Dalit Literature and / in Translation
An international conference at the British Centre for Literary Translation,
University of East Anglia, Norwich, UK
29-30 June 2015
CALL FOR PAPERS
This conference is the fourth event hosted by the AHRC-funded Research Network ‘Writing,
Analysing, Translating Dalit Literature’, which promotes a multi-disciplinary dialogue on Indian
literature produced by Dalits (formerly known as Untouchables) by hosting a series of workshops and
conferences on the production, translation, dissemination and analysis of Dalit literature. This
network seeks to bring together scholars in the field of literary and cultural studies, translation
studies, postcolonial studies, South Asian literatures, history and cultures to discuss this fascinating
corpus of literary texts. Dalit literature is the most significant development in Indian literature in the
last three decades, but it has received surprisingly little attention from academics outside India. We
invite scholars to attend who are not necessarily experts on Dalit literature, in order to encourage a
wide-ranging discussion on the translation of Dalit texts.
After the first events of the series in Nottingham and Leicester (June 2014) and Montpellier (October
2014), the theme of this two-day conference at UEA will be the analysis of the concepts of literary
and cultural translation in relation to Dalit literature. We invite papers that explore the specific
challenges that are involved in the translation of Dalit literature from one vernacular language to
another, or from one vernacular language to a European language. What are the differences
between translating Dalit literature into an Indian vernacular language and a European language? We
are also interested in exploring the ways in which different readerships are inscribed in Dalit texts
and how translation responds to, or reacts against, this inscription. To what extent are the translated
texts re-encoded for a different audience, pan-Indian, non-Dalit or global? The politics of which texts
are selected for translation, or not selected, will also be examined, as will the publishing, marketing
and reception of Dalit literature translations. Participants will be encouraged to analyse the ways
Dalit literature performs a translation of subaltern and often oral art forms, and to explore how this
form of cultural translation translates, or does not translate, into different languages. Ultimately,
which features of Dalit literature resist translation? What is left out and irredeemably lost? These
questions will be asked about literary texts and their translations but also about films, videos and
other documentaries. The many ways caste and Dalitness travel, or do not travel, from one language
to another, through subtitles and their translations, will also be considered.
Please send abstracts of paper proposals of up to 300 words to Dr Nicole Thiara
(nicole.thiara@ntu.ac.uk) and Dr Judith Misrahi-Barak (judith.misrahi-barak@univ-montp3.fr) by 30
November 2014. Notification of acceptance will be given by 15 January 2015. Please note that the
conference organisers cannot offer financial assistance of any kind to the speakers.
AHRC-funded Research Network Series, 2014-16:
http://pays-anglophones.upv.univ-montp3.fr/?page_id=996
Principal Investigator Dr Nicole Thiara, Centre for Postcolonial Studies at Nottingham Trent
University, UK; nicole.thiara@ntu.ac.uk
Co-Investigator Dr Judith Misrahi-Barak, EMMA, Université Paul-Valéry Montpellier, France;
judith.misrahi-barak@univ-montp3.fr