Download or read book Babel written by R. F. Kuang and published by HarperCollins. This book was released on 2022-08-23 with total page 814 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Instant #1 New York Times Bestseller from the author of The Poppy War “Absolutely phenomenal. One of the most brilliant, razor-sharp books I've had the pleasure of reading that isn't just an alternative fantastical history, but an interrogative one; one that grabs colonial history and the Industrial Revolution, turns it over, and shakes it out.” -- Shannon Chakraborty, bestselling author of The City of Brass From award-winning author R. F. Kuang comes Babel, a thematic response to The Secret History and a tonal retort to Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell that grapples with student revolutions, colonial resistance, and the use of language and translation as the dominating tool of the British empire. Traduttore, traditore: An act of translation is always an act of betrayal. 1828. Robin Swift, orphaned by cholera in Canton, is brought to London by the mysterious Professor Lovell. There, he trains for years in Latin, Ancient Greek, and Chinese, all in preparation for the day he’ll enroll in Oxford University’s prestigious Royal Institute of Translation—also known as Babel. Babel is the world's center for translation and, more importantly, magic. Silver working—the art of manifesting the meaning lost in translation using enchanted silver bars—has made the British unparalleled in power, as its knowledge serves the Empire’s quest for colonization. For Robin, Oxford is a utopia dedicated to the pursuit of knowledge. But knowledge obeys power, and as a Chinese boy raised in Britain, Robin realizes serving Babel means betraying his motherland. As his studies progress, Robin finds himself caught between Babel and the shadowy Hermes Society, an organization dedicated to stopping imperial expansion. When Britain pursues an unjust war with China over silver and opium, Robin must decide… Can powerful institutions be changed from within, or does revolution always require violence?
Download or read book Imperial Babel written by Padma Rangarajan and published by Modern Language Initiative. This book was released on 2014 with total page 251 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Translation suffers a poor reputation: traditionally dismissed as a derivative, invisible process, its recent critical emergence has led to its being cast as a central tool of colonial oppression. In Imperial Babel, Padma Rangarajan challenges both these arguments by revealing translation's complex role in shaping nineteenth-century literary and political relationships between India and Britain. Drawing from a wide range of texts ranging from eighteenth-century oriental tales to mystic poetry of the fin de siècle, Rangarajan examines literal enterprises of translation as well its ethnological, mythographic, and religious variants to show how translation in the empire steps out of the shadows and allows us to consider its diverse political and cultural consequences. Merging ongoing interests in complicating colonial epistemologies with new theoretical shifts of Translation Studies, Rangarajan argues that colonial translation was not merely a monovocal instrument of oppression, but a process that changed both colonizer and colonized, and undermined colonial hegemony as much as it abetted it. Searching for translation's trace enables both a broader, more complex understanding of the work of translation in imperial culture as well as a more nuanced understanding of the dialectical relationship between colonial policy and nineteenth-century fiction. Imperial Babel uses translation's persistent presence in colonial literature to reconsider the history of orientalism and its relationship to nineteenth-century British culture. Rangarajan argues that while bearing witness to the violence that underwrites translation in colonial spaces, we should also remain open to the irresolution of translation, its unfixed nature, and its ability to transform the colonizer as well as the colonized, the translated language and the translator's language. Imperial Babel will be of value to students and scholars of nineteenth-century British literature, South Asia, and translation.
Download or read book Between Babel and Beast written by Peter J. Leithart and published by Wipf and Stock Publishers. This book was released on 2012-07-06 with total page 169 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The United States is one of history's great Christian nations, but our unique history, success, and global impact have seduced us into believing we are something more--God's New Israel, the new order of the ages, the last best hope of mankind, a redeemer nation. Using the subtle categories that arise from biblical narrative, Between Babel and Beast analyzes how the heresy of Americanism inspired America's rise to hegemony while blinding American Christians to our failures and abuses of power. The book demonstrates that the church best serves the genuine good of the United States by training witnesses--martyr-citizens of God's Abrahamic empire.
