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TALAL

ASAD

The Concept

of

Cultural

Translation in British Social

Anthropology

Introduction

All anthropologists are

familiar

with

E

B. Tylor's famous defJ

llillon

of

culture:

"Culture or Civilization, taken in its wide ethno

graphic sense,

is

that complex

whole which

includes

knowledge, belief,

art, morals, law, custom,

and

any other capabilities

and habits

ac

quired hy man as a member of society. t would be interesting to trace

how and

when

this n o ~ o n of

culture,

with its enumeration of "capabil

ities

and habits" and

its emphasis on

what

Linton called social here ity

(focusing on the

process

of learning), was transformed into the notion

of a text that is, into

something

resembling an inscribed

discourse.

One

obvious clue to this

change

is to be

found

in

the

way

that

a

notion

of

anguage as the precondition

of historical

continuity and social

learning ( cultivation ) came to

domjnate

the

perspective

of social an

thropologists. In a

general

way,

of

course, such

an interest in language

predates Tylor,

but

in the nineteenth

and

early

twentieth

centuries it

tended to

be central

to varieties of nationalist

literary

theory and edu

cation

cf.

Eagleton

1983

:ch.

2) rather

than

to

the

other human

sci

ences. When

and

in what ways did it

become

crucial for

British

social

anthropology? I do not intend to attempt such a

history

here,

but

merely

to remind ourselves that the

phrase

"the translation of cul

tures," which

increasingly

since the

1950S has hecome an almost

banal

description of the distinctjve task of social anthropology, was not al

ways so

much

in evidence. I

want

to stress that this apparent shift is

not

identical with

the old

pre-Functionalism/Functionalism periodiza

tion. Nor is it simply a matter of a direct interest in language

and

meaning that

was

previously

lacking

(Crick 1976).

Bronislaw

Mali

nowski, one of

the

founders of

the

so-called

Functionalist

school,

wrote much on "primitive language"

and

collected enormous quan

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2

T AL.o\L

ASAD

lItles

of

lingu

istic ma t

e ria l (prove rbs ,

kinship

terminology,

magical

spe

ll

s, and so

on) for

an t

h

ro

pological analysis. But

he never

thought

of his work iin te rms of the translation of cultures.

Godf rey Lien hard,'s paper "Modes of Thought" (1954) is possibly

one

of the

earl

i

est

-

certa

inl y

one of

the

most

subtle-

examples

of

the

use of

Ilnis l'1otion

of

tr ans lation

explicitly

to describe a central

task of

social

anthropology.

""F

he problem

of describing to others how men2.

bers

of

a

remote tribe

think then

begins to

appear

largely as

one-" f'

translaLion.

of making the

co he r

en

ce primitive

thought has

in

the

lan-

guages

it

rcally

lives in , as clear as possible in our own"

(97). This

state

ment is quoted and cr

it ici

zed

in

th

e article

y

Ernest Gellner

that

I

an alyze in

the next

section,

and

I shall return to

it in the context of

Ge

lln er's argument.

Here

I

draw attention

briefly to

Lienhardt's

lise of

the

word

"translation" to refer not

to linguistic

matter per

se,

but to

"modes of thought"

that

are embod

ied in

such matter. It may not

be

withollt sign ificance, incidentally, th

at Lienhardt has

a background in

English

literature,

th

at

he

was a

pupil of F. R.

Leavis's

at Cambridge

before

he

became

a

pupi

l

and

co

llaborator of E.

E.

Evans-Pritchard's

at Oxford.

Oxford

i

s,

of cou

rse,

famous

as

the

an thropo

l

og

ica l

center

in Brit

ain Illost self-conscious

about

its

concern

with

"the translation

of cul

tures." The best-known

int roductory

textbook

to emerge from that

center,

J o

hn

Beattie's Other Cultu.r (1964),

em p

hasized

the

ce

ntralit

y

of the "problem

of

trans

l

ation" for

social anthropo logy and dist in

guished (but did not

separate) "cul

ture"

from

"language"

in a way

that

was b

ecomin

g familiar

to anthropologists

-

though not

necessarily

therefore

en tirely clear (see pp.

89 - 90).

It

is

in terest ing to find Edmu nd Leach, who has

never been

associ-

ated

with

Oxford, employing the

same

no ti

on in

hi

s conclusion to a

historical ske tch of socia l an thr

op o

logy a

decade

lat

er:

Let

me

r

ecapit

ulate.

We started by

em phasizing h

ow diff

er

ent

are "the

or.hers"- a

nd made them nOl

only

different but remote

<md

in fer

i

or.

Se nti

mentally we

then

took the

oppos

ite track a

nd

ar

gued that

a

ll

human beings

are

alike ; we

can understand

T r

ob ri

a

nd

ers o r

(he Barotse

because

their

Ol

od

vations are

just

the sa me as our ow n; but that

didn't wor

k eit her , "rhe ot he ls"

remained obstinately ot hel'. But now we have

come to

. ~ e e that the

problem

is o ne

of

transla

ti

on, T he linguists have shown us

that

a

ll

translation

is

difficult,

and that

pe

rf

ec

luan

slation is usually

impo

ssible .

And

y

el we

know

that for

practical purposes a tOle r

ab

ly satisfacto ry translation

is

a lways pos

sible even

when the

o

ri

g in al "text"

is

highly abst

ru

se .

Languages

are di.ITere_lt

but

not so different

as a ll that. Looked

at

in this

wa

y socia l

anth

ropologists are

engaged in establishing a methodology

for

the translation of cu ltural l

an

guage. (Leach

' 973

:77

2)

The Concept of Cu ltur

al

Trans

lati

on

'43

Even Max Glu

ckman (197 3: 905), responding

shortly

afterward

to

Leach,

accepts

the

centra lity of "cu ltural translation," while

propos

in g a

very different genea

logy

for that anthropological pr

actice.

Yet despite

the general agreement

with which this no tion has

been

accep,ed

as part of the self-defini tion of Briti

sh

social

anthropology,

it

has

rece

i

ved

little systematic

exam

i

na ti

on

from

w

ithin

the

pr

o fession.

One partial

except

i

on

is Rodney

Need

ham's Belief, Language, and Expe-   •• .

'riente

(' 9

72). This is a complex, scholarly work that deserves extended

treatment. He r

e , h

oweve

r , I

wis

h

to

conce

nt r

a te on a s

honer

text.

Ernest

Gell ner's

"Concepts and

Society," which ap pe

ars

to

be

fairly

widely

used

in undergraduate co

ur

ses a t British universities and is still

available in

severa

l

popu

l

ar

co

ll

ections. I

propose

,

therefore,

to d

evo te

th e

next

sec tion

to

a detailed exa

min at

i

on

of

that

essay and then to

take up so me points that em

erge

from m y discussion in the sec tio ns

th at follow.

A Theoretical Text

Gellner's "Co n

cep

ts a nd Society" is

concerned

with

the

way in

which Functionali

st

anthroPQlogists deal with

problems

of

in ter pret

- '

ing

and translating

the

discourse of a

li

en socie

ti

es. His basic argument

is

that (a) contemporary anthropologists insist

on

interpreting exoti!:

concepts and

be

li

efs within a social

context, but that

(b) in

doing SO j

the

y ensure that

apparently absurd

or in

coherent

a s ~ ~ r ~ i o n s are al

ways given an acceptable

meaning,

and that (c) while

the

contextual \

method

of

interpretation is

in

principle

valid,

the

"excess

iv

e

that usuall

y

goes

with it

is

not. The paper contains

severa

l d i

agrams

intended to fix and clarify

the relevant

cu

ltur

al processes visua

ll

y.

Gellner introduces the problem

of

in terpretat

i

on

hy

refere

n

ce to

Kun

Samuelsson's R eligion and Economic ction (1961), which

is

an

economic

historian's

atta

ck

on

the

Web

erian

Protestant-ethic

thesis.

Samuelsson

takes issue witb

the

fact that W

eber

a

nd

his

supporters

have

reinterpreted religious texts in a way that. enables

them to

ext ract

meanings that

confirm the

thesis. Gelln

er pr

ese

nts

this

exa mpl

e

merely

to bring

out more

sharply

the contrasting

position of the Funct.ionalist

anthropologist:

I

am not concerned, nor competent, to argue wheth

er Samuelsson's em ploy

ment,

in this

particular

case,

of

his tacit principle (hat

one must not

re

interpret

the

assertions one actually finds,

is

valid.

What is

rel

evant

here is

that if

such

a

principle

is made explicit and generalized, it would

make

non

se

nse

of

most

sociological studies of

the

relationship of belief and

conduct.

We

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TALAL

ASAO

'14

sha ll find anthro polog ists d"jven O employ the ve ry oppo site p,-inciple, the

insistence rather than r

ef

usal of con  

ex

lual re-

im

e '

-p

'-etation. 20)

But this mod est disclaimer of

com

p

ete

nce a llows too

llla ny

in te r

est ing questions

10

drift b

y.

To

beg in with , it ca lls for no great com pe

tence to note

that

Sa muelsso n does

not

hold

10 the

principle that one

mu st never re

int

e rp re t. Nor

does

he insist that there

is

never a signi fi

can l con nec tion between a religious text and its social context. but

only

that th

e concl usio n the Weber thesis see ks

10 make can

not be es

tablished. (See, e.g., SamuelsS ",

'96, :69.)

There is, fu

rth

er

mo r

e, a

rea l con tras t that Ge llner mi ght have picked up between the Samuels

son

example

and th

e typical anthropologist's

predicament. For

eco

no mic hislO rians a nd socio log ists

in

volved in the Weber debate, his

to rical texts a re a prim

ary

d atum in relat ion to which the

co

ntexts mu

st be

reconstructed

.

