreading that twists what Derrida says into its opposite. The possibility for such a misreading serves only to reinforce Derrida's claim that language can never guarantee a 37 particular understanding. While some scholars claim that the term has nothing to do with the destructive sense, their attempts to introduce the term as an innocent one will definitely go unheeded. Saddiqi’s judgment appears to be only partially accurate since Deconstruction does involve reconstruction. Paul De Man- one of Deconstruction proponents- maintains that Deconstruction concerns itself with rebuilding after dismantling: “However negative it may sound, deconstruction implies the possibility of rebuilding” (De Man, 1983: 140). In his article ‘Structure, Sign, and Play’ (Derrida: Writing and Difference, pp 278-294), Derrida makes the claim that a system replaces a system: it destructs it, but ultimately comes up with a new version. Therefore, Al- Ghathami’s option doesn’t mean that he was ignorant of the meanings the term is loaded with. There is a likelihood that he realized that the term cannot easily pass straight into Arabic, hence expensing with accuracy for the audience. Bazi’i (1998:190) notes that the term Tafkikiya has widely been taken as the exact equivalent for the word Deconstruction. “However, this is not the right term if we want to account for the demolishing sense of Deconstruction. Perhaps the term Taqwidhiya (literally: demolishing) is more precise. We come to know the close relationship between Demolishing and Deconstruction when we know the kinship between Deconstruction and Friedrich Nietzsche’s Nihilism.” He goes on to say that Unwinding does not imply the decompositionists’ (attafkikiyoun) argument 38 of rebuilding after decomposition. Taqwidhiya, he adds, is commensurate with the metaphor used by Derrida to describe the Western metaphysical thought as a building that should be brought down. Taqwidhiya, he maintains, is the right term that covers all the shadings of Derrida’s Deconstruction (all translations mine). Bazi’i (2004, 153-154) quotes Barbara Johnson, one of Deconstruction proponents, denying the demolition sense, but then she reconsiders her previous stance saying that: “Deconstruction is not synonymous with destruction, however. It is in fact much closer to the original meaning of the word 'analysis' itself, which etymologically means to undo- a virtual synonym for to de-construct” (Johnson, 1981: xiv). Kazim Jihad was the first to translate Derrida. This might be the reason why his renderings of deconstructive terminology were the most used ones. Deconstruction for Jihad is Tafkikiya (lit: Decomposition). Most translators who came later used the same term when they translated other works by Derrida. It seems that upon circulation, the term has become so stabilized- at least for translators- that translators no more gloss or preface it. Following Kazim Jihad, critic Mohammed Anani (1996:131) adopts the term Tafkikiya saying that Deconstruction has been seriously misunderstood, probably because of scholars’ failure to provide it along with its history, i.e. the philosophical term was reemployed in literary criticism. Taha Abdul Rahman (1995, 42) uses the word Tafkikiya, even 39 though, he argues, the meaning that comes to mind, when an Arab hears this word, is mixed up with Tafseel (lit: illustration) or Takhlees (extraction). The French-speaking or the English-speaking reader in contrast, Abdul Rahman expounds, would associate the term with a demolishing practice (Taqwidhi). Mona Tolba and Anwar Mugheeth (2005, 20) followed in the footsteps of Bazi’i in opting for Taqwidhiya in their translation of Of Grammatology. Their Taqwidhiya is a total term which combines both construction and destruction without the dominance of one over the other. “Al-taqwidhiya destructs the text and then builds a new one, which is, in turn, subject to further destruction” (my translation). Similarly, critic Abdulmalik Murtad (1999: 279) published a paper entitled Annathariyh Attaqwidhiya (Lit: Demolishing Theory) in which he criticized the adoption of Tafkikiya as an equivalent for Deconstruction. Attafkikiya, he argues, “has nothing to do with Derrida’s theory. Whereas Attaqwidhiya well accounts for the English term Deconstruction and the French term Déconstruction, Attafkikiya does not carry, and nobody can make it carry, the implication of the foreign term” (my translation). Deconstruction for Harb (1995: 24) is synonymous to Destruction (Arabic: hadm): “Deconstruction is the most important event of thought in the second half of the twentieth century, through which the solid bases of ideologies were entirely toppled over” (my translation). 