Translator, Traitor or Teacher: A Neophyte-Focused Communication Pedagogy

This dissertation presents a theory of teaching derived from the production and reception of translations, with a particular focus on the neophyte. The neophyte is described as either an individual who through the process of literary translation deepens his or her understanding of a new language, or a new reader of translations beginning to harvest a cosmopolitan worldview.Since its initial 1988 Iranian publication, Shahrnush Parsipur's Women without Men was first translated into English in 1998, then made into a film in 2009, and translated into English again in 2011 - an exceedingly peculiar circulation that stems from an equally complicated clash of international politics and cultural production. Using this text and its various iterations as case studies, I situate the works in both a theoretical network and literary tradition to then unpack operative hermeneutic principles. From the translations, I outline the unique pedagogical attributes obtained from the production and reception of translated works, with a marked advocacy of the neophyte on either end of this practice.First, the process of translation is traced from a critical reading of the source text and analysis of the renderings. The subjectivity and hermeneutics of the translators is then explored using material gathered from a symposium on Women without Men held at UC Irvine on February 14, 2014 with Parsipur, all three of her English translators, and other prominent scholars in the field. Discussions of the politics of translation, Iran, and America, with Parsipur's work as the central point of reference, resulted in fascinating insights from the author and translators that day.A problem that was brought to the fore during the Women without Men Symposium was the dearth of translated material from Eastern cultures in the West, despite the great fortitude going the other way. This necessitates cultivation of not just people who speak multiple languages, but also those who are using their competency, and perhaps even advancing it, in the translation of Eastern literatures for a Western audience. In my conclusion, in reference to this problematic I submit the experiences of the translators of Women without Men as testimony from exemplary neophytes serving as both creator and audience. My dissertation seeks to promote more translation projects, both as a method to learn languages, as well as an introduction to foreign concepts