Female voices and feminist translation in German and Austrian literature, 1924-1996

我的研究，一个理论翻译项目，将研究二十世纪的小说写在德国，与女性第一人称叙述者。我将对那些作者声称在为女性的声音和经历创造空间方面遇到困难的作品特别感兴趣。我的原始文本语库将暂时跨越1924-1996年：亚瑟·施尼茨勒的Fräulein Else (1924)， Irmgard Keun的Gilgi（1931）和Das kunstseidene Mädchen (1932)， Marlen Haushofer的Die Wand (1963)；英格博格·巴赫曼的《玛丽娜》（1971）；以及玛琳·斯特鲁维茨的《Verfuhrungen》（1996）。仔细阅读这些文本将使我能够形成一个图像，在这个世纪中创造一个特定的女性声音，并反对不断变化的女权主义语境。我将研究整个作品的语言模式，以及某些叙事技巧或正式实验作为创造女性声音的尝试（或失败）的利用，特别是考虑到作者哀叹语言过于男性化而不允许这样做。我将研究这些文本的现有英文翻译，并牢记三个广泛的问题：英语译者是否准确地抓住了作者试图开辟女性语言利基的企图？男性译者和女性译者是否会使用劫持或前置等女权主义翻译技巧来表达不同的女性声音？英国和德语国家不同的文化历史是否会影响译者对女性声音的理解，从而影响他们的翻译选择？我将展示重新关注女性主义翻译理论的必要性，作为一种独特的理论，它可以解决原作者试图为女性角色配音的问题。女权主义翻译通常被定义为女权主义文本的翻译，尽管它经常与更广泛的术语“性别敏感翻译”互换使用。现有的定义相当模糊，这是女性主义翻译受到忽视的标志；作为一种可信的、全面的翻译方法，它很少受到关注。然而，由于女权主义翻译在魁北克发展得最为迅速，因此很少有针对德英翻译的具体讨论。事实上，最近有一本关于翻译中的女权主义和性别敏感性的综合手册（冯·弗洛托和卡迈勒主编）。（2020）分析了来自20个国家的工作，但忽略了德语国家。在解决我的研究中的这一疏忽时，我将对翻译研究领域做出原创性的贡献；为今后对女性主义翻译的研究奠定基础，并有可能使其成为一门与经常讲授的目的论和对等论相媲美的综合性翻译理论。我的研究是在一个活跃的领域，也就是说，在21世纪对性别语言的意识和语言变化的背景下，以解释性别认同的新表达。这种变化的例子包括：在过去十年中，人们开始使用非标准代词，如ze和zir；以及最近在医疗保健、教育和政治领域高调消除性别语言。仅从2021年开始的例子就包括：分娩慈善机构和NHS信托机构发布指南，使用性别中立的术语，如“喂奶”、“围产期”和“分娩父母”，而不是“母乳喂养”、“产妇”和“母亲”；圣保罗女子学校废除“女校长”的标签；美国众议院在所有众议院文件中取消“母亲”和“女儿”等性别术语，代之以“父母”和“子女”。对女性专有术语的删除，为我对独特女性声音的创造和再创造的研究提供了现代相关性：今天的女性应该如何被讨论、阅读和翻译？

My research, a theoretical translation project, will examine twentieth-century novels written in German, with female first-person narrators. I will be particularly interested in works whose authors claim to have had difficulties in creating space for women's voices and experiences. My corpus of source texts will provisionally span the period 1924-1996: Arthur Schnitzler's Fräulein Else (1924), Irmgard Keun's Gilgi (1931) and Das kunstseidene Mädchen (1932), Marlen Haushofer's Die Wand (1963); Ingeborg Bachmann's Malina (1971); and Marlene Streeruwitz's Verfuhrungen (1996). Close readings of these texts will allow me to form an image of approaches to creating a specifically female voice across the century, and against shifting feminist contexts. I will examine linguistic patterns throughout the works, and the utilisation of certain narrative techniques or formal experimentation as attempts (or failures) to create a female voice, especially in light of the authors' lamentations that language is too male-oriented to allow for this.I will examine existing English translations of these texts, bearing in mind three broad questions: have the authors' attempts to carve out a female linguistic niche been accurately captured by English translators? Do male and female translators render female voices differently, making use of feminist translation techniques such as hijacking or prefacing? Might different cultural histories across the UK and German-speaking countries impact translators' understanding of female voices and, therefore, their translation choices? I will demonstrate the need for a renewed focus on feminist translation theory, as a theory which is uniquely equipped to address the original authors' attempts to voice female characters.Feminist translation is usually defined as the translation of feminist texts, though it is often used interchangeably with the broader term 'gender-sensitive translation'. That the existing definitions are rather unclear is a sign of the neglect that feminist translation has met with; it has received little attention as a credible, comprehensive translation approach. Recent attempts to revise this neglect are commendable however, as feminist translation has developed most rapidly in Quebec, it has seldom been discussed with specific reference to German-English translations. Indeed, a recent, comprehensive handbook of feminism and gender-sensitivity in translation (von Flotow and Kamal eds., 2020) analyses work from 20 countries, yet overlooks German-speaking countries. In addressing this oversight in my research, I will make an original contribution to the field of translation studies; laying a foundation for future research into feminist translation, and possibly for this becoming a comprehensive translation theory comparable to the frequently-taught skopos and equivalence theories.My research is placed in an active field, namely, in the context of twenty-first century awareness of gendered language, and linguistic change to account for new expressions of gender identity. Instances of such change include individuals' adoption of non-standard pronouns such as ze and zir in the last decade; as well as recent high-profile eliminations of gendered language in healthcare, education, and politics. Instances from 2021 alone include childbirth charities and NHS trusts issuing guidance to use gender-neutral terms such as "chestfeeding", "perinatal", and "birthing parent" instead of "breastfeeding", "maternity", and "mother"; St Paul's Girls' School abolishing the label "head girl"; and the United States House of Representatives eliminating gendered terms such as "mother" and "daughter" in favour of "parent" and "child" in all House documents. The elimination of terms specific to women lends modern relevance to my research into the creation and re-creation of uniquely female voices: how should womanhood today be discussed, read, and translated?