40 In his book Asda’ (English: Echoes), critic Inad Ghazwan (2000, 145) reflected the elusive nature of Deconstruction when he referred to it using three Arabic equivalents: tahdimiya, tashrihiya and tafkikiya (Lit: Destruction, Anatomy and Decomposition). This indeterminacy of not giving one definite equivalent for the term serves only to reinforce Derrida’s claim that language can never guarantee a particular understanding. Ghazwan’s multi connotations emphasize the fact that one appropriate translation is not possible with a term that is defined in many different ways in the source culture. Introducing into Arabic a Western term in this way reveals two problems: the first is the moral or ideological purpose behind the use of the term, and the second is the understanding of the term in its philosophical context. The moral or the ideological factor figures as the translator or the critic endeavors to produce a term that does not have a negative connotation in the receiving culture. When Al-Ghathami used the term Tashrihiya, he meant to send a message to the Arab reader that Deconstruction has nothing to do with destruction. It seems that there is a gap in the understanding of the meaning of the term, hence introducing it as something completely different after having snatched the term from what makes it very special, i.e., its dismantling- and accordingly rebuilding- character. The rendering of the term by Harb as Hadm (Destruction) shows that the attempt to engage in a critical activity 41 may completely fail as it remains subject to norms prevailing in the target culture. Harb, it seems, Arabizes terminology and twists the concept behind the term without any justification. 4. Différance Différance is the most important and enigmatic term Derrida coined. The method of Différance works to postpone the traditional practice of referring, and to infinitely delay significance. Différance does not restrict the evolution of language and systems of thought, but is based, instead, on forward movement in accordance with the requirements of the context of the language. Différance encompasses differing and deferring. The former refers to the distinguished nature of contexts and the latter signifies the suspension of the meaning of a sign that is not discovered: “The structure of the sign is determined by the trace or track of that other which is forever absent” (Taylor and Winquist, 2000:289). To explain what he means by differing and deferring, Derrida coins the word ‘Différance’ in his book Margins of Philosophy (1982). This term refers not to what is found (the language), but to what is absent, and thus undermines any method that defines the concept of presence. The notion of différance “designates the impossible origin of difference in differing and of differing in difference” (Culler, 1983: 162). 42 Différance is the most widely referenced term coined by Derrida. Therefore it has been addressed by many critics and translators in Arabic. Table (2) shows how the term was rendered into Arabic. 43 Table (2): Différance Rendering Transcription Back translation Translator Critic Strategy Aldifferance Différance Sameer الدفيرانس Masoud Naturali- zation -Alikhtilaf Difference Abdul االختالف maqsoud Abdulkarim Partial translation االختالف و االرجاء Alikhtilaf wa alirja’ Difference and deferring Mohammed Anani Thought-for thought الف)ت(االخ Alikh(t)ilaf Differ(e)nce Kazim Jihad Literal االختالف المرّجأ االختالف المرجأ Alikhtilaf almorajja’ Alikhtilaf almorja’ The deferred difference The deferred difference Huda Shukri Abdulaziz Bin Arafa Coinage Thought-for thought جالفاالختر Alikhtarjilaf Differ- deferring Abdul- wahab Almisiri Coinage Alakhtaleef Roughly االختليف differance Muhyiddin Ali Homaidi Coinage Almughayara المغايرة Heterogeneity Farid Alzahi Partial translation )ا(ل)ت(خ)أ(ال ف Al(i)kh(t)il(a)f Not applicable Alhusein Sahban Coinage Almobayana Contrast Abdulsalam المباينة Binabdulali Partial translation Alfariq Disparity Fatima الفارق Jayoushi Partial translation Différance Differance Differance Somaya Sa’d Borrowing Alikhlaj Not applicable Mohammed االخالج Abdullatif Coinage Alirja’ Deferring Mona Tolba Partial االرجاء translation Unlike the term Deconstruction (which relatively has a small number of equivalents), the renderings of Différance into Arabic are many. Kazim Jihad (1988: 61) - adopting Derrida’s device of playing on letters perfectly- proposes the term Ikh(t)ilaf (Lit: Differ(e)nce) as an equivalent-with the t appearing in