Knowledge in Motion

Marwa S. Elshakry

Article offers inquiry into:

Problem of global circulation of modern scientific knowledge

Science translations in modern Arabic language is a key instruments in the

continuing process of:

Socio-political & epistemological transformation and intrusion

Epistemology is the branch of philosophy concerned with the nature, scope and

limitations of knowledge.

It addresses the questions:

What is knowledge?

How is knowledge acquired?

To what extent is it possible for a given subject or entity to be known?

End of the 19th century

Dilemma of importing Western scientific vocabulary into Arabic

Finding lexical i.e. verbal equivalents in cross-lingual scientific discourse

Transliteration (conversion) of technical terms created issues

Issues related to the intense, ongoing cultural and political debate over language

These issues were played against the background of colonial rule

Included were questions of:

Linguistic tradition

Cultural purity

Modernity

In a nutshell:

The problem of translation

Historians of science addressed all problems related to the theory of science:

Its meanings, relationship to other disciplines

Paid little attention to language as the medium through which modern scientific

ideas travel

Ignored:

Actual process of translation

Its implications for the communication of scientific thought

Historians of science overlooked translations vital importance for the understanding of the

geography of knowledge

The way science travels across borders and through time

The work was left to:

Philologist Those who study words, their history and

Development in a particular language

Literary studies

Translation scholars

Most significantly, they took for granted that science has a unified and coherent

universal language

A body of perfectly translatable conventions, signs, and concepts

Marwa suggests:

Stop looking for a neutral scientific lingua franca mother tongue

Focus on the practice of translation to discover how and where local roots rest

How production of knowledge really matters

What does translation involve?

Extensive epistemological, authorial and literary modifications

Texts are relocated:

Carrying across linguistic and conceptual schemes and boundaries

Resolved by historical possibilities, geopolitical and social change

All-inclusive engagements

Merging or fusion systems of belief

Translators can shift the meaning and reference of the originals they work from

Translation is an open-end unspecified process

Translators do not need to be always faithful to the original text

Clarity is more essential

A legitimate equivalent remains an option

Refashion texts to make them accessible to a different reader

Their audience might not have the same level of knowledge as the original

Example:

Shibli Shumayyil a radical scientific materialist

Translated essays on Darwin written by a German scientist

Shumayyils was interested in conveying the essence of Darwins new philosophy of

evolution and progress

His translation was not even based on the original but on a later French edition

He employed frequent transliterations for French terms

Helped the reader by using Arabic explanations

His technique was most unorthodox but it served his purpose:

Conveying the essence of important ideas to his readers as quickly as

possible

This example illustrates:

Languages of scientific translations are dynamic

Altered in the process of translation

Shumayyil was aware of difficulties of finding equivalents in Arabic

Frequently translated a term in many ways

For clarity, he typically added an neologism (slogan or saying) based on Arabic

Example:

The word paleontology Study of prehistoric life or the science of excavations

Shumayyil transliterated it to al-baliyuntulujiya

For clarity he added:

(i.e.) ay `ilm al-ahafir

What he actually did was:

Highlight to the Arab reader the novelty of this new science

Make it more clear through a familiar paraphrase

Scientific terms might also have multiple meanings and need to be portrayed in different

ways

Conclusion:

Words convey different shades of meaning

Carry different cultural and linguistic associations

Translators choice might be a matter of preference

As such, results were often contested

What were the criteria for acceptance or rejection of certain words?

In 19th-20th centuries intense debate appeared in al-mashriq al-`arabi about:

Correct linguistic derivations

Conformity to literary traditions

Unjustified foreign borrowings

Improper assimilations

Translated terms were continuously challenged

Formulated on basis of: rational, linguistic and political concerns

Interest in modern science, technology, and medicine

Was accompanied by linguist upheaval

Language wars over the reform of Arabic

Local press was the center for discussions raised by the translations of science

Provided a public platform for debating the nature of:

Cultural authority

Social change

Literary tradition

New Knowledge Communities

Rifa'a al-Tahtawi 18011873 Writer, teacher, translator, Egyptologist and renaissance intellectual.

Among the first scholars to write about Western cultures

Attempts reconciliation between Islamic and Christian civilizations

Founded School of Languages in 1835

Effective in development of science, law, literature and Egyptology in 19th century Egypt.