The

a nth

ropo

l

og

ical field

worker

be

rglns with a social situ ation within which somethin g is and it is the

cu ltural signifICance of these e

nun

ciations that must be reconstructed,

This is no t to say, of course, that the hi storian can ever

a

pp roac

h his

arc hi val

material wi

Lil OU Lsome conception

of

its histor ical context, or

that the field worker ca n define the social situation ind

epe

nd em ly of

what

was said within

it. The

con

tra

st, such as it i

s,

is one

of

ori

enta

tion, whi ch follows

from

th e fact

thauhe

hist

or

ia n is given

a

text and

the e thnog rap her has to C011S/ruet 01le

I

nstead of

investigatin g

thi

s

impor

ta nt

cont

rast, Gellner rushes

along

to

define and commend what he ca lls "mod era te Functiona l

ism" as a method, which

consists of the insistenc.e on the fan that conce pts a nd beliefs do not exist in

isolation , in t

exts

or in individu al Ininds, but in the life o f m en and socielies.

':rhe activities and instiuHions, in the conl

eXl

of which a wOI d o r phrase or set

of

phra

ses is used, must be known before that word o r th ose ph rases can be

understood,

before we can reall y speak of a concept Or a

be

 

ef.

(22)

This

is well

put, and.

eve n

if

it has b

ee

n said

before,

it is

wort

h

restating. At this p

oint

the reader might ex pect a d i

sc

ussio n of the dif

fe

rent

ways in wh ich la nguage

is

enco

un t

e

red

by tne

ethnographer

in

the field, how utterances are produced . ve rbal meanings orga nized,

rhetorical

effects attained , a nd c

ultur

a lly appropriate responses e lic

ited. After all, Wittgcnstein

had

already sensitized British philoso

ph ers to the complexity

of

lang uage-in-use,

and

J L Austin h

ad

set

up

distinctions betwee n the different levels o f speech pr od uction

and

re

ception in a way that fo resh

adowed

what anthropologists would

later call the ethnography of speaking. But Gellner had pr eviously re

jected

the suggestion that this philosophical mo v

ement

had

of

va lue to

teach

(see his pole mic in Words

a.nd

Things '9

59),

a nd like

o ther critics , he always insisted that its co ncer n with understanding

The Concept

of Cultural Translalion

'45

everyday language was merely a disguise for defend ing establ ished

ways

of

sp

ea

kin g

about the

world, for

denying

tha, it

was

possible

for

suc h speech-ways

to

be illogical or

absurd.

Gellner has always

been de

term ined to maintain the distinction between defending and explain

ing

concepts and

beliefS" and

to warn

against

the kind of

anthropo

logical

translation

that rules out a

pr

ior i

the

critical distance necessary

for explaining how concepts actually function, for "to understand the

w01 king of the concepts of a society," he writes, "is to

understand

its

instit.utions" (p. ,8; see also

note, on the

same page).

This is why Gellner's brief statement about moderate Functional

ism quoted above leads him imm ed iate

ly to

a discussion

of D

urkheim's

Elementa.ry 

Forms

of

h e Rehgio 

us Life,

which, besides being one

of the

fountainheads of Functionalism in genera l"

(22),

is concerned to ex

plain

rather than

to c1efend concepts- to

exp

lain ,

more

precisel

y,

"

lhe

compu lsive nature of our categoria l concepts" (22) in

terms of

certain

collective processes. Thus:

Our

contempo

ra ry invocations

of

the functional , social-context

approach to

the

sLUdy

and interpretation of concepts is in various ways very different from

Du rkheim's. Durkheim was not so much concerned to defend the concepts of

primit ive societies: in their sening. they did not need a defence. and in the

setting of modern and chan ging societies he

was

not anxiolls to defend what

was

archaic, nor loath to suggest that some intelleclualluggage might

we ll

be

archaic, He was really concerned

lO

explain the cOf .lpulsiveness

of

what in

practice did

not seem

to need any defence (a nd

in

so doing. he claimed he

was

solving the

problem

of knowledge whose solut ion had in his view evaded Kanr.

and others, and to be solving it without fa lling into either empiricism or apri

or

ism), Whether he was successful I do not propose to discuss: for a variety of

reasons it seems 0 me that he was not. (23)

It

is clear th at Gelln

er

has recognized the basic project

of

Elemen

tary Forms - n

  me

ly, its attemp t to explain the compulsive

nature

of

socially d

efined

concepts- but

he

moves too hastily

from

a consi

dera

tion

of

what

mig

ht

be involved in such a

problem

to

a dismissal

of

Durkheim  s

attempt

a t explanation. The possibility that a pl'iori de

nunciation

may

not

further t

he purposes of explanation

any better

than defense

does

not seem to be envisaged in

Concepts

and Society."

Instead, the

reader

is reminded, by way of quotation from Lienhardt,

that the contemporary

an t

h ropologist typically appears to

make

it a

condition of a good translation that it conveys the coherence which he

assumes is

there to

be found in primitive thought" (26). So we have

here what I think lS a misleading contrast-Durkheim's attempt to ex

plain versus the contemporary an thropologist's attempt

to

defend. I

shall return to this point later, but here I want to insist that

O

ar

gue

for a form

of

coherence by which a discourse is held together is not

ipso facto to justify or

defend

that discourse; it is merely to take an

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TALAL ASAD

'4

6

essential step in

th

e prohlem

of

explain in g

its

compulsiveness.

Anyone

familiar with psychoanalysis would take this point quite easily.

We

might

put

it

another

way:

the

criterion

of abstran

coherence

or

log icality (Gellner tend s to use these and other terms interchange-

ably) is not always, and in every case, decisive for accepting or r e j e

ing discourse. This is because, as Gellner himself correctly observes,

Language functions in a variety

of

ways other than 'referring

to

ob

jects' 25).

No

t every utterance

is

an assertion.

There

are many things

thal language-ill-use does, and is intended

to

do which explains

why

we

may J-espond positively to discourse that may seem in ade quate from a

narrow logical  point of view. The functions of a particular langu age,

the intentions

of a particular discourse, are

of

course part

of

what

every

competent

ethnographer tries to grasp before he can

attempt

an adequate translation into his own language.

Gellner does

seem

half

-aware

of

this

poi11l

,

but

quickly

brushes

it

aside in his eagerness to display to Functionalist anthropologist s their

excessive charity  n cultural translation.

The situation , facing a social anthropo logist who wishes to interpret a con

cept, assertion or doctrine in an a  en culture, is basically simple. He is, say.

faced with an assertion

S in

the local language. He has at his disposal the large

or infinite set of possible semences iu his own language

.

He

ma

y not be wholly happy about this situation, but he

ca

nnot avoid il.

There is no third language which cou

ld

mediate between the native language

and his own, in which equivalences cou ld be stated and which wou ld avoid the

pitfalls arising from the fact that his own language has its own way of han

dling the world, which may not be those of the native language studied , and

which consequently are

1iable

to distort that which is being translated.

Naively, people sometimes think

that realit ,

itself could be this kind of

mediator and third language.  For a

var

iety of powerful reasons, this is

of COllrse no good.

(24-25)

Again , (his sensible statement might seem to some readers to sup

port

the

demand

that the elhnograp

h

er

must

try tn

reconstruct

the

various ways in which the native language handles the world, con

veys information, and

co

nstitutes x p r i n before translating an

alien discourse into th e

language

of his

elhnographi

c text.

But

Gell

ner's accoun t proceeds in

a

different, and very dubious, direction.

Having located an equivalem English sentence,

he cont

inu es ,

the

anthropologist notices that it inevitably carries a value connotat i

o n -

that it is , in other words, either Good

or

Bad. 1 do

not

say

'true'

or

'false',

for

this only arises with

regard

to some types

of

assertion. With

regard t others, other dichotomies, such as 'meaningful' and 'absurd'

or 'sensible' or 'silly'

might app

ly. deliberately use the 'Good'

and

'Bad'

so as

to

cover a

ll

such possible polar alternatives, which

ever

might best app ly

to

the equivalent of S (27)·

The Concept of Cultural Transl;llion

'47

Have we not got here some very curious assumptions, which no

practiced translator would ever make ? The first is th at eva luative dis

crimination

is

a

lw

ays a matter of choosing between polar alternatives,

and second , that eva

lu

ative distinctions are finall y reducible

to

Good 

and Bad. Clearly neidler of these assumptions is acceptable when

stated as a general rule. And then there

is

the suggestion

thell

the

translator's task necessarily involves matching

se

ntence for

sentence

.

But if the skilled translator looks first for any principle of coherence

in

the discourse to be

tr

anslated, and then (ries to reproduce that co

her

ence as nearly

as he

Can in his own language, (here cannot

he a

general rule

as

to what units the translator will employ- sentences,

paragraphs , or even larger units of discourse.

To

tUfn my point

around: the

app

r

opriaten. of

the unit employed itself

depends on

th e principle of coherence.

But

Gellner's parable of th e anthropologist-translato,·

requires the

assumption

that

it

is sentences that the latter matches , because that

makes it easier to display ow the sin

of

excessive charity occurs. Hav

ing

n1ade an initial equivalence between a sentence in the local lan

guage and one

in his own ,

the

anthropologist

not

ices

that the

English

sentence carries a Bad imp ression. This worries the anthropologist

because, so runs Gellner's parable, an ethnographic account giving

such an impression might be thought to be disparaging the natives he

has studied,

and

to disparage other cultures is a sign of ethnocen-

trism,

and ethnocentrism

in turn

is

a symptom

of poor

anthropolog y

according to the doctrines of Functionalist anthropology. Functional

is( method requires that sentences a

lw

ays be evaluated in terms

of

their own social context. So the worried anthropologist reinterprets

the original sentence , with a Illore flexible and carefu l use of the con

textual method, in order to produce

a

Good translation.