parentheses. He says his option is momentary (pending more accurate and efficient alternatives). “I put the t between parentheses urging 44 the reader to recognize that within the word Ikh(t)ilaf, there is a sense of breaking a promise (ikhlaf)” (my translation). Alhusein Sahban (1992: 29) adopts Kazim Jihad’s parentheses technique to deal with the term. He creates the term Al(i)kh(t)il(a)f. Sahban notes that this way the reader can evoke different connotations of ikhtilaf (literary: difference). The letters in parentheses, he adds, can be used alternately to obtain all the meanings derived from the root (kh,l,f): difference; lingering; alternation; breaking a promise; contravene; contradiction; and dispute. The basis according to which each meaning of these is evoked is the alternation between (t) and (a) (my translation). Abdulwahab Al-Misiri (1999, 255) is a literary critic who addressed some postmodern concerns. He coins the non-word Alikhtarjilaf (roughly Differ- deferring) to account for Derrida’s concepts of difference and deferring. This Ikhtarjilaf is not an identity, neither an origin nor a substance; rather it is a potent force in the language that separates the signifier from the signified, bringing to the meaning some sort of fuzziness (my translation). 45 Very close to this rendering is Huda Shukri’s Alikhtilaf almorja’ (the deferred difference) (1986) and Abdulaziz Bin Arafa’s Alikhtilaf almorajja’ (1993: 9), (double j), again with roughly the same meaning. The word almorajja that Bin Arafa uses has no root in Arabic. While Al-Misiri admits that his rendering is a coining (and this is an efficient strategy of translation), Bin Arafa uses the word almorajja as a new Arabic word. In fact, the researcher didn’t find this word in the Arabic lexicon Lisan Alarab. The almorajja was not found to go under any entry in the lexicon. Almobayana (roughly contrast) is another version introduced by Abdulsalam Binabdulali (2000, 78). Sometimes he uses the term Attamayoz (differentiation), arguing that Derrida’s Différance is closer to difference than to deferring. He justifies his rendering saying the root in Arabic (bayn) carries the meaning of difference, differentiation, remoteness and desertion. Almobayana generates differences. It is the force that liberates the movement of the signifier. This signifier, he argues, can only move if every present element is associated with another element, provided it has traces of the previous elements and those to come as well. Muhyiddin Homaidi (2008) coins Alakhtaleef (roughly differance). He notes that he committed himself to the original term and tried hard to be as faithful to Derrida’s term as he could. “I coin the word Alakhtaleef which does not appear to be an Arabic word in its morphology and phonology, yet the Arab reader will take it as an Arabic word without knowing how, 46 simply because it is very close in its spelling to the Arabic Alikhtilaf (difference)” (my translation). Fatima Jayoushi (1995) differentiates between two concepts: “Alfarq, as an Arabic equivalent for difference, and Alfariq (disparity) as a reasonable correspondent for Différance. Mona Tolba (2005, 12) prefers the term irja’ (deferring) hoping that the reader will figure out the exact meaning of Derrida’s Différance as s/he indulges into the textual meaning where Derrida explains the concept behind the term. These are the most circulated translations of the term, which were introduced with some sensitivity towards the term (giving the needed illustration). One can, however, find other translations here and there with the translators dealing with the term without recognition of the difficulty it represents in translation: Difference- the term retains the Latin letters- (Somaya Sa’d, 1984); Alikhtilaf- difference- (Abdulmaqsoud Abdulkarim, 1996); Almughayara- heterogeneity- (Farid Alzahi, 1992); Aldifirance- difference- (Sameer Masoud, 1992); and Alikhlaj- a coining from ikhlaf and irja’- (Mohammed Abdullatif, 2004). Unlike critics, translators seem to be faithful in strategy to Derrida’s term. Whenever one reads Jihad’s translation of Writing and Différance, one can feel how much faithful he was in rendering Derrida’s terminology. His Ikh(t)ilaf is as accurate as a literal translation can be. He was so loyal that he didn’t dare to violate the ‘sacredness’ of the term. Derrida coined the 47 term Différance by removing the /e/ and replacing it with the /a/ in order to have a term that checks for both difference and deferring. Jihad uses the same technique. To draw the reader’s attention to the /a/ in the French/English