Translation of Scientific and Medical Texts

Abstract

Knowledge is a mobile form of culture that acquires broad influence through the act of translation. This truth applies to science and medicine no less than to literature or sacred texts. Translation of scientific works, though often neglected by scholars in translation studies, has played a vital role in intellectual history generally, and in the spread of modern scientific culture, with all its consequent powers over the physical world, more specifically, both in the past and today. Analysis reveals that science translation is not literal work, but highly interpretive, with translators having often nativized material to new cultural contexts, greatly enriching science in the process.