Download or read book Imperial Babel written by Padma Rangarajan and published by . This book was released on 2006 with total page 400 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Scientific Babel written by Michael D. Gordin and published by University of Chicago Press. This book was released on 2015-04-13 with total page 424 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: English is the language of science today. No matter which languages you know, if you want your work seen, studied, and cited, you need to publish in English. But that hasn’t always been the case. Though there was a time when Latin dominated the field, for centuries science has been a polyglot enterprise, conducted in a number of languages whose importance waxed and waned over time—until the rise of English in the twentieth century. So how did we get from there to here? How did French, German, Latin, Russian, and even Esperanto give way to English? And what can we reconstruct of the experience of doing science in the polyglot past? With Scientific Babel, Michael D. Gordin resurrects that lost world, in part through an ingenious mechanism: the pages of his highly readable narrative account teem with footnotes—not offering background information, but presenting quoted material in its original language. The result is stunning: as we read about the rise and fall of languages, driven by politics, war, economics, and institutions, we actually see it happen in the ever-changing web of multilingual examples. The history of science, and of English as its dominant language, comes to life, and brings with it a new understanding not only of the frictions generated by a scientific community that spoke in many often mutually unintelligible voices, but also of the possibilities of the polyglot, and the losses that the dominance of English entails. Few historians of science write as well as Gordin, and Scientific Babel reveals his incredible command of the literature, language, and intellectual essence of science past and present. No reader who takes this linguistic journey with him will be disappointed.
Download or read book Babel written by Samuel L. Boyd and published by Fortress Press. This book was released on 2023-06-20 with total page 346 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In Babel: Political Rhetoric of a Confused Legacy, Samuel L. Boyd offers a new reading of the Tower of Babel in Genesis 11:1-9. Using recent insights on the rhetoric of Neo-Assyrian politics and its ideology of governance as well as advances in biblical studies, Boyd shows how the Tower of Babel was not originally about a tower, Babylon, or the advent of multilingualism, at least in the earliest phases of the history and literary context of the story. Rather, the narrative was a critique against the Assyrian empire using themes of human overreach found in many places in Genesis 1-11. Boyd clarifies how idioms of Assyrian governance could have found their way into the biblical text, and how the Hebrew of Genesis 11:1-9 itself leads to a different translation of the passage than found in versions of the Bible, one that does not involve language. This new reading sheds light on how the story became about language. Boyd argues that this new understanding of Babel also illuminates aspects of the call of Abram when the Tower of Babel is interpreted as a story about something other than the origin of multilingualism. Finally, he frames the historical-critical research on the biblical passage and its reception in ancient Jewish, Christian, and Islamic sources with the uses of the Tower of Babel in modern politics of language and nationalism. He demonstrates how and why Genesis 11:1-9 has become so useful, in often detrimental ways, to the modern nation-state. Boyd explores this intellectual history of the passage into current events in the twenty-first century and offers perspectives on how a new reading of the Tower of Babel can speak to the current cultural and political moment and offer correctives on the uses and abuses of the Bible in the public sphere.
Download or read book In Babel s Shadow written by Brian Lennon and published by U of Minnesota Press. This book was released on with total page 266 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "In Babel's Shadow is an ambitious, sophisticated book that addresses crucial, timely issues in the study of life-writing, translation, translingualism, literary theory, and linguistics. Its range is extensive and its erudition and intellectual calisthenies dazzling."---Steven G. Kellman, author of The Translingual Imagination --
Download or read book From Babel to Dragomans written by Bernard Lewis and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2004 with total page 455 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Bernard Lewis is recognized around the globe as one of the leading authorities on Islam. Now, this revered authority has brought together writings and lectures that he has written over four decades, featuring his reflections on Middle Eastern history and foreign affairs, the Iranian Revolution, the state of Israel, the writing of history, and much more. The essays include such urgent and compelling topics as "What Saddam Wrought," "Deconstructing Osama and His Evil Appeal," "The Middle East, Westernized Despite Itself," "The Enemies of God," and "Can Islam Be Secularized?" With more than fifty pieces in all, plus a new introduction to the book by Lewis, this is a valuable collection for everyone interested in the Middle East.