His work influenced many later scholars including

Muhammad Abduh.

Jurist, religious scholar and liberal reformer, founder of Islamic Modernism.

Regarded as the founder of the neo-Mu`tazilism

Islamic school of theology based on reason and rational thought

Tahtawi studied in France

Wrote: takhlis al-ibriz fi talkhis Bariz

The Extraction of Gold or an Overview of Paris,

A report on his trip to France

He deliberates on patriotic responsibility of citizenship:

To protect one's country, is to accept the changes that come with a modern

society

Tahtawi noted that in the West the word (scholar)`alim refers to: a rational scientist

Has no religious connotations

By contrast alim (savant) among Arabs was first and foremost a religious scholar

With modernity the status of the `ulama changed

A new educated class emerged

Ready to engage in knew methods and vocabulary of science

Printing Press a focal point in modernity coined as revolution

Helped in formulating al-nahdah (Renaissance)

Created a wider class of readers

New pressure for language reform

Extensive translation

Newspapers outlined the community of knowledge

Their readers were neither the `ulama nor the illiterate

They came from civil service, political or professional elite.

Readers play a major role in:

Creating widespread socio-epistemological and geo-political networks

Journalist were not all Egyptians

Cross-regional

Cross-confessional groups

The press mobilized an emerging professional and political elite

Allowed them to take over both the new means and the new discourses of knowledge

production

Readers transformed the notion of `ilm and `ulama

ulama now refers to both:

Traditionally religious scholarly class

Even when their prestige in 19th was waning

New Scientist class

Science, Knowledge and Wisdom

The Lewis Affair: al-ma`rifa, al-`ilm wa-al-hikma

Knowledge, Science and Wisdom

Is essentially a reflection on the nature and limits of science

Testimony of the review of the categories of knowledge in Arabic

Al-ma`rifa (knowledge) is not the same as `ilm

Not the same as al-hikma (wisdom)

`ilm is knowledge of things human

hikma is knowledge of things divine

What does Lewiss speech represent?

One case in the epistemological reorientation of the word `ilm

In the Quran ilm refers to:

1) Human knowledge of definite things

2) In wider sense `ilm includes revealed and acquired knowledge

3) `ilm is also equated with understanding and obtaining perception and approval

(tasawur wa tasdiq )

4. Intuition (al-badihah ) and believing (i`tiqad bima huwa bihi )

Lewis did not taking the Quranic meaning of ilm into consideration

He was following neo-Baconian "inductive reasoning"

To generalize a finding based on accumulating data

`ilm is committed to both positive facts and fundamental reasoning

Bacon suggested:

When you are trying to explain something

Draw up a list of all things when - what you are studying - does happen

A list of things when it does not.

Rank both lists according to the degree in which the phenomenon occurs in each one.

Then you should be able to deduce some conclusions

Positivism

This new approach was reflected in the translation of the Bible

Extensive lists of all words were prepared

Missionaries and natives assistants were influenced by European styles

Deliberately moved from decorative style of classical Arabic

Stressed on standardization and concise expression

Compiled new and highly simplified Arabic grammars

Editors of al-muqtataf - Sarruf & Nimr - reported on the Lewis incident as did other

Arabic newspapers

They were part of the epistemological revolution in the Arab lands

Goal: provide a prcis of latest scientific and technical works published abroad

Their translations also included the Christian commentary written by European scientists

The outcome of the Lewis affair disappointed editors of al-Muqtataf

They rejected meddling of missionaries in the questions of science

Promoted a new gospel of science A sphere of inquiry and knowledge that is defined beyond

religious beliefs

In Egypt, they participated in more radical rewriting categories of knowledge

As well as technological translation and transmission

The Lexicon of Science Includes all possible forms, meanings,

synonyms of a word

New discoveries require new terminology

Composing lexicons involves new conceptions and styles

al-Muqtataf provided, transliterations, neologisms (slogans, catchwords, proverbs) and

explanations

Provided a column entitled: mu`arrabat Arabicizations; technical terms translated

from foreign languages

Popularized Tahtawis glossary commissioned under Mohammad `Ali in 1833

Tahtawi encountered complexity of translating scientific terms

He avoided word-for-word translations

Words that did not exist in Arabic were transliterated i.e. Arabicizing

He added descriptive paraphrases

Example: Hydraulics fann al-miyah (the art of liquid)