The

sin of excessive

char

ity,

and

the contextual

method

itself, are

together linked, Gellner writes, to

the

relativistic-functlonalisl view

of

thought

that

goes back

to

the Enlightenment:

The

(unreso lved) dilemma, which the thought

of

th e Enlightenmem faced ,

was between a rcialivi sdc-funClionalist view of thought, and the absolutist

claims of enlightened Reason . Viewing man as part of nalUre, as enlightened

Reason requires. it

wi

shed to see

hi

s cog niti ve and evaluative activities as pans

of nature too , and hence as varying, legitimately, from organism to o rganism

and comext to conlext. (This is the relativistic-functionali st view.) But

at the

same time in recommending life according

0

Reason and Nature,

it

wished at

the very least to exempt this jew itself (and , in practice, some others) from

such a relativisrn. (3 1)

Typically, Gellner's philosophical formulation presents this

unre

- I

solved dilemma as an abstract opposition between two concepts- a

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14

8

149

AL

AL

ASAD

The

Concept of Cultural Translation

.t

{

relativistic-functionalist view of thought.  and the absolutist claims o f

po

ssible ? Wh y does one ever say to foreigners that th ey have mIS-

,r

enlightened Reaso n.  BUl how do these [\..,0 c

oncepts

  as

understood somethi ng they heard or saw? Does social learning

pro

, \

relates

of

he inst itutions

of

[

We

ste rn] society ? (cf. Gellner, p. 18).

t would not be difficull

LO

a rgue

,hat

the claims of enlight

ened

Rea

so n  arc

matenally

mo r e su ccessful in T hird World countries than

ma n y relativisti c views, that they have

exerted

gr

ea ter au./

}wn ty

than

th e lattel' in the deve lopment of industrial economie s and th e form a

lion of nation Slales. We shan have occasion to discuss this further

when examining transl

at

ion as a process of power. Th e point is th a t

the

abso

lu tist claims o f enlightened Reason  arc in e ffec t a.n

inslitu

rionalizedforce, and that as such it is by de(tnition committed to adva'nc-

Il

ing inw and appropriating

alien territory,

and

that its

opponents

(whether explicitly relativistic or not) are by definit.ion

defensive.

Thus

when Genn er continues on the sa me page to characterize

th

is abstract

dilemma

in

the attitudes

of

anthropo

l

og

ists,

he

fails

to

consider

what

cUltuqJ

tran

slation  might involve when it is considered as institu

tio nalized practice given the wider relationship of un equal societ ies.

l

For it is not

the

abstract logic of what individual Western an

th rop o

lo

gists say in

Lh

eir ethn

og

raphies, but the concre te logic of what their

countries (an d perhaps they th emselves)

do

in their relations with lh e

Third

World that should form the starling point for this pa

ni

cu la r

discu

ss

ion . Th e dilemmas of ·'relativism  appear differ

en

tly depend

In g on

whether

we think

of

abstracted

und

erstanding o r of histor ica lly

l t u a t pracllces.

How ever, Ge llner says he is not in principle aga inst anthropologi

cal relativism. My main point about tole rance-engende rin g con

textual in terpretation, he writes, is that it ca lls for caution (32). But

why such cauti

on

is r eserved for toleran ce-engel'ldering  as opposed

. to intolerance-engendering co

nt

ex tu al interpretations is

nOt

ex

plained. Afte r a ll , Gellner insisted earlier that a ll translated se ntences

are bound to be received eith er as Good or as Bad.  Wh y should we

be suspici

ous only

of

tho

se t

hat appear

Good'

If

it is

the

priQr de

te rmin

at

ion

that

S, the indi ge nous affirmation, be interpreted favour

ably, which determines just how mu ch

(ontext

will be tak en into co

n·

sideration  (3 3), can we per haps escape this vicious cin.;ularit y by

adoptin g

an

U.11Sp palit

eti(

all . lUd

e

Gellner does no t address himself

di rec tly to this possibility here, but one mu st assume [hat it cann ot be

a solution, especia lly in view of the

claim

tha t there is not

hing

[sic] iD

I he nature of things or societ ies to d ictate visibly just how

mu

ch co n

text is relevant

to

any given

ut tera

nce, or how the context should be

described

(33.).

r Yet can thi s last remar k be mean t seriously ?

Nothing?

How, then ,

is communication even between individuals in the sam e socie ty ever

duc e no skills in th e discrimina ti

on

of releva nt conte xts? T he answers

to these questions should be obvious, and they are connected with the

fact th a t th e anthropologist's

tr

anslation is not merely a m

at

te r of

matching sen tences in the abstract. but of

lean. ing

o j i v ~

another

O r r r v . f

J.if and to sp ea k another kind Ef langu age. Whi ch con texts a re rele

\.JO

vant in

diff

er

en

t discursive even ts is something

one

learn s in the

- s e of

Ji

ving. and even th ough it is often

ve

ry difficult to verbalize

lhat

knowledge, it is still knowledge about something in th e n

at

ur e of

society, about some aspect of hving, that indicates (a lthough it does

not dictate ) ju st how mu ch context is re

le

vant to any given utter

ance. T he point, of co urs e, is not that th e

ethnograph

er

cannot

know

what context is ap propriate for giving sense to typica l stat.ements , or

th

at he

is

indu

ced

to

be

mo r

e charitable than h e should be

in

trans

lat

ing them, but th

at

his attempts at trans lation ma y meet with pr oblems

rooted in th e linguislic materials he works with

a

nd the social co ndi

tions he works in

-b o

th in the field and in his own society. More on

th

is later.

T he latter ha lf of Gellner's essay is devoted to examples from et h

no

graphic studies in ord er to display, fi rst, excessive cha ri ty in transla

tion, and then, the

ex p

lana tory advantages of tak ing a cri tical look at

th e logic of a lien religious discourse.

The first se t of exa mpl es comes from Evans-Pritchard 's N U ~ I

R eli

gion

(1956), in which odd-sounding initial translations of Nu er reli

gio us disco urs e, such as th e notorious statem

en

t tha t a twin is a bird,

are re inte rp reted. This kind of statement , Gellner observes,

ap pears to be in conAict with the princi ple of idel1lity o r non

contradiction, or witb common sense, or with manifes t observable

fact : human twins are nO I birds,

ahd

vice versa  (34). Acco rding to

Gellner , Evans-Pritcha rd 's reinterpretation absolves Nuer thou ght

from

th e ch

arge

of

pre-l

og

ical me

nt

ality  by

an arbitrary

use of th e

conlextual melhod. T he

apparent

absurdity is reinterpreted to deny

that

Nuer

beliefs co

nAi

ct with

manif

est fact by relating the meaning

of

the absurd  statement to log ical  behavior. Gellner indicales ho w

this is

do n

e by qu oting (w ith the deliberate om i

ss

i

on

of one significant.

sentence) from Evans-Pritchard:

no contradiction is involved

in

the statemenl which, on the co

nt r

ary, appears

quite se nsible and eve n true,

to

one who presenLS the

id

ea

to

himself

in

the

Nuer lan

guage and

within

Ih

eir system of religious th

oug

ht. [He does not

then ta

ke

their statements abo

ut

[wins any more lit

era

lly than they make and

und erstan d them themselves.] They a.re 1U t saying thal a. Iwin has a.

beo.It,

feathers,

and so for th. Nor i-n lheir everyday relalilms as t-wins do Nuers speak of

hem

IS

bi-,.ds or

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  5

 

TA LAL ASAD

act towards them as though they were birds (35. Sentence in bra ckets omitted

by

Ce

lln

er; emphasis supplied y Cellner.)

At this point Gellner breaks off the quotation

and

inteljects in

mock despair:

But

what, then, would

count as

pre-logical thought?

Only, presumably, the behaviour

ofa

totall y demented person, suffer

ing

from

perman

e

nt

hallucinations , who

would

treat something which

is

perceptibly a

human

being as

though

it had all th e attributes of a

bird   (35). So eager is Ge lln

er

to nail utterances that must

count

as

expressions of pre-logical thought  (why is he so eager?) that he does

not pause to cons

ider

carefully what E

va

ns-Pritch

ard is

trying to

do. In fact,

Ev

ans-Pritchard devotes several pages to ex plaining this

strange

senten ce. It is plain that he is concerned to explain (in terms of

Nuer

social life), not to ju slify (in terms

of

Western commonsense,

or

Western values).

Th

e

aim

of

this kind

of

exegesis

is

ce

nainl

y

not

to

persuade

Western reade rs to

adopt Nuer

religious pra ctices.

Nor do

es

it rul e

out the

possibility

that

individual

spea

kers make mistakes or

utter absurdities in

th

e ir religious discourse when employing their

traditiona l ways of thinking. It is

not

clear, therefo re, why Gellner

should point to this example from Nner Religion to substantiate his

charge of excessive charity on the part of Fun ctionalist anthropolo

gists. Evans-Pritchard is trying to explain the coherence

that

gives

N uer re ligious discourse its sense, not

to

def end that se nse as having a

universal

status-after

a ll , Evans-Pritchard himself was a Catholic

both before

and after

his

monograph

on

Nuer

religion was written.

N

ow

whether Evans-Pritchard succeeds in explaining the basic co

herence of Nuer religious discourse is, of course, another question.