Download or read book Complete Works Of Isaac Babel written by Исаак Бабель and published by W. W. Norton & Company. This book was released on 2002 with total page 1084 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Presents the collected short stories of a master of the form, along with his letters, plays, diaries, and screenplays.
Download or read book Tower of Babble written by Dore Gold and published by Forum Books. This book was released on 2005-10-25 with total page 346 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A United Nations insider exposes the ugly truth about the UN—including how UN organizations have been funding terrorist groups! In the New York Times bestseller Tower of Babble, former United Nations ambassador Dore Gold blows the lid off the UN’s shocking failures to keep international peace, its corruption, its rampant anti-Americanism, and its emboldening of terrorist organizations. Citing previously unpublished documents, a brand-new chapter exclusive to this paperback edition provides the untold story of the infamous oil-for-food scandal—including the real scandal, that the UN let oil-for-food money go to fund terrorist organizations.
Download or read book The Babel Message written by Keith Kahn-Harris and published by Icon Books. This book was released on 2021-11-04 with total page 329 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: 'Quite simply, and quite ridiculously, one of the funniest and most illuminating books I have ever read. I thought I was obsessive, but Keith Kahn-Harris is playing a very different sport. He really has discovered the whole world in an egg.' Simon Garfield A thrilling journey deep into the heart of language, from a rather unexpected starting point. Keith Kahn-Harris is a man obsessed with something seemingly trivial - the warning message found inside Kinder Surprise eggs: WARNING, read and keep: Toy not suitable for children under 3 years. Small parts might be swallowed or inhaled. On a tiny sheet of paper, this message is translated into dozens of languages - the world boiled down to a multilingual essence. Inspired by this, the author asks: what makes 'a language'? With the help of the international community of language geeks, he shows us what the message looks like in Ancient Sumerian, Zulu, Cornish, Klingon - and many more. Along the way he considers why Hungarian writing looks angry, how to make up your own language, and the meaning of the heavy metal umlaut. Overturning the Babel myth, he argues that the messy diversity of language shouldn't be a source of conflict, but of collective wonder. This is a book about hope, a love letter to language. 'This is a wonderful book. A treasure trove of mind-expanding insights into language and humanity encased in a deliciously quirky, quixotic quest. I loved it. Warning: this will keep you reading.' - Ann Morgan, author of Reading the World: Confessions of a Literary Explorer
Download or read book Isaac Babel s Selected Writings Norton Critical Editions written by Isaac Babel and published by W. W. Norton & Company. This book was released on 2010 with total page 9 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: (Kashirina), M. N. Berkov, Iosif Stalin, Vyacheslav Polonsky, Clara Malraux, Kornei Chukovsky, Erwin Sinko, Antonina Pirozhkova, Dmitry Furmanov, and others. Many of these materials appear in English for the first time." ""Criticism" brings together five major assessments of Babel's legacy, by Viktor Shklovsky, Semyon Budyonny, Lionel Trilling, Efraim Sicher, and Gregory Freidin." "A Chronology and a Selected Bibliography complete this Norton Critical Edition." --Book Jacket.
