Abstract

ESALA, Nathan. Loyalty and Liberation: Skopos Theory's Ethic in Dialogue with Contextual Bible Study's Commitments. Old testam. essays [online]. 2016, vol.29, n.3, pp.434-454. ISSN 2312-3621.  https://doi.org/10.17159/2312-3621/2016/v29n3a5.

This paper explores how Christiane Nord's ethic of translator loyalty could be invigorated in African Bible translation by engaging the social commitments of Contextual Bible Study, a practice of Bible reading and action developed in South Africa. After describing Nord's concept of loyalty and its prevalence in African Bible translation, the paper notes the challenge of practicing loyalty amidst complex power dynamics in the post-colonial context of Ghana. The paper then imagines how Christiane Nord's four poles of translator loyalty could be reconfigured if they included the social commitments and interpretative practices of Contextual Bible Study. The goal is to situate translators so they can produce a translation that offers details from critical scholarship and from actual Contextual Bible Study experiences which marginalised groups in their audience may find liberating. An experimental English translation of Job 3 is included for reference.

Keywords : translation ethics; skopos theory; Contextual Bible Study (CBS); liberation hermeneutics; post-colonial; sacred text translation.

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