Translation as a Means of Resistance:

The Case Study of Ebrahim Younesi’s Translations Before the Islamic Revolution of Iran

Abstract

Translation is not just a neutral interlingual transfer; it can be a tool for socio-political purposes, including resistance to whatever prevents a society’s salvation. Applying a descriptive-analytical method, this study aimed at investigating how resistance was enacted in an Iranian activist translator’s translations. In other words, it attempted to explain the causation in two literary translations from English into Persian produced by Ebrahim Younesi (1926–2012) before the Islamic Revolution of Iran in 1979. In so doing, an analytical model based on Aristotle’s doctrine of four types of cause, proposed by Pym (2014) for the study of translation causation, was used. A survey of the translator and source text authors’ identities and affiliations (the efficient cause), analysis of the source texts selected to be translated (the material cause), consideration of translation strategies taken and stylistic choices made by translator (the formal cause), and detection of the probable resistance purposes of translation (final cause) provided the data in this research. The findings of this study indicated that by selecting suitable source texts to translate, Younesi has taken the greatest steps to facilitate his resistance. When content and/or messages of the source text seem to serve the translator’s purpose, are similar to the receiving context, and can provoke the target readers’ sympathy and appreciation, some additions, omissions, generalizations, or replacements at textual levels complete the action.