Several British a

nthropol

ogists-for example, Raymond Firth (1966)

-( though not, to my knowledge , a

ny

Nuer themselves) have disputed

aspects o f Evans-Pritchard's interpretation . But such disagreements

are still about different ways

of

making se nse

of Nuer

religious dis

course, not about too mu ch Or tOO little charit

y

in translation . In fact

contrary

to Gellner's allegations, Evans-Pritchard's exegesis does make

,quite explicit apparent contradictions, or at least ambiguities, in

Nuer concepts-for example, between the notion of a supreme and

omnipresent be ing and

that

of lesser spiriL',  both of which

are

ca te

gorized as

kwo lh 

And il is precisely because Evans-Pritchard insis

ts

on

keeping the different se nses of

kwolh

together as parts of one con-

cept

and

does

not treat

lhem

as

homonyms (as Malinowski might

have done by relating the word to different contexts of use) that

the Nuer conce pt

of

spirit might be said to be contradictory .  But

whether

th e identifica tion of ambiguities and contradictions  in the

basic conceptual repertoire

of

a language provides obvious evidence

of

pre-logical

thought

is , of course, a different issu I would sug-

The Co ncept of Cultural Tran slalion

'5'

ge

sl that only

someone

with a very naive unders ta

nding of

what was

involved in translation cou ld think that

it

does .

Yet Gellner's discourse typically evades the issu

es

it see ms lo be

rais

ing

,

in

a style that seeks

to

hurry the reader

along ove

r a series

of

archl y

phras

ed disclaimers:

I do nOI wish to be mi sunderstood: I am tw l arguing

thai

Eva

ns-Prilc

hal

'd s

account of Nuer concepts

is

a bad one, (Nor am I anxious to revive a do ctrin e

of

p, -e-

Iogical me

ntality f

Levy- Bruhl.) On the

n t r r ~

I have the greatest

admiration

for it. What

I am anxiolls

to

argue is thal con textual interpr

eta

lion, w

hi

ch offers an account or

wh

at

asse

rlions r

ea ll

y mean

in

opposition to

what th ey seem to mean

in

iso lation , does not by itse lf

cl in

ch matters . (3

8

)

Now who would have claimed

it

did ? Certainly Evans-Pritchard

do

es

not. In any case the opposi

ti

on between a contex LUal intel-pretatio n 

and

one

that is not contextual

is

enlirely spurious.

Nothing

has mea n

ing in isolation . The problem is always, what kind of co nleXl?

But that is somethin g Ge llner never discusses, except by suggest

ing that the answer must involve a vicious circu larity- or by utterin g

repeated warnings against excess

ive

charity (when is charity not ex

cessive ?). He appears unaware that for the lranslator the problem

of

determining the relevant kind

of

co ntext in each case

is

so

lv

ed by sh ll

in th e use

of

the langtlages concern

ed not by

an a prio

ri a

ttitude 

of

intolera nce or tolerance. And skill is something that is le rned th at

is, something .that

is

necessarily circular, but not vi ciously so. We are

de

aling

not

with an abstract matching

of

tw o se

ts of

sentences, but

with a socia l practice rooted in mod es of life. A translator may make

mistakes, or he may knowingly mi srepresent something- much as

people make mistakes or lie in everyday life.

But

we cannOl

produce

a

gen eral principle for identifying such things , panicularly not

through

warnings

to

be careful

of

the co ntext ual method

of

inte rpreta tion.

And

so to a

nother

of Gellner's c

harming

disclaimer

s: To

say a ll

this is not to argue for a scepticism or agnosticism concerning what

memb

ers of a

li

e n languages mean , s

oilless

to

c:lrgue

for an abstentio n

from

the contextual m

el

hod

of

inte

rpretation

. (O n the contrary, I

shall argue for a fuller use of il , full er in the sense of allowing fo r the

possibi lity that what people mean is sometimes absurd .) (39). The

charm

of

this statement co nsists in Gellner's cheeky appr opriation

of

his opponent's method to strengthen his own distinctive pos itioll .

But

before that is done, we

are

given furt her exampl es or th e

tolerance-engendering contextual method at work in Leac h's P

obticu l

Systems of Highland unna Thus according to Leach, Kachin state

ments about

th e s

up

ern at ural world are

i

n th e last analysis,

nothing

more

than wa

ys

of describing the formal relationships that ex ist

between real persons and real groups in ordinary Ka chin society

-

r

  .I\SoI

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2

TALAl. ASAD

I

(quoted

on p. 40). At this

point

Gellner intervenes: " It is possible to

I

discern

what

has

happened.

Leach

 s

exegetic

procedure

s have

also

Isavesl

.1he K ~ c h i n s {rom being

credited with

wbat they

appear to

be

say

i!1g"

and m

ade it

possible

" to au ribute _

meanin

g

to assert

i

ons

which

might otherwise be

found

to lackit" (41).

Ge

lln

er goes

on

to

insist that he is not concerned LO dispute Leach  s in terpreta

tions,

but

merely

"to

show

how

the

Tange of co ntext, a

nd the

manner in which

th

e

context

is

see

n ,

necessarily affect the intel-pretation"

(4 1).

This is

a

si

gnificant remark

,

because

it is

indeed not

Leach's

reductionism to

which

Gellner

objects (we shall find

him

insisting on it

him

self

later

in

connection with Berber

religious

ideology) but to the

fact

that

this

ex

am p le

of reductionism

- which

Gellner

misleadingly ca

ll

s

"contex

tualism

"- seems

to

defend, rather

than

to attack,

the cultura

l d is

course

concerned.

Ge

llne r

 s demonstration

of how

"the uncharitable

may

be

'co

nt

ex

tualist' in

the

second, deeper

and better

sense" (42) begins by

present

i

ng

a fictitious

word

in a fictitious

society-the word "bable," used

in a

way

rem"rkably

like

the

English

word

"noble." Thus we

are

tOld

that

it

can be

applied to people

who actually display certain

habitual

forms

of conduct,

as well as to

people

who occupy a

particular

social

status

irrespective

of

their

behavior.

"But the point is: the

society ill question

does not distinguish

two

concepts boble (a)

and

boble (b).

It

on ly uses

tlte word

boble LOlit court"

(42). Tbe logic of bobility

is then analyzed

further to

show

how

bobility

is

a co

nceptual

device

by

which the

privileged

class of the soc i

ety

in

question

acquires some of

the

prestige of certain v

irtue

s re spected in that so

ciety,

without

the incon venience

of

needing

[

practice it . thanks to the

fact

that the same word is ap p lied either

to

practitioners or those vin ues

or

TO oc

cupiers

of

favoured posirions. h is, at the same tim e, a manner

of

rein ro ,'cin g

the

ap

pea l

of

those virtues, by associating

them

. th rough the

use or

the same

appellation,

wit h pr es

lige

and pO\\r·er.

But

a

ll

this needs

to

be

sa

id , and to say

it.

is

to

bring out the int

e

rnal

logical in co hc.'e nce

or

rhe

concep t - an incoher

ence which , ind

eed,

is socia lly functional. (42)

t .

fI n

fact

~ h e co

n

cept of

"bobility" is

not shown

to be

i n c o h e r e n l ~ e v e n

if

it

be accepted

lhat the ambiguity of

the

word allows it to be

used

in

Q

political disc ou rse

to consolidate tbe

legitimacy of a

ruling

class

(and

 I; .

r

therefore,

in principle , also

to undermine that

legitimacy), Gellner's

satisfied conclusion to his fictional

example

is surely far too hasty:

"

What

this sbows ,

however

, is

that

the over-cha

rjtable

interpreter,

de

termined

to

defend the

concepts

he is investigating from the charge

of logical

incoherence,

is bound to misdescribe

the

social situation. To

make sense the concept is

to

mahe nonsense

of

the society (42, emphasis

added). t,:

learly

the word

"bobility"

makes

sense

to

its

user

s in

particu

-

The Concept

or

Cu ltura l Translacion

153

lar

state

m e

fH

S

(or tlley

would not

use it), and

it makes

sense l s o ,

al

thou gh-of a different kind , to Gellner, who states that by deceiving its

llsel-S

it somehow upholds

a social S

t.ruClure. Sense

0 t.:..

nonsense

,

l i k ~

tl-utb

or falsehood, ap p lies

to

s.tatemen ls

and

not

to a b s _ ~ r a c t

concepts.

There seems

to

me no evidence

here

of

a

"no nsensical" concept,

be

c,!!:se

there is no ana

lysis

of

socia

ll

y

situated

state!!lents.

But

there

is

a

ls

o a more

important

failure ev

ident

in this

example:

",lW   I C ~

the

lack

of

any

attempt to

explore

i

ts

c o h e r e ~ t h a t

which

makes

its

social effect

such

a

powerful

possibility. or

course,

political

discourse

employs lies,

half-truths

, logical trickery,

and

so on. Yet

that is

n0

what

gives it

its

cornpu.

.lsive

character,

any

more

than

the

use of true

or

l L O .

e a r

statements does, and

compulsiven ess b,.precisely

wha

t is in volved

in

Gellner's

example.

It

is not

the abstract logical status of concep-,ts

that is

relevant here,

but

the

way in which specific political

discourses

seem

to mobilize

or

direct

the behavior

of people within given cu lw ral

t i o n s . The compulsiveness of "bobility" as a politi cal

concept

is a

feature not of

gullible

minds but of

co h

erent

disco

urses

a

nd

practices.

T

hat

is why it is essential

for a translator

of powe

rful

political ideolo

gies

to

attempt to convey

somet

hin g of this

coherence,

To

make

non-

sense

of the concept is to mak

e non

sense of the

society.

Gellner

 s final

example comes from

his own fieldwork

am o

ng

the

ce ntral Moroccan Berbers, and is

intend

ed

to

clinch the argument

thal an

un

c

haritabl

'e

con

textu a

Iist makes better

sense

of

the

societ y

he

describes by

emphasizing the

in

coherence

of its

concepts:

"Two con

cepts

are relevant,"

he

writes , baraka and agu.rra1n (pI. iguTramen).