Added indexes with each entry

Aimed at a comprehensive Arabic scientific dictionary

Sarruf and Nimr relied on transliteration more than Tahtawi

They actually expanded the language

Often created words to represent or replace foreign ones

They played off linguistic tensions

Searched for equivalences by creating expressions that could be identified as both

foreign and domestic

All faced major problem with classical linguistic rules

Root derivations ishtiqat compounding aht or borrowing ta`rib

Preference was to the universal nature of science

Often transmitting terminology wholesale

Their work was tightly linked to the creation of:

Modern Arabic language

The move from the classical models and linguistic traditions

At the core rested significant political implications

The political Neologisms

In the challenge of scientific popularization, al-muqataf shaped the way toward a radical

literary break with the past

Its readers were cross-regional and cross-confessional

It aimed at a language easily read and understood by all

We should write in a style the

learned will not despise,

the ignorant will understand

But this also had its problems

Many words created problems for translators

Translating Darwin proved problematic:

Darwinism was translated as:

Madhhab Darwin or al-Darwiniyya

Madhhab had different implications in the Islamic shari`a

It refers primarily to one of the Orthodox Schools of fiqh (Muslim Law)

The word Race was a problem

It cannot be translated as umma

Because umma is a concept meaning community, peoples, and nation

Translators opted for:

al-anwa` al-bashariyya

Literarily: human kinds

Origin of the Species: asl al-anwa`

Literarily: source of varities

There is no word in Arabic for species

Some opted for:

al-tanawwu`at al-bashariyya

In Arabic the terms implies varieties

Is this what Darwin wanted?

Probably not

Evolution: various translation were used for this word

Theory of Evolution and Progress translated by Shummayil:

madhhab al-nushu wa-l-irtiqa

Others would use tatawwur relying on the Quranic verse:

He created you in stages

The aim was always about making the unfamiliar familiar

Sarruf and Nimr faced problems of a different kind

Some of their readers claimed Darwins theory was not original

That it was only a reformation of medieval Arabic ideas

The editors of al-muqtataf focused on the novelty, or modernity

Not the antiquity of contemporary scientific concepts

When in a fix they used ancient Greek words as a basis

In defense Jirji Zaydan wrote:

It is well known that the makings of our recent scientific renaissance are derived, wholly or in part,

from the Europeans.

At the basis of such debates was politics of neologism i.e. finding new words

Carrying foreign words wholesale mu`arabat or ta`rib Arabicized created criticism

Some thought it was becoming excessive

Accusations ran deep:

Corrupting the Arabic language

Ignoring the rules of classical language

Translators position:

Arabicized words were more familiar

Did not corrupt the language

This was the same problem of translation from Greek in the earlier centuries

Therefore, we need no justification for our actions

Concern with tradition raised the question of linguistic change and canonical fidelity

Great debates ensued

The people of al-nahda liberal and open-minded talked about the evolution of

languages

Evolution is a natural process

Some even listed Arabicized words in the Quran

Others pointed out dangers of borrowing

It will distort the language

Make it into an cultural and political amalgam a hybrid

The debate came at a time of growing anti-imperial feelings

Even the question of origins of science itself were put to question

Many looked back at the cultural history of the Arabs and their contributions to western

civilization

Conclusions:

Some believed that language constantly evolved through borrowing

Others, coined new terms on the basis of old rules

In practice, translators often wavered between alternative strategies

Similar to the politics of language and the politics of science that shifted ground

The Peoples Prose

The Peoples Science

Debates about translation developed into debates about fundamental issues of:

Style, aesthetics, taste and rhetorical tradition

Some believed the link between Arabic language and the Quran is absolutely critical

language is tied to religion like the body is to the soul

19th Century classical style was under fire:

It was overly poeticized, complex and cumbersome

Purpose was: more accessible style

The key achievement of the nahda was the creation of new and concise prose

The press had a major role in this respect

They created a scientific form

Aim: transmission of useful knowledge

Clarity and communicability were paramount

A new debate begins about spoken and written Arabic

That the difference between East and West in terms of scientific achievements

is due to:

The gulf between written and spoken Arabic

It was considered a drawback

Sarruf and Nimr proposed three solutions:

Replace Arabic by new language entirely

Rejected as distasteful

Written form replaced with colloquial

Politically undesirable it will fragment the watan

Spoken dialects replaced by simplified correct Arabic al-`arabiyya al-sahiha

The preferred solution

Preferred solution renders a great service to the watan

Arabic language is more flexible than most

It will easily adapt to demands of new scientific terminology through Arabicizations ta`rib

They called for a language academy to monitor these developments

Such views were highly controversial and elicited responses negative and positive

This issue rests at the heart of cultural debate in the Arab world

Some called for a new and simplified Arab lingua franca

This will be especially helpful in translating technical terms for the lower classes

It will lead to popularization of knowledge

Some objected that it stressed social over geographical inclusiveness

Others objected that the classical was already an Arab lingua franca

Pointed to the Arab cultural heritage

The united character of literary Arabic

Importance of preserving its classical identity as the language of Islam

Their anxieties were justified

Many foreigners were already promoting the colloquial option

And Latin alphabet

As a means to Christianize the people

Foreign involvement elicited negative criticism

They aim to destroy the culture and fragment the watan

Regardless, foreign writings left their impact

Most Arab intellectuals agreed the written language needed to be simplified

A new concise style should be promoted

But must avoid fakh al-taqlid

(emancipation from imitation)

What was the role of translators?

Good translations were essentially reformist in nature

Accepted on condition: they will uphold basic architecture of classical Arabic

At the same time making its prose style more supple

Goal: communicability, elegance and simplicity

Purists: criticized what they called lughat al-jaraid (language of the press)

Science Standardized

The debates were actually about:

Who held the authority over language

How to make it uniform or standardized

Reformists and Purists called for linguistic supervision and

standardization

Suggested government institution to oversee and reform Arabic prose

Royal Academy of Cairo

Established by king Fuad

Arabic Academy in Damascus

al-majma` al-`ilmi al-`Arabi

Established by Emir Faysal

Underlying the anxiety of purists and some intellectuals

The radical reforms introduced by Mustafa Kamal Ataturk

The goal of the academies was to revive and enhance the language

Simplify prose and grammar especially in schools

Problems remained

Members of the academies differed on the language question

Debates among them slowed the process

New terms were subject to criticism and scrutiny Some opted for ishtiqat

(extension of root tri-lateral forms)

Others opted for ta`rib (Arabicize)

Cairo Academy created new terms Example:

Sayyarah for automobile (root sayyara moved)

Hatif for telephone (root hatafa call)

Miqyas al-harara for thermometer (root qasa: measure; harr: heat)

This type of transliteration was scorned by those who felt: it was a losing battle.

Salamah Musa

An influential science supporter, radical materialist, and socialist mocked their clumsy alternatives

The nation needs useful books on the subject of the:

utumubil (car) tilifun (telephone) and radyufun (radio)

It does not need to be told that these are actually called:

sayyarah, misra, and midhya`

Words must serve the needs of society, in close contact with social evolution, or become useless

Government interference in the academies led to stalemate

Purists appointed as part of a broad political strategy

Failed to recognize that language was a matter of usage and convention

Not only a matter of standardization and elite decision making

Influence of journalism and print capitalism outmaneuver official

attempts

They argued:

Neither `ulama can be replaced by appointed committee men

Nor the pace and direction of linguistic change can be determined

by government mandate

Knowledge in Motion

Marwa cites Isma`il Mazhar A progressive Egyptian liberal thinker

One of the pioneers of contemporary scientific renaissance in Egypt and the Arab world

One of the pioneers of thought, science and translation

Transliteration comes from the notion that language of science is universal

It remains foreign to Arabic

Create a proper scientific language in Arabic which is well equipped for such a task

He died before realizing the dream of an Arab scientific dictionary

Colonialism had a great impact on translators

They were provoked by the status of science as a Western import

Language of modern science was, therefore, treated as highly

contested, ambiguous and often arbitrary

Impact of imperialism

Rapid sociological

Political fragmentation that came in its aftermath

All led to an intense and deeply political debate over the language question.

Efforts to assess and standardize terminology

Failed to satisfy the requirements of the elite or even public opinion

Marwa ends her article:

Message of historian of science:

The focus on translation throws light on:

The multinational scopes of knowledge production

Active and critical role of language in shaping the ways in which scientific ideas traveled

In translation rests:

Major cause of transformations and compromises involved, as scientific knowledge

travels across borders