text, he puts the corresponding /ت/ between brackets, believing this can well account for Derrida’s concept. Strategies used to deliver this term were multiple: literal (Alikh(t)ilaf), coinage (Alikhlaj, Al(i)kh(t)il(a)f, Alakhtaleef, Alikhtarjilaf, Alikhtilaf almorajja’), partial translation (Alirja’, alfariq, almobayana, Almughayara, Alikhtilaf), borrowing (Différance), naturalization (Aldifferance) and thought-for-thought (Alikhtilaf almorja’, Alikhtilaf wa alirja’). Most however fall under the general name Interpretation. This is concordant with Derrida’s belief that every new reading generates a new meaning. The translator, thus, becomes an interpreter who adds to the meaning which can only be seen as cumulative, approximate and never definite. Alikh(t)ilaf (Kazim Jihad), Alikhtilaf Almorja’ (Huda Shukri), (Abdulaziz Bin Arafa), Alikhtilaf wa alirja (Mohammed Anani) and Aldifferance (Sameer Masoud) are the most widely-used renderings- corresponding to literal, thought-for-thought and naturalization strategies, respectively. 5. Grammatology Grammatology is a term coined by Ignace Gelb (1952). It refers to the scientific study of writing systems or scripts. In his book Of Grammatology (1976), Derrida introduced many of his concepts on writing. He discusses 48 the writings of Ferdinand de Saussure, Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Claude Lévi-Strauss, Étienne Condillac, Louis Hjelmslev, Edmund Husserl, Roman Jakobson, Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz, André Leroi-Gourhan, and William Warburton. This work by Derrida is considered as the foundation stone for his school of Deconstruction. Derrida shows how writing has always been taken as inferior to speech in Western philosophy. Of Grammatology comes to turn this tradition into its opposite. Table (3) shows how the term was translated into Arabic. Table (3): Grammatology Rendering Transcription Back translation Translator Critic Strategy Annahwiya Syntax Abdulmalik النحوية Murtad Sa’d Bazi’i and Miajan Rwaili Abdullah Al- Ghathami Mistranslation Ilm alqawa’id Grammar Sabri Hasan علم القواعد Mistranslation ابةعلم الكت Ilm alkitaba The scientific study of writing Mona Tolba & Anwar Mugheeth Yousef Waghlisi, Jabir Asfour and Sa’d Bazi’i, Functional Equivalence Ilm Alnahw Syntax Khamisi علم النحو Boghrara Mistranslation Dirasat دراسة الخطوط AlkhoHtoutH The study of calligraphy Bassam Baraka Mistranslation Gramatologia Grammatology Kazim Jihad جراماتولوجيا Naturalization Alkitaba Writing Fadil Tamir Partial الكتابة translation Murtad (1990:265) translates the term as Annahwiya (syntax). Abdullah Al-Ghathami (1985: 52) uses the same rendering when he talks about Derrida: “The start of Derrida was in 1967 when he published his book fee 49 Annahwiya” (my translation). Al-Ghathami further cites Abdulqaher Al- Jorjani’s work on Grammar and Systems as a typical form of Grammatology: “The notion of Derrida’s Grammatology reminds us of Imam Abdulqahir Al- Jorjani and his grammatical systems” (my translation). Likewise, Sabri Hasan (1989, 291) claims that Ilm alqawa’id (Grammar) is the best equivalent for Grammatology. Sa’d Bazi’i (2000: 158) is another critic who rendered the term as Annahwiya. He criticized the Arab critics who translated the term as Ilm Alkitaba (back translation: the scientific study of writing). Bazi’i restates his point of view elsewhere in his book Daleel Annaqid Alarabi (Arab Critic Guide) (p160) when he says that grammar is the basis of the system of language and thus Derrida’s Grammatology is close to Nahw (Syntax) but not to Kitaba (Writing). But Bazi’i (2007, 358) reconsiders his previous stance and uses the term Ilm alkitaba (the scientific study of writing), but without giving a justification for this shift. The seven years that elapsed between the two works could have given Bazi’i the chance to study Of Grammatology in depth; hence the shift. Yousef Waghlisi (2008, 47) criticizes Khamisi Boghrara (2004) who took Ilm Alnahw (Syntax) as an equivalent for Grammatology. Waghlisi proposes Ilm alkitaba as a convenient equivalent when he quotes Derrida saying that he refers to Ignace Gelb’s A study of writing- the foundations of grammatology to build on his concept of Grammatology. 