Bm'aha is

a

word which

can

mean

simply

'enough', but

it also

means

plenitude, and

above all blessedness manifested

amongst

other things

in

prosperity

and

the power

to cause prosperity in others by super

natural means, An agurram. is

a poss

essor of baraka (43),

Igurramen translated as "saints" in Ge llner's

later

writings (e,g.,

Ig6g)-are

a fairly privileged

and

influential

minority

in

the

tribal so

ciety

of

centra

l

Moroccan

Berbers

who

act as foci

of

religious values

and

also as n1ediators

and arbitrators amongst

the tribal popu l

ation

with wh

om they

live. "T

he

local

belief is

that

they are

selected by

God.

Moreover,

God makes his choice manifest by

endowing

those

whom

he has seJected with certain characteristics,

including

magical powers,

and great generos

it

y, prosperity,

a consider-the-lilies

attitude

, paci

fism,

and so

forth" (43).

This is Gellner's "

tran

slation. " But his too-fluent use of" re ligious

vocabu l

ary

with

strong, and

peThaps

irrelevant

, C

hri

stian

overtones

rn

ust prompt

doubts

and questions

at

this point.

What

precisely are

the

behavior and discourses translated here as "a consider-the-lili es at

titude

," "

make

s

hi

s cho i

ce manifest." and "e ndowin

g,"

[or

in stance?

Do

the

Be

rbers

believe

that God

endows

their

"sai

nt

s" with disposi

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TAL.

i\L ASAD

154

tional

charaCleristics su ch as great

generosity

and pacifism, or do

tbey take it rather tha t these characteristics are conditions

of

saintli

ness,

of

th e closeness of i

gu.TTGmen to

God ? Do the Berbers r

ea

lly be

ha ve as th ough re

li

g

ious

and

moral

virtues

wer

e manif

es

tat ions of

divin

e c

hoi

ce?

Wh

at do th ey say and

how

do

they

behave

when people

fail to display

th

e

virtues they

ought to

ha

ve? By whom

is an

gurram s

behavior concep

tualized as a consider-the-lilies a

ttitud

e,  given that

he has bot h family

an

d property, and that this fact is taken by the Ber

bers to be perfectly in

order?

Gellner does not g ive the r

eade

r

the

relevant evidence for answering these important questions, whose sig

nificance for his translation will emerge in a

n10menl.

Th e reality of

the

situation

is,

however, th aL the

igu f1 amen are

in fact se

Iecr.cd by the surrounding

or

dinary tribesmen who use their services, by being

ca

ll

ed to

perform t h o ~

services

and

being

preferr

ed to

the

rival ca

ndidates

for their performance,

Whal appear

s to be vox Dei is in reality vox populi.

Mor

eover,

the maHer or

the

blessed ch

aracter

istics,

the

stigmata

[s

ic]

of

agunmn-hood is

more

complicated .

t

is essemiall.ha t successful c

andidates

to

agu1

 ram

stat

us be ClwLiled with

(he

se c haraCleristics, bUl it is e

qu

a lly essenrial ,

at any

rale

wi

th

regard

to some

of them, (h

al

the y should not really possess

rhem.

For

instance, an agurram

who

was

extremely

ge nero us in a consider

the-lilies

sp

irit would soon be impoveri

shed

and, as such , fa il by another cru ,

cial

eS

I, that of prosperity.

There is he

re

a crucial

divergen

ce hetween

concept and

reality, a div

er

gence

whi ch

moreover is quite

essenti

a)

for

the working of the

social system.

(43- 44)

It is

not at

all clear from the acco

unt

given by Gellner what is

mea nt by

th

e statement, The local belief

is

that they are selected by

God -   selected  for what

exact

l

y?

For being a rbitrators?

But

arbitra

tion mu st be initiated by

one or

o th er

member of

the tribal society,

and that fact

can

hardly be unknown to

the tribe

smen , For being pa

cine? But padfism is a virtue, not a rewa

rd

. For worldly success

and

prosperity? But that cannot

be a local

defini

ti

on

of

saintliness,

or

th

e

French colonial rulers would have

been

r

ega

rded as more saintly than

an

y agurram.

t is really

no

great explanatory ac

hi

eve

ment

for a

Europe

an an

thropologist to inform his ag nost ic and/or modern European readers

tb at the Berbers believe in a particular kind

of

direct intervention

of

the

deity

in

their affairs,

th

at

th

ey are of cO

urse mistaken

in this be

li

ef,

an d that this mistaken

belief

can have social

consequences.

In

this

kind

of

exercise we do

not

lea

rn

what they helieve, but only that what

th

ey

believe

is quit

e

wrong:

thus, th e Berbers believe that

God

se

lects igu

,.ramen;

we

kn

ow

God

does

not

exist (or

if

some

of

us still be

lieve 

he doe

s, we know  he does not interve

ne

directly in secu

lar

his

tory); ergo the

se

lecto r 

mu

st be a nother agent

whom

the tribesmen

The

Conce

pt of C

ultural Translation

'5 5

do

n

ot

know as the

agent- in

fact, the su

rr ou nding

tribesmen them

selves. The ig UTlamen are selected

(for

a par ticular social role? for a

moral virtue? for a religious destiny?)

by

the people.

The

selection

a ppea rs to be vox

Dei and is

in reality vox populi,

Or is

it?

In

reality the social process descrihed

by

the anthropologist as se- I

lection is the locus

of

a

vox

only if it is

pr

etended that

that

process

constitutes a c

ultural

text.

For

a t

ex

t

mu

st have an author- the one

who makes his voice heard

th r

ough it. And if that voice cannot be

God 's, it

must

be someone else's-the peo

pl

e's,

Thus

Gellner the athe

ist insists o n answering a

th

eo logical

qu

es tio n:

who speaks

through

histo ry,

through

society? In this particula r case, the answer

de p

e nds

on

th e text containing

at

once the

rea

l,  un conscious meaning and its

appropriate

translation,

This fusion of signifier and signified is

espe

cia lly evident in the way in which the Islamic concept of bamka is ma de

to

sound

remarkably like the Christian conce

pt

of grace as

portr

ayed

by an eighteenth-century skeptic, so

that

the

conditions

defining the

agurram s baraka

are re ferr ed to with a knowing Gibbonian smile as l

s

t igmata -and

by that

deft

sign, a portion of the

Berber

cultural

text

is at once constructed (made

up)

and designated (shown

up)

within Gellner  s text , as exqu isite a union of word and thing as any to

be

found

in all his writings,

But society is not a text that co

mmunicates

itself to the s ~ i l l e 1 1 :

reader. t is people who spea k. And the ultimate meaning

of

what

they say

does

not

re

side in soci

ety-soc

iety

is the cultural con

dition in

which speakers act and are acted upon . The pri vileged pos ition th at

Gellner accords himself for deco

ding

the real meaning

of

what the

Berbers say

(regardless

of what they

think

they say)

can

be m aintained

only by someone who snpposes that translating

other

cultures is es

sentially a

matter of

matching written sentences in two languages,

such

that

the

se

con

d set of sentences becomes

the

real meaning of

the f irs t-an op eration the anthropologist alone com.rois, fr om field

notebook

to

printed ethnog

raphy,

In other

words, it is

the privileged

position

of

som

eone who

does

not, and

can

afford not to, eng

age in

a

genuine

dial

ogue

with those

he

or she once lived with a

nd

now writes

about

(cf. Asad , ed, 1

973:

17),

In the middle of his article, when discussing anthropolog ical rela

tivism, Gellner compl ains that anthropologists were relaLivistic, toler

an t

, contextually-comprehending vis-a.-vis the savages who

are

a

fter

all some distallce away, but absolutistic, intolerant vis-a -vis their imme

diate neighbou rs or predecessors, the

memb

ers

of

our own soc iety

who

do not share their comprehending

outlook

and are

th

emselves

'ethnocentric' .

(3

1) .

Why have 1 tried to insist in this

paper

that anyone conce rned

with

translat

ing from other

cultures must

look for co herence in dis

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15

6

TA

L AL ASA D

cou

rs e

s, and yet

devoted

so

many

pages to

showing that

Ge llner 's

text

is largely incoherent ? The

reason

is

quite

simple:

Gellner

and I spea k

the same

l

anguage, be

long to the sa

me

academic pro fession, live in

the same society.

In

taking

up

a critical sta nce [Oward his

text I am

co_

nte

sti·ng wh

at

he says, not

tra.nslating

it,

and the radi

cal d i

ffere

n

ce

be

I

w

ee

n

these

two activities is precisely

what

I insist on. Still,

th

e

purpose

of my

argumen

t is n

Ot to

expr ess

an attitude

of " in tolerance" LOward

an "

immed

ia te ne

ighb

our," bUl to try and

identif

y incoherences in his

text that ca ll

for remedy

, because

the

anthropo logica l ta sk of

tr

ansla

tion

deserves

to be

mad

e mo re

co

herenL.

Th

e

purpose

of thi s criti

cism ,

therefore,

is to furth er a co llective e

nd

eavor. Criticizing "savages

w

ho are

after a ll

some

d i

stance

away ," in

an ethnographi

c mo

nograph

they

cannot

re

ad , do

es not

seem to

me

to have

th

e sa me kind of

pose, In

order

for criticism to be responsible , it

must

always be ad

dressed to someone who

ca n contest it.

The lnequality of Languages

A ca ref ul r

ead

ing of Gellner's paper shows

th

a t a

lthou

gh he

raises a number of important

question

s,

he not

only fails LO answer

them , but misses

some

of

the

most c

ru

cial aspects of

th

e

problem

with

wh i

ch

the ethn

og

raph er is eng

aged.

The most

intere

sting of

these

, it

see

ms to me, is

the

pr ob lem

of what one might

call unequal lan

guages

- and it is thi s I wan t now

to

discuss in

some

d

em

it.

