Yale-NUS faculty conduct research in non-native languages

Faculty research at Yale-NUS is an integral part of the College’s vision of aiming for excellence in the creation and transmission of knowledge. This is very much evident in Professor of Humanities (Chinese Studies and History) Scott Cook’s and Associate Professor of Humanities (Literature) Steven Green’s research projects, which are not only illuminating, but also require them to be well-versed in Chinese and Latin, respectively.

Professor of Humanities (Chinese Studies and History) Scott Cook’s book, A Study of Recorded Conversations of Confucius Texts among the Shanghai Museum Manuscripts（上博竹書孔子語錄文獻研究）was published in 2021. Image provided by Prof Cook.

In his recently published book, A Study of Recorded Conversations of Confucius Texts among the Shanghai Museum Manuscripts（上博竹書孔子語錄文獻研究）, Prof Cook provides a comprehensive reconstruction and analysis of all the Confucius dialogue texts that appear among the Shanghai Museum manuscripts. Apart from being a significant contribution to the field of early Chinese manuscript research, this book contains newly reconstructed transcriptions and presents intellectual-historical analysis that will be of relevance to those with a broad interest in the early history of Confucian thought.  In a similar vein, Assoc Prof Green’s forthcoming monograph for Oxford University Press offers a translation and rigorous analysis of the Ilias Latina, a shortened Latin version of Homer’s poem.

Associate Professor of Humanities (Literature) Steven Green recently contributed an article on the Ilias Latina to an edited volume. Image provided by Assoc Prof Green.

Both Prof Cook and Assoc Prof Green share what it means to put their linguistic abilities to the test and work with texts in another language.

What was the genesis of your respective research projects?

Prof Cook: I have been working with excavated philosophical manuscripts from pre-imperial China for over two decades. The first phase of this research culminated with the publication of my study and complete translation of the Guodian bamboo manuscripts (郭店楚簡)in 2012. My work on the Confucian texts among the Shanghai Museum manuscripts was a natural outgrowth of this research.

This book grew out of a series of papers I wrote, mostly for conferences in mainland China and Taiwan, from 2014 to 2020.

Assoc Prof Green: The Ilias Latina is a hexameter poem written by an anonymous poet at some point during the age of Roman emperor Nero. It should be regarded not as a literal ‘translation’ of Homer’s Iliad, but as a ‘version’ with its own Roman literary and cultural agenda.

My monograph – which contains Latin text, English translation, and commentary – will be the most substantial Anglophone publication on the poem to date. It contains full text and English translation of the poem along with a line-by-line commentary. My previous work on the poem took the form of smaller pieces on specific thematic aspects.

How do you ascertain a text’s nuance and meaning when translating?

Prof Cook: I believe that it is more of an art than a science; a multi-faceted hermeneutical process that is especially complicated when it comes to excavated manuscripts. Interpreting them involves simultaneous acts of character decipherment, reading those characters into particular words, and figuring out the order of bamboo strips as the tying strings are often disintegrated.

Putting all of that into a coherent and probable interpretation of any given line within its reconstructed context requires both an acquired ‘native sense’ of classical Chinese constructions and an assiduous check of possible parallels among early Chinese texts from the received canon. It is an extremely complex puzzle, but there are many Chinese scholars working on these manuscripts, and we all learn from each other’s proposals about how any particular character or line might most probably have been intended.

For this book, which is a combination of reconstruction, transcription, interpretation, and contextualisation, I often paraphrase and elaborate upon the gist of the text instead of translating my transcriptions directly into modern Chinese. Any transcription of an early Chinese bamboo manuscript text is itself already an act of interpretation: it involves both a rendering of the archaic graphs into pseudo-modern equivalent characters and a reading of those graphs as particular words in the manner that they would be represented in modern script.

Assoc Prof Green: I always translate for myself first. This is often aided by the relevant dictionaries. I then look at any associated commentaries and previous translations to ascertain if there is anything additional to be learnt from them.

Robust translation requires an understanding of both cultures in order to do it justice, and there are always choices to be made. For example, jokes vary from one culture to another. When translating from Latin into English, a decision needs to be made on whether to translate the exact words or try to recreate the comparable joke in a new language.

Are there any misconceptions about working with another language for academic research, be it Chinese or Latin?

Prof Cook: Not a misconception per se, but I would say that there is a general bias against publishing in foreign languages throughout academia, which is a bit too Anglo-centric for its own good. Publishing half my work in Chinese has not hurt my own career as I have been fortunate enough to work at colleges that recognise the value of linguistic diversity, but the bias in question has certainly affected others.

Assoc Prof Green: I think the main misconception is that ancient world research is only about discovering tangibly new material. For linguistic classical scholarship, it is more often about shedding new light on existing texts or bringing familiar texts into conversation with less familiar texts, ideas, or newer methodologies.

Do you have any advice about pursuing research that requires translation?

Prof Cook: You need to have patience, perseverance, and a love for the language to get you to the point where you have developed the level of facility to understand the texts in all their depth and nuance.

Assoc Prof Green: The two most important things: persevere with formal language learning to an advanced level, and then continue reading widely in the new language.