On translation and its history in the social sciences and humanities
On translation and its history in the social sciences and humanities

Summary/Abstract: This article explores the role of translation within the social sciences and humanities (SSH), as well as some theoretical and methodological challenges of historicizing SSH translation. Moving beyond traditional literary-focused translation studies, we argue that disciplinary fields and their categories are not essentialist but culturally and temporally contingent epistemic constructs. Consequently, providing a rigid definition of SSH translation is both problematic and, perhaps, unnecessary. Through a series of what we call micro case studies, we posit that the study of translation within the SSH can be understood at least in three distinct ways: as a heuristic lens, as a documented practice, and as an internal (trans)disciplinary issue. We conclude that translation within the SSH is better approached as a flexible, unstable and open-ended historical phenomenon, and we advocate for an entangled perspective to historicize it.

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