All

good

translatio 'n see ks to

reproduce tbe

structure of an alien

di

sco ur se within the translator's own la n

guage.

How

th at

strUCtu re

(or

cohere

nce

") is re pr odu ced will , of course, depend on

the ge

nre

conce rned (" poetry," "scientific analysis," "

narrative,"

etc.), o n

the

re

sou rces

of the transla to r

's

lan

guage,

as we ll as on the inte res ts of the

translator and

/o r hi s r

eade

rs

hip

. A

ll

successful

trans

l

at

ion is

pr

emis

ed

on

the

fact th at it is

addressed

within a

spe

c

ifi

c

language, and

there

fore

also to a

spec

ific

set

of

pr

act ices, a

spe

.c

ifi

c f

orm of

life.

Th

e fu r

ther that

form

of life

is

from

the or

iginal ,

the

less

mechanica

l is the

reproduction . As Wal

ter

Be

njamin

wrote: "T he lan

guage

of a

tr

a nsla

tign ca

n- in

fact

must- let

its

elf

go, so

that

it gives voice

LO

th e

inte

nt

io

d..'\;

of

t : e

  not

as

reproduction but

as

harmony

, as a

supplement

to

the language

in which it e

xpres

ses itself, as its own kind

of ten tio

(1969:

79

).

It

is,

incidentall

y,

lo r

the

read

er to eva lu

ate

that intentio,

n

ot

fo r

the tran

sl

ato

r

to

pr e

e

mpt

th

e evaluation. A

good

t

rans

l

at

i

on

sh

ou

ld always

pre

ce

de

a c

ritique

. A

nd

we can

turn

thi s

around

by say

ing that

a

go

od cr

iLiqu e

is

a

lw

ays an "int e

rnal

critiqu

  t

h

at

i

s,

one

based

on

some shared un d

e rst

an ding

, on a

joint

lif

e, which it aims to

Tbe Con ce

pt

of Cu ltural Translat ion

' 57

enl

a rge

and make

m

ore coherent.

Such a critique

 n

o less

than

th e

objeCl o f cri ticis

m -i

s a

point

of view, a (contra)

ve

r

sion

having only

provi

sional

and limited author ity.

What

h

appens when

the

languages co

ncerned

are

so r

emote

Lhat

l

is very di fficu lt to

rewrite

a

harmon

io us /entia?

Rud

o

lf

Pannwit

z.

qu oted

in

th

e Be

njamin

essay on which I have just

drawn

, makes

the

following

observation:

Our tran slations, even the best ones, proceed from a wrong premise.

They

want

LO

tum Hindi . G reek, Eng lish

in

to German instead of tunling Ce rman

into Hindi , Gree k, English. OUf translato rs have a far g reater reverence for

the

usa ge

of

their own langu age

th an

for

the

spirit o f th e

foreign

works, . . .

The

basic e

rr

or of the

lr

ansl

al.O

r is thal he

preser

ves the Slate in which his own

' lan guage ha

pp

ens to b e instead

of

a

ll

owing his lan

guage

to be powerfu ll y ar.

reeted by the foreign l

on g

ue, Par'tic

ul

a

rl

y when translating fr om a langu age

very remo te from his own he must go back to the primal element

 

of lan g'uage

i(sel f and penetrate

to

the point where

wo

rk, image,

and tone convnge.

He

mu st expand and deepen his

language

by means

of

the foreign language.

( 1969:80-8, )

Th is ca ll to

tra

ns

form

a

language

in or der

to

tran sl

ate th

e

cohe

r

ence

o f the original, poses an interes ting cha

ll

en

ge to the

pe rson satis

fi ed with an

absurd-soundin

g translat io n

on the assumption th at the

original must

have

been

equally

absurd: th

e

good

transla t

or

do es not

immediately assume

that

unusu

al d ifficulty in conveyi

ng th

e sense of

an alien

dis

cour se d

enotes

a fault in

the

lauer ,

but

instead critica lly

examin

es the

normal

st

ale

o r his

or

her

own

language, The

relevant

qu est ion therefore is

not

how

tolerant an aUil Ud.e th

e translator o ug

ht

to display toward the o riginal author (an abstract ethi cal dil e

mma)

,

but

how she

ca n test

the

tolerance of her own lan

guage for

assuming

unaccustomed

forms.

But this

pushin

g beyo

nd

the limits of one's habitual usages, this

breaking

down

and reshapin g of

one

's

own

lan

guage

through

the pro

cess

of

tr ans

lati

on,

is

never an

easy business, in

part

be

cause

(if

I may

II

._

be a ll

owe

d a hy

posta ti

la tio n) it depends

on

the

wi

llingness of the

translator's language to su bject itself to this

transform

ing pow

er.

I a t

tr ibute, sOlnewhal ficti

ti

ous l

y,

volition to

th

e

language

because I

want

to em phasize

th al the

matte r is largely something the

trans

la to r can

not

d

ete

rmine by

individu

al activi ty (a

ny

mo re than

th

e individ

ua

l

sp eake r ca n affect the evoluti

on

of his 01 her la n

gu

age)- that it is gov

erned by institutionally

defined

power re la

tions between th

e lan

guages

/

mode

s

of

lif

e conce

rned. To pU

L t crudely: because the lan-

 I

guages of Third World societies-including , of

course

, the socie

ti

es i l

that social anthropologi sts have traditionally s

tudi

ed-a re "weaker" in ,

~ l . •

relation [0

W

es

te

rn

languages (and t

od

ay, especia lly [0 English),

the

y .

.

are more likely to

subm

it to forcible r.ransrarmati

on

in

the

translation

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TALAL ASAD

'58

p£.ocess than the

other

way around. The reason for this is, first, that in

l h ~ i r

political-econ01Tlic relations with

Third

World countries, West

ern nations have tbe greater

ab

ility

to

manipulate the latter. And sec

ond, Western l

anguages produce

a

nd

deploy

de

sire knowledge mOre

  i l y

than Third World languages do. (The knowledge that Third

World languages deploy

more

easily is not sought by Western societies

i ~ u i t

the

same way, or for the same reason.)

Take modern Arabic as an example. Since the early nineteenth

century there has been a grow

in

g volume of material translated from

European

language

s  sp cially French and

Eng

li

sh

  in to Arabic.

This includes scientific texts as well as "social science," "history," ph i-

loso ph y," and "

Ii[

erature. And from the nineteenth cen tu ry, Arabic

as a lan

guage

has

begun

as a result to

undergo

a

transformalion

(lex-

ica l, grammalical, semanlic) that is far more radical than anything

to be identified in European languages-a transformation that h

as

pushed

it

to

approximate

to the latter

more

closely

than

in

the

past.

I

1

Suc h

r

ansforma£ions signal in equalities in the

power

(i.e. , in

the

ca

 

parities

of the respective languages in relation to the

dominant

forms

I

of dis

course that

have been

and are

still being translated. There

are

varieties of knowledge to be learnt, but also a host of models to be

imitated and reprod uced. In some cases knowledge

of

these models is

a

precondition

for

the

production of

more

knowledge; in

other

cases

it

is

an end in itse lf, a mimetic gesture

of

power, an expression

of

de-

sire for transformation. A recognition of this well-known fact reminds

us that industrial cap italism transforms nOt only modes of production

but also kinds of knowledge and styles of life in the Third World.

And

with th

em,

forms of language. The result of

half-transformed

styles

of life wi

ll

make for ambiguities, which an unskillful Western trans-

la

tor

may simpl ify in

the dir

ection of his own "strong" language.

What does

this argument imply for

the

anthropological

concept

of

cuituraltranslation?

Th

at perhaps there is a greater stiffness in eth

nographic linguistic

co

nventions, a greater intrin sic resistance than

ca n be

overcome

by individual experiments

in

modes of

ethnograp

hic

representation.

In

his perceptive essay "Modes of T houg

ht

, which Gellner criti-

cizes for making over-charit

ab

le assumptions about the

coherence

of

"primitive thought,"

Lienhardt

has this

to

say:

When we l ve with savages and speak their languages, learning

to

represent

their experience

t o

ourselves in their

\'la

y.

we

come

as

near to thinking like

them

as

\

 ·e

can without ceasing

to

be ourselves. Eventually. we try to represent

their conceptions systematica

ll

y in the logical constructs we have been brought

up to use; and we hope, at best, thus TO reconcile what ca n

be

expressed

in

their languages, with what can be expressed in ours.

We

mediate between

their hab its of thought. which we have acquired with them, and those

of

our

The

Concept

of Cu

ltu

ral

Translation

'59

own society;

in

doing so, it

is

not finally some mysterious

p

rimitive

philos.,9-

I

ph)' '

that we are exploring, but the further potentialities

of

our thought and

language. (

954:

96-97)

In the fjeld , as Lienhardt rightly suggests, the process

of

tran slation

takes place

at the

very

moment

the e thnographer engages with a spe-

cific

mode

of life-just as a child does in learning to grow

up

witbin a

specific culture,

He

learns to find his way

in

a new environment, and a

new language. And like a child he needs to verbalize explicitly what

the proper way

of

doing

things i

s,

because

that

is how

learning

pro-

ceeds. (Cf. A. R. Luria on "synpraxic speech" in Luria and Yudovich

197

1

:50.) When the chi ld

/anthropolog

ist becomes adept

at

adu lt

ways, what he has learnt becomes

implicit as

assumptions inform

n

g

a shared

mode

of life, with all its resonances and areas of unclarity.

But learning- to live a new

mode

of life

is

llot th e same as lea rning

I

about anothe r mode

of

life. When anthropologists return to

their

cauneries , they must write up "their people , and they must do so in

the con ventiolls of representation already circumscribed (already

:'writlen

around,

bo unded")

by

their discipline, institutional life,

I

and wider societ

y.