Download or read book Empire Star written by Samuel R. Delany and published by Macmillan Reference USA. This book was released on 1977 with total page 112 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book The Power of Babel written by Ali AlʼAmin Mazrui and published by James Currey. This book was released on 1998 with total page 248 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Linguists estimate that there are currently nearly 2,000 languages in Africa, a staggering figure that is belied by the relatively few national languages. While African national politics, economics, and law are all conducted primarily in the colonial languages, the cultural life of the majority of citizens is conducted in a bewildering Babel of local and regional dialects, making language itself the center of debates over multiculturalism, gender studies, and social theory. In "The Power of Babel," the noted Africanist scholar Ali Mazrui and linguist Alamin Mazrui explore this vast territory of African language. "The Power of Babel" is one of the first comprehensive studies of the complex linguistic constellations of Africa. It draws on Ali Mazrui's earlier work in its examination of the "triple heritage" of African culture, in which indigenous, Islamic, and Western traditions compete for influence. In bringing the idea of the triple heritage to language, the Mazruis unravel issues of power, culture, and modernity as they are embedded in African linguistic life. The first section of the book takes a global perspective, exploring such issues as the Eurocentrism of much linguistic scholarship on Africa; part two takes an African perspective on a variety of issues from the linguistically disadvantaged position of women in Africa to the relation of language policy and democratic development; the third section presents a set of regional studies, centering on the Swahili language's exemplification of the triple heritage."The Power of Babel" unites empirical information with theories of nationalism and pluralism-among others-to offer the richest contextual account of African languages to date.
Download or read book Babel written by Gaston Dorren and published by Atlantic Monthly Press. This book was released on 2018-12-04 with total page 408 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: “Babel is an endlessly interesting book, and you don’t have to have any linguistic training to enjoy it . . . it’s just so much fun to read.” —NPR English is the world language, except that 80 percent of the world doesn’t speak it. Linguist Gaston Dorren calculates that to speak fluently with half of the world’s people in their mother tongues, you’d need to know no fewer than twenty languages. In Babel, he sets out to explore these top twenty world languages, which range from the familiar (French, Spanish) to the surprising (Malay, Javanese, Bengali). Whisking readers along on a delightful journey, he traces how these languages rose to greatness while others fell away, and shows how speakers today handle the foibles of their mother tongues. Whether showcasing tongue-tying phonetics, elegant but complicated writing scripts, or mind-bending quirks of grammar, Babel vividly illustrates that mother tongues are like nations: each has its own customs and beliefs that seem as self-evident to those born into it as they are surprising to outsiders. Babel reveals why modern Turks can’t read books that are a mere 75 years old, what it means in practice for Russian and English to be relatives, and how Japanese developed separate “dialects” for men and women. Dorren also shares his experiences studying Vietnamese in Hanoi, debunks ten myths about Chinese characters, and discovers the region where Swahili became the lingua franca. Witty and utterly fascinating, Babel will change how you look at and listen to the world. “Word nerds of every strain will enjoy this wildly entertaining linguistic study.” —Publishers Weekly (starred review)
Download or read book Babel s Tower Translated written by Phillip Michael Sherman and published by BRILL. This book was released on 2013-04-15 with total page 377 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In Babel's Tower Translated, Phillip Sherman explores the narrative of Genesis 11 and its reception and interpretation in several Second Temple and Early Rabbinic texts (e.g., Jubilees, Philo, Genesis Rabbah). The account of the Tower of Babel (Genesis 11:1-9) is famously ambiguous. The meaning of the narrative and the actions of both the human characters and the Israelite deity defy any easy explanation. This work explores how changing historical and hermeneutical realities altered and shifted the meaning of the text in Jewish antiquity.
Download or read book Archaeology of Babel written by Siraj Ahmed and published by Stanford University Press. This book was released on 2017-12-12 with total page 352 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: For more than three decades, preeminent scholars in comparative literature and postcolonial studies have called for a return to philology as the indispensable basis of critical method in the humanities. Against such calls, this book argues that the privilege philology has always enjoyed within the modern humanities silently reinforces a colonial hierarchy. In fact, each of philology's foundational innovations originally served British rule in India. Tracing an unacknowledged history that extends from British Orientalist Sir William Jones to Palestinian American intellectual Edward Said and beyond, Archaeology of Babel excavates the epistemic transformation that was engendered on a global scale by the colonial reconstruction of native languages, literatures, and law. In the process, it reveals the extent to which even postcolonial studies and European philosophy—not to mention discourses as disparate as Islamic fundamentalism, Hindu nationalism, and global environmentalism—are the progeny of colonial rule. Going further, it unearths the alternate concepts of language and literature that were lost along the way and issues its own call for humanists to reckon with the politics of the philological practices to which they now return.
