Translation, Script and Orality: Becoming a Language of State traces debates around transcription/translation in Konkani that eventually contoured the development of the language towards nationalist or state-seeking forms. Though the book is structured around contemporary linguistic states such as Goa, Pinto argues for a focus on aspects of language that deviate from the nationalist literary norm. The present volume is structured as a long essay, interspersed with excerpts from the introductions and prefaces to transcribed/translated texts. The historically significant extracts demonstrate the shifts in perspectives with regard to transcription and translation, and reveal how what was once termed a dialect, acquired the symbolic attributes of cultural dominance necessitated by nationalist discourse.
Rochelle Pinto is an independent researcher. She has held research fellowships at the L’Institut d’Etudes Avancées, Nantes (2019–20), the Nehru Memorial Museum and Library, New Delhi (2015–2017), and the Centre for the Study of Developing Societies, Delhi (2014–2015). She taught at Delhi University, FLAME, Pune and at Centre for the Study of Culture and Society, Bengaluru, where she co-directed a two-year project, ‘Archive and Access’, funded by the Sir Dorabji Tata Trust, Bombay (2009–2011). Her first book, Between Empires – Print and Politics in Goa (2007) was awarded the Hira Lal Gupta Research award (2009). Her other publications include, ‘The Foral in the history of the comunidades of Goa’ in Journal of World History (June 2018), ‘Govinda Samanta, or eluding ethnography in the colonial novel’, in Novel Formations (2019), and ‘Settling the land – the village and the threat of capital in the novel in Goa’ in Commodities and Affect (2017). She co-authored ‘Archives and the State’, an ethnographic account of the state of archives as an online publication for the Centre for Internet and Society, Bengaluru.
Preface
Introduction
PART ONE
I. Transliteration as Translation: The Ramayana and the Mahabharata as Sixteenth-century Texts
II. Script as an Indice of Political Distinction
III. Other Ramayanas and Mahabharatas
Inauguration Speech by Dr. Suniti Kumar Chatterji, All-India Konkani Sahitya Parishad Tenth Session, 1974
???. ????. ????, ‘????????? ?? ??? ?????’, ‘???? ?? ??? ????????????? ?????-??????? ?? ??’, ?????? ??, ‘?????????’, Shantaram Varde Valaulikar ed., Samagra Shenoi Goembab, Khand iv, Shri Bhogvontalem Git, 2003
Extracts from the sixteenth century Konkani Mahabharata as dictated to Portuguese transcribers
Rocky V. Miranda, ed., The Old Konkani Bharata, 2011
PART TWO
IV. The Doutrina and the Quest for a True Language
Archbishop D. Matheus de Oliveira Xavier ‘Introduction’, Catecismo da Doutrina Christã em Concanim, 1915
V. Two Systems of Transliteration
J. Gerson da Cunha, The Kon . kan. î Language and Literature, 1881
Sebastião Rodolfo Dalgado, Introducção’, Diccionario ‘Kom.kan. î-Portuguez, 1893
Mariano Saldanha, Doutrina Cristã em Língua Concani, 1945
VI. Popular Literature, Dictionaries, and Histories
Kashinath Shridhar Naik, ‘????? ????????’, V. Varde Valaulikar, ‘???????? ????? ’, 2003
VII. The Test of Konkani in Newsprint
Articles from newspapers between 1951 and 1961 180
PART THREE
A Brief History of Translations into Konkani in the Kannada Script
Manohar Rai Sardessai, A History of Konkani Literature, from 1500 to 1992, 2000
Rev. Sylvester F. Menezes, ‘Introduction’ to The Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ: According to St. Mathew, 1944
Basti Vaman Shenoi, ‘??????????? ?????’, and Khadap, ‘??? ???? ?????? ? ??????? ??’, V. J. P. Saldanha, ????? ?????, 2013
William R. da Silva, ‘Introduction’, Yashwant Chittal, Khel ani her Katha, 1986
William R. da Silva, ‘Foreword’, Na. D’Souza, Mog mat pavana (ani her katha), 1987
Francis D’Cunha, PÉÆAQÚAvï CuÁÌgï ¸Á»vï, Mangalore, 2004
PART FOUR
Selected Essays on the Cultural Politics of Transcription/Translation
Section I: S. M. Borges, ‘??????? ????????? ??????????? ??????? ??????? ??????’, in Suresh G. Amonkar, ed. Goenchem Saunsasarikikaran, 2017
Excerpts from Narayan B. Desai, ‘Politics of script: The Case Of Konkani (1961–1992)’, 2002, Goa University
Excerpts from Jason Keith Fernandes, ‘Citizenship Experiences of the Goan Catholics’ 2013, Instituto Universitário de Lisboa
Victor Ferrao, Translation between the Self and its Colonial Other
Dale Luis Menezes, Between Language and Scripts: The Controversies of Konkani revisited
Section II: Teotónio de Souza, ‘Confessionários or Manuals of Confession – missionary tools and their colonial uses: The case study of Goa’, Sod, 2005
Vidya Pai, ‘Translation of Culture’
William Madtha, ‘Bhashanthar: Bhashevyjnanik Siddhanth’, Amar Konkani, 2005
Melvyn Rodrigues, ‘Eka Orthache pattik poddun’, Naman Ballok Jezu, 2014
S. M. Borges, ‘??????????????? ?????????? ?????? ?????? ???????’, in Suresh G. Amonkar, ed. Goenchem Saunsasarikikaran, 2017
Pratap Naik S.J., ‘Bhashantharachim Thathvam ani Kala’ (Principles of translation and art), Amar Konkani, 2007
Conclusion
Acknowledgements
Index