Cu ltural translalion"must accommodate itself to a

different

language not only in

the

sense of English as

opposed

to

Dinka,

or

English as

opposed

to Kabbashi Arabic,

but

a

lso

in the sense

of a British, middle class, academic game as opposed to the modes of

li fe of

the

"tribal "

Sudan.

The stiffness

of

a powerful established

structure of lif

e.

with its own discursive games,

it

s

OWIl

"strong" lan

guages, is what among other things finally determines the effective-

ness

of the

translation:

The

translation is

addressed

to a very specific

' )

e

aud,ence, which 's wallmg to read

a bou t another

mod e of life

and

to / .

manipulate

the text it reads acco

rding

to established ru les, not to

learn to live a new mode of life.

f

Benjamin was right in proposing that translalion may require

not a mechanica l reproduction

of

the original but a harmonization

with its

i-nlenlio, it

follows that there

is

no reason why this should be

done on ly in the same mode. Indeed , it cou ld be argued that "trans-

lating" an alien form of life, another cuitu re,

is

not always done bes t

through

the

representational

discourse

of ethnog

raphy, th

at under

certain conditions a dramatic performance, the execution of a dance,

or the playing of a piece of

mu

sic might be

more

apt. These would all

be

productions

of the orig

in

al and nOt mere interpretation s: trans

formed instances

of

the original , not authoritat ive textual representa

ti

ons

of it (cf. Hollander '959).

But

would they be t

hought

of by most

social anthropologists

as

valid exercises

in

the "translation of culture"?

I think not , beca use they a ll raise

an

entirely different dimension of

the relationship between the anr.hropologiGIl "work" and its audience,

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160

TALAL ASAD

th

e

qu est

ion of different Uses (practices), as op pos

ed merely

to d iffer

ent unitings and readings (meanings) of that work. And as social

an

I thropologi

sts we

are trained to trans

lat

e

other

cul

tura

l lan

guages

as

texts , no t O o d u c e or e

nlarg

e c

ultural

ca pacities,

learnt from

ot he r ways of living, in to o ur own. It seems

to me

very likely Ihat th e

n

otio

n

of

c

ultur

e a s

text

has

reinf

orced this view of

OUf

task,

because it

faci lita tes

th

e assumpt. i

on th

a t translation

is essentia lly

a ma ller of ver

bal re

pre

se

n tation.

Reading

Other

Cultures

This

in e

quality

in the

power of

l

anguages,

togeth

er with th e

fact th

at the

an t

hr

o pologist. typ ica lly writes

about

an illite

rate (or at

any

rate

non-English-spe

a king) popu lation

for

a largely

academic,

English

-speaking aud

ience,

encourages

a

tendency

I would now like

to

d iscuss: the

tendency

La r

ead

the implicit in alien cu

ltures

.

Ac

co

rding

to

many

social anthropologists,

the

object

of et

hno

grap hic

[1'anslat

i

on is not the

hi

stor

ica

ll

y s

ituated speec

h (th

at

is

the

\..

 

,ask of

the

folklorist or the linguist), but cu

lture

,"

and

to

trans

l

ate

c

ulture the anthr

o

polo

g i

st mu st.

first

read

a

nd

then

reinscribe the

im

plicit

meaning

s

that

lie ben

eath

/wi

thin

/

beyond si

tua t

ed

speech.

Ma r

y

Douglas

puts

this nicel

y:

The a nthmpologist wh o draws Out the wh ole scheme of

the

cosmos whi ch is

implied

in [the

observed] practices does

the

primitive

culture

gr

eat vi

ol

ence if

he

seems

to

present the

cosmology as

a

systematic philosophy suhscribed

[ 0

consciously by individuals So the primitive world view which

I

have de ·

fined above is l'arel y iLSelf an obj ect

of

co

nt

e

mplation

and speculation in th e

primitive c ulture.

t

has evolved as the appana ge of other social insritutions .

To thi s extent

it

is produ

ce

d indirectly. and to this extern the primitive culture

mu

st be taken

to be un

aware o f itself, un consci

ous of

its own con ciitions.

(

  966 :9

1

)

One

differenc

e

between

the an

throp

ologist

and

the

lingui st in

the

matter of

translaLion is p

er

ba ps this :

that whereas

t

he

latte l'

is imme

diatel

y faced with a specifit.: piece of dis co

urse

produced within the

societ y

studied

, a dis

co

ur

se

that

is

th en

textualized,

the

fo

rm

e r

must

co

nstruct the

di

scourse as

a c

ultural text

in

terms

of

meanin

gs

imphc

it

in a range of

pra

ctices. T he co

nstru

ction of

cultural

disco

urs

e and its

translation

thus

seem to be facets

of

a single act.

This point

is

brought

out in

Douglas

's com

ments on

her

Own

translations of

the meanings

o f

the

pangolin cult

among the Lele:

There

are

no

Lele books

of

th

eo

logy or philosophy

to

state

the meanin

g

of

the

cult. The metapbysir:al impli

c;.n

ions have

not been expressed

to me in so

man

y

The

Co

n

cept of Cu

ltu

ra

l

Trans

la ti

on

161

words by Lcle, nor did I even

eavesdrop

a cO

ll

versali

on

betwee n (Iiviners

covering this ground.

Wh

at ki

nd of

eVldence for

the

meaning of

this cult, or

of

a ny cult , can be

sensibly d emanded ? h can

ha ve

many

different

levels a

nd

kind s o f m

ea

nin g.

B

Ul the

one o n which I gro

und

my a rgum e

nt

is [he m

ean

in g wh

ic

h eme rges

out of a paltern in which

the

parts can in co

nt

eslably he shown to

be regu

la rly

related. No

o ne

membe

l- o f tile socie{y is neces

sar

ily

aware of the

whole

pat

tern, any more than

spea

kers are able

to be

explicit

abo

ut the ling uistic

pat·

terns they emp l

oy. ( 1966: 17

3- 74)

I've

suggested

elsewhe

re

(Asad 1983a)

th

at

th

e

attribution

of im:

I

p

li

cit

me

a

nings to an

a

li

en

pr a

c(jee

rega rdl

ess

ojwhether

th.

ey a re acknowl-

edged

by

its

a g e ~ 1

is

a

cha

racteristic

form of

th

eo

l

og

ica l exerc

is

e, with

19

an anc

ie

nt

history. H ere 1 want to

note

tha t refe r

ence

to the linguistic.

patterns produ

ced

by

speakers

does not

ma k

e a

good

analogy because

lingui

st

ic

patte

rns are not meanings

to be

tran

sla t

ed, the

y

are

rul es

to

I;>e

systematicall y

descr

ib

ed and ana

lysed. A nat.ive s

peak

er is

aware

of

how su ch

patterns

sho uld be

produ

ced even

when

he ca

nn

ot verba

li

ze

that

know led

ge ex p

licitly in

the form

of

rules.

T he apparent l

ac

k

of

ab

ility

to verba

lize sllch social knowl edge does not necessarily

co

nst i-

tu te

evidence

of

uncon

scious mea

nin

gs

(c f. Dumm

e

tt

1

98 ,)

.

The

co

n

ce

pt

of un consci

ous

m

ea nin

g  belongs

to

a

theo

ry of the r

epressive

unconscious,

suc

h as Freud's, in whi ch a person

ma

y be sa id t o know 

so

methin

g

un

conscio usl

y.

The

business of ide

ntif

ying

uncon

sci

ous

me

anings

in

th

e task o f

"cultural translatio n 

is th

ere fo

re

perhaps better

com

pared to the ac

~ ~ i t y

of

the

psyc

ho

a n. l

ys

t than to

that

of

the

linguist.

Indeed

British

anthropologists

have

sometimes

prese

nt

ed

their work

in pr ecise ly

these

terms.

T

hu

s David Pocock, a

pupil

of Evans· Pritch

ar d

's, writes:

In

s

ho n

,

the

work

of

lhe social

n t h r o p o

may be rega rd ed as a highly

co

mplex

act

of tr

ans la

t i

on in which a

uth or

a

nd

translator co

llaborare

.

A

more

precise analogy is that. of the rel

at

ion between

the

psychoanalyst a nd his sub·

ject. The

analyst

enters

the private wo rld

of

his subject in

order

to lea

rn th

e

grammar

of his private langua ge. 1f the analysis goes nOfurth er it is nOdiffe r·

em in kind fro m

the und

erstanding which may exist betw

ee

n a ny

tw

o

pe

ople

who

kn ow

eac

h

ot

her well.[

 ] It

beco mes

sc

ientific to

the ex t

ent

thalthe

pri

va

te

language

of intim

ate und

erstanding is

lran

slated into a puhlic lan

guage

, h

ow·

ever specialized

from the

layman's point of view, which in thi s case is t he la n

guage psychologists . But the

particu

lar act

of tran

sl

alio

n does no t disto rt

the private experie nce of the subject and ideall y it is,

at

least pOle ntia lly, ac·

ceptabl

e

to

him as a scie ntific

represe

nt

ation

of

it. Similarly, the m

ode

l o f

Nuer politi

ca

l life which e m

erges

in

Pr

o fessor Evans-PriLch

ard

's wo rk is a sc i·

entific m

ode

l m

ea

ningful to his fellow-sociologists as soc iol

og

ists, and it

is

effective because it is /JOlen l.iaily acceptable to the

uer

in same ideal

situaligll

in

which th ey could be supposed 10 interested in themselves as nun Lving in society. T he

collaboration of narur al scient ists

ma

y

from

this point of view be see n as de ve l

~ \ i

l l > l ' ~

>J

_  L

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.63

62

TALAL

ASAD

oping

lan guage enabling ce

rl

ain

people ro

com

municate \,,..ith

incr

eas

ing

[lety

abo

ut a distinct

area of natural phenom

e na

whic.h is defined

by

the name

of the part

icul

ar

science. Their science i

s,

in [he lit

era

l

meaning of

the

term

,

their

commonsense

,

their common

m

ea

ning.

