TRANSLATION AT BARD

Broadly defined, translation is a mode of critical thought, a means of communication, an art form with a rich history, a transnational sociopolitical phenomenon, and a practice undertaken at the horizon of the impossible. The Bard Translation and Translatability Initiative (BTTI) brings together scholars, practitioners, and students to explore translation and its discontents. Translation at Bard is read in both the narrower interlinguistic sense of moving meaning between two languages, as well as through an interrogation of the broad hermeneutic conditions at stake in questions of translatability. This interdisciplinary approach aims to elicit new collaborative insights, develop curricular initiatives, and stimulate experimentation and debate across the Bard network and the community at large.

The BTTI encourages curricular initiatives that promote translation, particularly from a multicultural or multidisciplinary perspective, and aims to bring together scholars, teachers, writers, and artists from the United States and other countries. The BTTI also works with Bard faculty members to elicit new interdisciplinary insights, develop new curricula, strengthen communication, and stimulate experimentation among the College’s four divisions and across its network of international liberal arts and graduate studies programs.