50 Mona Tolba (2005, 12) says she and Anwar Mugheeth first opted for Ilm osool alkitaba (lit: The fundamentals of writing) as an equivalent for Derrida’s Grammatology, then they took the term Ilm nothom alkitaba (lit: systems of writing), but later on- guided by what Derrida says on page 13 of his Of Grammatology that it is the science of writing- they settled on Ilam alkitaba. There have been other renderings that never gained circulation because of their oddity, such as Bassam Baraka’s Dirasat Alkhotout- the study of calligraphy- (1985, 94) and Fadil Tamir’s Alkitaba- writing- (1994,47). Jabir Asfour (1998, 135)- in his overt criticism of Bazi’i and Rwaili- says some translators take the word wrongly as Annahwiya, which might come to mind at the first glance. “They have naively taken the term as Syntax without bothering to read inside the book.” Kazim Jihad (1988, 34) says: “some translators wrongly opted for Annahwiya, deceived by the prefix gramma, while the best equivalent is Ilm alkitaba, though I will continue to use the term Grammatologia” (my translation). Ali Saddiqi (2008) cites a dialogue between Abdulmalik Murtad and Jabir Asfour on the translation of the term Grammatology: Murtad: Perhaps Jacques Derrida was the greatest philosopher to deal with text analysis, especially in his book Ilm Annahw (Syntax). Jabir Asfour: I ask Murtad to correct some translation errors, especially his translation of Grammatology as Ilm annahw. Whether we translate from 51 French or English, Grammatology is Ilm alkitaba (the scientific study of writing). Murtad: As for the translation of Grammatology, I was actually in a rush. In fact, I don’t have the book in my library. It was my mistake to translate a term without bothering to search for its real meaning (my translation). The dialogue summarizes the range of problems of translating Derrida’s title into Arabic. Obviously, if one wants to translate the concept behind the term, not the word in itself, then one has to bring in the cultural background of the term, since disengaging the term from its context will definitely obscure the inherent conceptual features of the original term. Strategies of literal (if this is the right word) and partial translation were clearly erroneous. 6. Supplement A Supplement is something which is added to something else in order to improve it or complete it; something extra (Cambridge Advanced Lerner’s Dictionary). Derrida often coins new terms or reemploys old ones. As an example, he reuses the Supplement in Rousseau. Derridan Supplement means both replacement and addition: it supplements and supplants. It either adds something to something that is incomplete or comes to replace something else that is unable to be present (Of Grammatology, 144). When there is a lack in what is supplemented, a Supplement is usually brought in. A Supplement serves as an aid to the original. Writing, for example, is a supplement of speech: “if supplementarity is a necessarily indefinite 52 process, writing is the supplement par excellence since it proposes itself as the supplement of the supplement, sign of a sign, taking the place of a speech already significant” (Of Grammatology, 281). Supplement is not less controversial than the former terms, but with fewer options that might be attributed to the fact that the term had an equivalent before being employed by Derrida. The term was rendered more literally, as Table (4) shows. Table (4): Supplement Rendering (s) Transcription Back Translation Translator Critic Strategy Almulhaq Annex Abdulrahman الملحق Almansour Abdulsalam Bin Abdulali Literal (partial translation) Almulhaq and الملحق و الزيادة Azziyada Supplement and Addition Kazim Jihad Thought-for- thought ةتكمل Takmila Complement Mohammed Asfour Literal (partial translation) Almukammil Supplement Mona Tolba Literal المكمل (partial translation) الااستكم Istikmal Completion Sabri Hasan Literal (partial translation) Each of the options marked literal is a good match for the word supplement, but since Derrida’s Supplement is not identical in meaning to the word supplement, I glossed the literal strategy with partial translation to show that the literal is appropriate for the word, but not for the concept. The other strategy used to deliver this term was the thought-for-thought, as the table demonstrates. 