Call for papers
CDDC 17-18/2022
INTERSEMIOTICITY, INTERGENERICITY, INTERMEDIALITY:
FROM TRANSLATION TO DRAMATISATION, ADAPTATION, PERFORMANCE
Roman Jakobson’s On Linguistic Aspects of Translation (1959) is still a much quoted
(re)source, above all for having introduced the concept of intersemioticity or transmutation
as “the interpretation of verbal signs by means of
signs of non-verbal sign systems”. For the 17thand 18th
issues of Concordia Discors vs.
Discordia Concors, we propose a reflection on translation and adaptation as
a passage, not only from verbal to non-verbal, but also from a genre to
another, and also from a medium to another.
Whether we see intersemioticity, along with Aba-Carina
Pârlog (2019) as a prism, or we consider it a metamorphosis or mutation, it is
always reinvention, extension, addition, and not a simple repetition of an “original”
text. Umberto Eco (2003) argues that intersemiotic translations or
transmutations (in Jakobsonian terms) are nothing but adaptations, as they
reshape previous texts due to their tendency to ‘say too much.’ Much like
translations, adaptations are usually judged in terms of their fidelity to a
prototext, even if a change of medium is involved. In keeping with the
so-called archontic literature, which
posits that texts based upon or referring to other texts are never simply
derivative or subordinate, they do not retell or repeat a story; they rather
build an archive that expands the textual world.
Intergenericity
explores the translation potential of generic interactions and
influences. Considering genre from a
linguistic perspective, as a text type, spoken or written, but also, from a
social perspective, as an “activity type” (Fairclough, 1992) closely connected
with the subject positions that are socially determined, we focus on the
relationship between authorial and
lectorial genericity. In the latter part of
the 19th century and the former of the 20th, novelists
used to “dramatise” their fiction, either in
order to protect it against unauthorised dramatisation or for much more
than reasons of copyright (see Henry James’ Daisy Miller, Thomas Hardy’s Tess of the D’Urbervilles, Joseph
Conrad’s The Secret Agent, or J. M. Barrie with his books featuring Peter Pan).
The process of self-adaptation
is, as shown by Richard James Hand (1996), illuminating because it reveals much
about the way these novelists saw their fiction as well as the broader
perception of their culture.
Due to the fact that Jakobson’s concept
of intersemiotic translation is limiting, as the source medium is traditionally
a written text, intermediality came to define various interactions among media,
dissociating the translation from its strictly linguistic meaning (Shober,
2010). According to Lars Elleström (2010), every medium is constituted of four
necessary conditions or basic modalities: material, sensorial, spatiotemporal
and semiotic, in such a way that even the apparently monomodal text is, in
fact, multimodal. Consequently, as intermediality is “the result
of constructed media borders being trespassed,’’ various signs may be part of
various systems at the same time without losing
their stability. We understand, therefore, intermedial translation both as the
adaptation and transmission of a literary work through another medium, and as interactions
among other different media, such as, for instance, Amy Lowell’s poetic
translation of Stravinsky’s music (Shober), or Marie Chouinard’s
choreographical translation of Hieronymus
Bosch’s painting The Garden of Earthly Delights (Montesi,
2021).
As Martha Dvořák (2012) claims, “text in the original etymological sense of textus (surface, material, base) signifying
the concrete bottom or supporting part has mutated – mutated to an immaterial mental
state, but also to other forms of material, other cultural media, transforming
intertextuality to intergenericity, intersemioticity, or rather,
intermediality”.
We kindly
invite subsmissions in English, French,
German, Italian or Spanish for the 17th and 18th issues of
the peer-reviewed academic journal Concordia Discors vs. Discordia Concors: Researches into
Comparative Literature, Contrastive Linguistics, Cross-Cultural and Translation
Strategies (http://condisdiscon.blogspot.com/2021) on one of the following subtopics (but not only):
§ musicalisation
of literature
§ ekphrasis
§ from
picaresque to picturesque
§ from
the book to the screen
§ from
the book to the stage
§ digital
art
§ movement
as translation
§ from
stage/screen to page; text as anchorage
§ the socio-cultural
meaning of the material expression of
signs; substances/surfaces of production (ink, gold, paint, etc./paper, canvas,
wood, etc.)
§ intermediality
and interartiality
§ adaptation
as reverence or subversion towards source texts
§ intermediality
in graphic novels
§ intersemiotic
translation and the burden of historical and cultural context
A special
section will be dedicated to interviews, reviews of publications, as well as
research progress reports in adjacent thematic areas.
Interviews and reviews of recent
books / plays / films / musical performances / art exhibitions are also
accepted, which need not relate to the topic at issue.
Contributions in
extenso should be sent no later than September 1st 2022 to the mail addresses indicated under CONTACTS.
Abstracts:
§
should be submitted in English
and not exceed 150 words
§
should include 5 keywords,
as well a short bionote in English
(indicating author’s name, affiliation, academic / research areas of interst,
email)
§
should indicate the section
preferred (Comparative Literature, Constrastive Linguistics, Cross-Cultural
Strategies, Translation Strategies, Cross-Artistic Approaches, Reviews and
Presentations)
CONTACTS
Daniela Hăisan: danielahaisan@litere.usv.ro
Raluca
Balaţchi: raluca.balatchi@usm. ro
Daniela-Maria
Marţole: danielamartole@yahoo.com
REFERENCES
Byden, Diana; Martha Dvořák, eds., 2012, Crosstalk:
Canadian and Global Imaginaries in Dialogue, Wilfred Laurier University
Press
Brower, Reuben Arthur, ed., 1959, On
translation, Harvard Studies in Comparative Literature, vol. 23, Harvard
University Press
Dvořák,
Martha, 2012, “Rejoinders in a Planetary Dialogue”, in Diana Byden
and Martha Dvořák, eds., Crosstalk:
Canadian and Global Imaginaries in Dialogue, Wilfred Laurier University
Press, pp. 111-134
Eco, Umberto, 2003, Mouse or Rat. Translation
as negotiation, London: Orion Publishing Group
Elleström, Lars, ed., 2010, Media Borders.
Multimodality and Intermediality, London, Palgrave, Macmillan
Fairclough, Norman, 1992, Discourse and social
Change, Cambridge: Polity Press
Hand, Richard James, 1996, Self-adaptation:
The Stage Dramatisation of Fiction by Novelists, PhD thesis, http://theses.gla.ac.uk/1912/
Jakobson, Roman, 1959, “On
Linguistic Aspects of Translation”, in Brower, Reuben Arthur (ed), On
translation, Harvard University Press, pp. 232-240
Montesi, Vanessa, 1921, “Translating
Paintings into Dance: Marie Chouinard’s The Garden of Earthly Delights and the
Challenges posed to a Verbal-based Concept of Translation”, in The Journal of Specialised Translation,
35, pp. 166-185
Pârlog, Aba-Carina, 2019, Intersemiotic
Translation: Linguistic and literary Multimodality, Springer International
Publishing; Palgrave Pivot
Shober, Regina, 2010, “Translating Sounds:
Intermedial Exchanges in Amy Lowell’s Stravinsky’s
Three Pieces ‘Grotesque’ for String Quartet”, in Lars Elleström (ed) 2010, Media
Borders, Multimodality and Intermediality, London, Palgrave Macmillan, pp.
163- 175
