Translation Studies and Agamben's Theory of the Potential

Abstract

In his article, Translation Studies and Agamben's Theory of the Potential, Paolo Bartoloni discusses the interstitial space of translation by drawing on literary and philosophical preoccupations, especially Giorgio Agamben's notion of potentiality. The first part of the article is devolved to defining and discussing potentiality and the significance that it has for a general re-thinking of translation theory. Bartoloni moves on to ask what would happen if the focus of translation shifts from the final product, or from the relation between the original and the translation, to the process of translating, that is the middle ground, the in-betweenness where two distinct languages and cultures meet without superimposing one's own values onto the other. This section is occupied by a dialogue with a series of postcolonial texts, especially Pratt's Imperial Eyes and Bhabha's The Location of Culture. Bartoloni's main interest and purpose in this article is to point to a new hermeneutic and epistemological zone from which a new reflection on translation as well as literature and subjectivity can commence. Paolo Bartoloni, Translation Studies and Agamben’s Theory of the Potential page 2 of 10 CLCWeb: Comparative Literature and Culture 5.1 (2003):