53 In his article Mantiq Almolhaq (roughly: the Logic of the Supplement), Abdulrahman Almansour (1997, 33) covers one aspect of supplementarity when he uses Almulhaq, and so does Abdulsalam Bin Abdulali (2000, 81), who says the Supplement is added to something to fill a gap in it. When it is added, it reveals the vulnerability of the original, and so destroys any possibility of contrasting the positive and the negative. Mohammed Asfour (1996, 222-223), in his translation of Albonyawiya wa ma Ba’daha (Structuralism and post-structuralism), maintains that the Supplement makes up for the original term- giving the same result- but does not replace it, hence his rendering Takmila (complement). The origin, he postulates, is incomplete in itself and it still needs the Supplement to give it its true character. When the Supplement is added to the origin- which was previously viewed as a perfect thing- it reveals some inherent lack. Though the Supplement is external, it becomes a key component of the life-cycle of the original (my translation). Kazim Jihad (1988, 27) in his translation of Derrida’s Writing and Difference goes beyond the literal translation to account for both elements of supplemantarity and addition. According to Kazim, the Supplement is enclosed to something to compensate for a deficiency. The rendering of Mona Tolba (2005, 13) involves the elements of supplemantarity, addition and replacement /alternative. Tolba uses the term Almukammil to account for the combination of augmentation, 54 annexing, addition and supplementarity. Almukammil, according to Tolba, implies a lack that necessarily needs supplementation. “I used the term Almukammil since the Arabic root kamala involves both supplementation and perfection, which live together like two peas in a pod” (my translation). Very close to her is Istikmal (completion) which was used by Sabri Hasan (1989, 83). For Tolba, Hasan, Almansour and Binabdulali, Supplement plays an auxiliary role- to additionally enhance the origin. It completes and reinforces the original concept. For Derrida, it adds and substitutes (These nuances are found in Tolba, too). It extends and replaces. It enhances understanding of the original concept. The Supplement denotes two significations: “The supplement adds itself; it is a surplus, a plenitude enriching plenitude, the fullest measure of presence. It cumulates and accumulates presence” (Of Grammatology, 144). But the supplement also supplements: “It adds only to replace. It intervenes or insinuates itself in- the-place of; it fills, it is as if one fills a void. If it represents and makes an image, it is by the anterior default of a presence” (Of Grammatology, 145). Derrida’s Supplement implies two elements: replacement and addition. These are inseparable and the meaning of the term does not hold unless they are taken together. The double meaning of Supplement provides what is missing and what is extra (Hatim and Munday, 2005: 209). 55 7. Trace Derrida used this term in two of his early books, namely Writing and Difference and Of Grammatology. In addressing a binary opposition, Deconstruction exposes a trace which can be seen as a crack in the structure. Trace is the “mark of the absence of a presence, an always- already absent present” (Of Grammatology, xvii). “The trace is not a presence but is rather the simulacrum of a presence that dislocates, displaces, and refers beyond itself” (Derrida, Speech and phenomena: 156). Derrida says that the Trace is always being erased: Always differing and deferring, the trace is never as it is in the presentation of itself. It erases itself in presenting itself, muffles itself in resonating, like the writing itself, inscribing its pyramid in difference (Derrida, Margins of philosophy: 23). Any kind of presence, then, is important only because it is marked by a Trace: “Language makes the movement of signification possible only if each element that is said to be ‘present’ appearing on the stage of presence, is related to something other than itself but retains the mark of a past element and already lets itself be hollowed out by the mark of its relation to a future element. This trace relates no less to what is called the future than to what is called the past, and it constitutes what is called the present by this very relation to what it is not, to what it absolutely is not” (Derrida: Speech and Phenomena: 142-3). The Trace for Derrida is the general structure of the sign and the general structure of experience (Harry Staten, 1980: 19.) For Derrida, sign is the play of identity and difference: “half of the sign is always not there, and 56 another half is not that” (Derrida, Of Grammatology: xvii). The sign never leads to an extra-linguistic concept; it leads to another sign, one replacing the other. People do not feel the presence of a thing through a sign, but through the absence of other presences. This is done by means of guessing. Trace and not being there are the elements that create meaning. Table (5) shows how the term was rendered into Arabic. Table (5): Trace Rendering Transcription Back translation Translator Critic Strategy Alathar Trace (with االثر the impact sense) Abdullah Al- Ghathami Literal + selected connotation + Alathar