Kääntäminen valehtelemisena

Authors

• Ritva Hartama-Heinonen Helsingin yliopisto

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.61200/mikael.129793

Abstract

Earlier in my research, I have explored the crucial role of truth and truthfulness in the context of translation. The very same semiotico-philosophical issue can, however, be approached from the opposite vantage point, namely, from what is not true – is false or unauthentic. Even here semiotics can provide a fruitful starting point, particularly the view of semiotics as a theory of the lie as proposed by Umberto Eco in the 1970s and furthermore, Eco’s ideas of fakes and forgeries from the 1980s and the 2000s. In this theoretical article, the phenomenon of translation is discussed from both these lines of approach to find support for the paradoxical claim that translation is a truth-seeking action, yet to translate is to lie. This paper also touches upon the semiotically relevant and related question of whether a translation as a sign either represents and stands for the source text or whether it counts as the source text.