To move

hom this

com mon

se nse to

the

com mon sense of

the wider

public involves

aga

in an act

of

translation. The

situ atio n

of

social anthr

opo

logy,

or

soc iology

in

ge nel-al,

is

not at

this level so

very different. The difference

lies in

the

fact

th

a t so

ciological

ph

e

nomena are

objectively swelied o

nl

y to

[he extent

that

th

eir

sub

jecti

ve m

eani

ng

is

taken

into accou

nt and

[hat the

people

studied

a re

poten

tially

capable

of sharing lhe sociol

og

ical consciousness

that

[

be

sociol

og

ist

has

of them. ('96

. :

88-89; emphasis added)

I have quoted thi s

remarkable

pas

sage in

full because it

states

very

lu

cidlya

position

that is, I think , broadly accepta

ble to

many an thropol

ogist.s who would otherwise

co

nsider themse lves

to

be engaged in very

differe

nt

kinds of enterprise. I have quoted it also because the nature

of the collaboration be.tween auth or and transla tor is

neatly

brou ght

J \ ti

l

out

in the subsequent reference to the

psychoanalyst

as scientist: if the

a nthropological translator, like

th

e a nalyst, has final authority in d e

ter m ining the subject's meanings-i t is then the forme r who becomes

tlt

e Teal au.thoT of the latter. In this view,

c

ultural translation  is a

matter of d etermining implicit

meanings-n

ot the meanings the

na

I

tive speaker ac tually

acknowl

edges in his speecb, not even the m ea n

ings the

nativ

e listene r necessarily accepts , but th

ose

he is potentially

capable of sharing with scientific a

uth

o rity in some idea l situation :

it

is

when

he

can say, f

or

example, with Gellner, that vox Dei

is

in real

ity

vox

poPu.li that he ut ters the true mea ning o f his traditional dis

course, an ~ s s e n t i l meaning o f his culture . The fact that in that

ideal

situation  he would no lon ger be a

Muslim

Berber tribesman, but

something coming to resemble Pr

ofesso

r Gellner, does not

appear

to

worry such cultural

tr

a

nslators.

1 This

power

to create meanings for a subject through

the

notion of

I

th

e

implicit

 

or

th

e

u

nconscious ,

to

autho1ize lhem

h as

of

co

urse

been discussed for the

;malyst

-analysand relationship (e.g., recently in

Malcolm

'9

82).

It has not ,

t.o

my knowledge ,

been

considered with re

gard

to

what

the

cu ltural

transl

ato r

does. Ther

e are, of co

ur

se, impo r

tant

differen

ces in the case

of

th e an thropolog·ist. I t m ay be point

ed

o

ut

that the

laLter

do

es

not

impo

se his tran

slation

on the me

mbers

of

th

e society whose cultural discourse he

unravels

, that his

et

hn

og

raphy

is

th erefor e not authoritat

iv

e in

the

way the ana lyst

 s

case

study

is. The

analysand

co

mes

to the

analy

st ,

or is

referred

to the latter

by

th

ose

with

authority

ove

r

him,

as a pat ien t in

need

of he lp.

The

anthropolo

gist, by

co

nt ras t, comes

to the

society he wants to read, he

see

s himself

as a learner, not as a guide, and he

withdraws

from

the

society when

he has adequate in f

orma

tion

to

inscr ibe its c

ulture

. H e does not

co n

-

The Concept of Cultur

al

Tra

nslation

sider th e society, and ne ith er do its members

cons

ider themselves to

be , sick: the society is ne

ver s ~ b j e c t

to the anthropologist's authority.

But this argu me nt is not quite as

con

clusive as it m ay seem at

first

sig ht. It remaius th e case that the et hnographer's translation / repre

sentation of a particul

ar

culture is inevitably a textual construct, that

as representation it cannot normally be

co

ntested by th e people to

whom it is a ttributed , and that as a scientific tex t it evemually be

come

s a privileged element in the potential store o f histo rical m em o ry

for the uonliterate society concerned. In mo d er n an d modernizing

societies,

inscri

bed reco rds hav e a greater power to shape, to reform,

selves and

instituti

ons

than

folk memo ries

do.

They eve n

co

nstruct

folk memories. Th e an thropologist s monograph

may

return , ret.rans

lated , int.o a weaker

Third

World language. I n the long run, th er e

fore, it is not the persona l au thority of

th

e ethnographet·, but the so

cial

authorit.y

of hjs , thnography matters. And that authority i§.

insc ribed in the insn t

utio

Qalized forces of indu§tri al ca pitalist socie t

Y

(see page 158

above),

which are constantly tending to pu sh the mean

ings of various

Third

Wo rld societies in a sin gle direction. This is not

to say that there are no r

es

ista nces to this

tendency.

But

resi

sta n

ce

in

itself indica tes the presence of a dominant force.

I must

stress

I

am

not arguing that ethnography plays an y gTeat

role in the reformation

of

other

cu

ltures. In this respect the effects of

et

hn og raphy canno t be compared with some ot her forms of repre

senting societies- for exa mple, television films produced in th e

West

that are sold to

Third

Wo rld countries. (That anthropologists r

ecog

nize th e power of television is re Rected, in

cide

utally, in the increasing

number

o f a nt.hropological films being ma de for the medium in Brit

ain.)

Still less can

th

e effects of et hn ogra phy compare with the politi

ca l, eco nomic, and military constraints of the world system. My point

is only that the

pr

ocess of   cult ural translation

is

in

ev

itably enmeshed

in cond

itions

of power -professiona l, national,

internation al.

And

among

th

ese conditions

is

the

a

uthority

of

et

hn og raphers

to

u n

cove

r

the implicit meanings of

subordinate

societies. Given that that

is

so,

t.he inter

es ting

question for en quiry

is

not whether, a nd if so to

what

exte

nt

,

anthrop

olog ists s hould be relativists

or

rationalists, critical

or

char

itable, toward

ot he r cultures, but how power en ters into

the pro

cess of

cultural

translation,

seen both

as a dis cursive

and

as a

non

dis c

ur

sive

practice.

Conclusion

For some years I have been

exercise

d

by

this pu

zz

le.

How

is it

that the a pproach exemplified

by Gelln

er  s

pape

r re mains attractive

to

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Ii

TALALASAD

16

4

so many academics in sp ite

of

its

being

dem

onstrably

faulty? Is it per-

haps because

they

are

intimidated by a style We know, of course, that

a nthropo logists, like

ot

her

academ

ics, learn not merely to use a schol-

arly

language, but

to

fea r it, to admire it, to be captivated

by

it. Ve t this

does not quite answer the question because. it does n

ot

LeHus wh

y

such

; ..Sc

holarl

y style sh

ou

ld

capture

so

many

intellige

nt peop

le. 1 now

put

f

orwar

d this tenta tive solutio n. What we have here is a style easy to

leach,

to learn, and to reproduce (in

examination answers, assessmen

t

essays, a

nd

dissertations). I t

is

a style

that

facilitates the textualization

of other c

ultur

es, that encourages the construction

of diagrammatic

answers to

comp

l

ex

c

ultural

questions, and

that

is well s

uited

1 a r-

ranging fore ign cultural

concepts

in clearly marked hea ps of se nse

or

nonsense

. Apart from being' easy to teach and to imitate, thi s style

promises visible resu lts

th

at ca n readily be graded. Su ch a style must

surely

be

at

a

premium

in an establish

ed

university discipline

that

as

pires to st nd rds

of sc

ientific objectivity. Is the l r i t y of this style,

then, not a reflection of the

kind

of pedagogic institutio n we

inh

ab it?

Although

it is now

many

years since Gellner's p

aper

was first

pub-

lished,

it

represents

a

doctr

inal position

that

is sti

ll popular

today.

1 have in mind the sociologism according to which religious ideo logies

are sa id to gel lh e ir real

meaning

from

the

poli tical or

economic

struc

tur

e,

a

nd th

e self-confirm in g methodology accordin g to which this re

ducLive semantic principle is eviden r to the (authoritative) anthr

opo

lo

gis t

and not to the people being

written

about.

This

position therefore

assumes th

at

it is not o nly possihle bUl necessary

for the

anthropolo

gist

to

act as

tr

a nsla

tor

and critic

at

o ne aIld the same time. 1

regard

this position as

untenable,

and think

that it

is relations

and

practices

of power that give it a measure of viability. (For a critical discussion of

this position as it relates to Islamic history, see Asad Ig80.)

The positive

point

I have tried

to

make in

the course

of my inter

roga

ti

on

of

Gellner 's text has to do with what I have ca lled th e ineq ua l-

ity of languages. I have proposed that the a nthropologica l

enterpr

ise

of c

ultur

al

tr

anslation may be vi tiated by

the

fact that

t.h

ere are asym

m

et

rica l tendencies and pressures in the languages of

domina

t

ed

and

dominan t societies. And I have

suggested

that an th ropologists need

to

explore these

processes in o

rde

r to

determine

how

far

they

go

in de-

fining

the

possibilities and

the

limits of effect ive tra nsla tion.

In additjon to the

memb

ers of the Santa

Fe

seminar

wh

o discussed an early

draft

of

this article- and especially Paul Rabinow,

wh

o

co mmented

on

it

at le

ngth

- I wish

to

thank Tanya Baker. J ohn Dixon, Rodney Needham, and Keith Nield for their helpful

criticism .