Trace Kazim Jihad Literal االثر selected connotation Alathar Trace (with االثر the sense of sign) Anwar Mugheeth and Mona Tolba Literal + selected connotation Alathar Trace (in the االثر mirage sense) Abdulwahab Al-Misiri Literal + selected connotation Alathar Trace (with االثر the ashes sense) Abdulaziz Hammouda Literal + selected connotation Alathar Trace (with االثر the track sense) Abdulsalam Bin Abdulali Literal + selected connotation Alathar Trace (with االثر the ashes sense) Adel Abdullah Literal + selected connotation Alathar Trace ( with االثر the sign sense) Khalida Hamed Literal + selected connotation Trace was delivered literally by all translators. Nevertheless, it was introduced with eight different senses. Each translator rendered the term coupled with a selected connotation. 57 In his book Alkhatia’ wa Attakfir (Sin and Penance), Abdullah Al- Ghathami (1985, 53) takes the term as Sihr albayan (charm of rhetoric), which is behind every expression. Then he says the Trace is the effect which results from the process of writing. “Derrida’s Trace,” he says, “is an alternative to Saussure’s sign” (my translation). He introduces the term as a riddle that is not scalable, but emanates from the heart of the text. In Thaqafat Alasila (lit: The Culture of Questions) Al-Ghathami (1992, 72- 73) elaborates on his Trace (with the impact sense) when he takes up Mahmoud Darwish’s poem Passers by in Passing Speech in terms of its impact on the Israelis: “I take this poem to provide an evidence of the impact that the poem had on recipients, since this poem was translated into different languages including Hebrew. We judge a text according to the impact it leaves on the audience” (my translation). Al-Ghathami didn’t mean to say that a poem is a trace. Rather, he only took the poem to illustrate his reasoning that a trace is an effect (a poem influences the reader). Because the Arabic equivalent for Trace is Athar (which corresponds to more than ten terms in English), Al-Ghathami took one of these correspondents and used it as an equivalent for Derrida’s Trace. Kazim Jihad (1988) renders Trace as Alathar (lit: trace). He explains the term saying it is the erasing of something while retaining its identity within its signs. It is a channel of linkage between previous texts and texts to come. That is to say, Trace is the entity which links the signifier and signified. Everything gains meaning within its relationship to other things. 58 In the movement of the signs “there is neither symbol nor sign but a becoming-sign of the symbol” (Derrida, 1976, p. 47). Translators Anwar Mugheeth and Mona Tolba (2005, 147) use the same term with a different sense: “Alathar is the origin of the original text.” For them, the Trace is the force behind a text, the power that prompts a writer to write a text. Alama (sign) is another rendering that Khalida Hamed (2002) employs in dealing with the term. According to this view, what is inside a text (the perceived) suggests what is outside it (the unperceived) by means of the sign. Although Al-Misiri uses the term Alathar (1999, 668) as an equivalent for Trace, he employs it in the sense of a mirage. Each signifier implicates a trace of other signifiers whether they occur before or after it in the text. Through the process of Differance, these traces are accumulated and emerge like a real meaning while they are not. They are only illusions (my translation). According to this argument, the real meaning often evades us. Trace for translators Idrees Katheer and Izziddin Al-Khitabi (1994, 29) and critic Adel Abdullah (2000, 91) is Athar. This Athar denotes effacement and retention: effacing a thing but retaining its marks, and thus becoming a means to an interrelation between texts and signs which enter into conflict with other signs. Abdullah argues that Athar bears two meanings at the same time: departure and stay, or as he puts it, the effacement of something while retaining some of its traces. The text carries within itself Athaar 59 (traces) of former texts. This is what Abdulaziz Hammouda calls ashes (1998). Trace, he says, is the background knowledge from which all texts emanate (97). A word like Farmakon, he says, combines two concepts: poison and antidote. The thing that makes this word tolerate these two meanings is what Derrida calls Trace. So, Trace is not a poison, nor an antidote, but something in between or a mixture of both, though one of the meanings has precedence over the other. Abdulsalam Bin Abdulali (2000, 79) uses the word Athar, which, he contends, indicates a lacerated, disjointed, deferred presence, a presence that implies effacement. This presence is incompatible with metaphysics. The Athar refers us not to another presence, but to another text, leaving behind it some of its ashes, thus becoming the trace of the trace. This Athar abolishes the original and replaces it with another (my translation). According to Davis (2001:15), “Derrida usually speaks of the trace, rather than the signifier, partly to recall its sense of a 'track' or even a ‘spoor’.” Derrida (1982:21) cautions that “the concept of the trace is incompatible with the concept of retention of the becoming-past of what has been present. One cannot think the trace-and therefore, differance-on the basis of the present or the presence of the present.” According to Davis (2001:15- 16), “these relations to past and future are often called retentive and protentive characteristics and the trace is where the retentive/protentive relationship with the other is marked…In order to exist as meaningful 60 events, texts must carry within themselves traces of previous texts” (Davis, 2001:16). In his last work Learning to live finally, which was published three years after his death, Derrida equates his concept of Trace with the concept of Specter. I have always been interested in this theme of survival, the meaning of which is not to be added on to living and dying. It is originary: life is living on, life is survival [la vie est survie]. To survive in the usual sense of the term means to continue to live, but also to live after death. When it comes to translating such a notion, Benjamin emphasizes the distinction between uberleben on the one hand, surviving death, like a book that survives the death of its author, or a child the death of his or her parents, and, on the other hand, fortleben, living on, continuing to live. All the concepts that have helped me in my work, and notably that of the trace or of the spectral, were related to this "surviving" as a structural and rigorously originary dimension (2007, 26). Trace, thus, is the unsaid, the hidden thing that survives the death of the originator. It remains operative after the initiator perishes. The word Trace has many Arabic equivalents (with the senses of Mirage, Track, Effect (impact), Sign, and Ashes). Yet, assigning a meaning to this term becomes a play or a guessing game. In practice, there should be some sort of explanation; otherwise, the term will lose much of its force. Some key points of Derrida’s Trace have been overlooked by translators: first, the concept of Ghost which has always been a prominent theme in Derrida’s writings. He even equates the concept of Trace with that of a 61 Ghost. Usually a ghost haunts. It is a reminder of the original. It looks like it, but it is not the original. Second, there is the sense of track or spoor. The term Athar is an equivalent for several terms in English: trace, track, sign, signal, heritage, favor, influence, impact, news, footprints. According to the all-out Arabic lexicon Lisan Alarab, this term covers all of these concepts. In Arabic-talking about regulations that govern behavior- one could use the term Athar as the wise sayings of prophet Mohammed (MPBH), his companions or other disciples. In Arabic, context of use determines sense. There are many senses as there are contexts. 8. Dissemination “The word dissemination implies a link between the wasteful dispersal of semantic meaning and semen” (Powell, 2000:108). There are a myriad of contexts for a text and, therefore, every new reading brings a new understanding and gives a new meaning. A meaning of a text, thus, can never be exhausted; there will always be something new to be said or to be added. Derrida reworks Dissemination to refer to this process: “If one takes the expression plurality of filiations in its familial literality, then this is virtually the very subject of Dissemination” (Derrida, Points, 1995: 224). Once a text is published, it begins its journey of dissemination- a journey to no end: We are playing on the fortuitous resemblance of seme and semen. There is no communication of meaning between them. 62 And yet, by this floating, purely exterior collusion, accident produces a kind of semantic mirage: the deviance of meaning, its reflection-effect in writing, sets something off ... it is a question of remarking a nerve, a fold, an angle that interrupts totality: in a certain place, a place of well-determined form, no series of semantic valences can any longer be closed or reassembled ... the lack and the surplus can never be stabilized in the plenitude of a form” (Derrida: Positions, 1981: 45