Translating Past to Present

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Translating Past to Present is written by Andrew Offenburger and published by U of Nebraska Press. It's available with International Standard Book Number or ISBN identification 149624401X (ISBN 10) and 9781496244017 (ISBN 13).

The act of interpretation has been central to Western American history. At every historical juncture, interpreters were active and present—conveying meaning between people speaking mutually unintelligible languages, bartering for goods and power along borders, and translating intentions from gestures, acts, and words. While research on interpreters within zones of cultural exchange has grown among scholars of early modern Europe and Asia, the historiography of interpreters of the American West remains deficient. Translating Past to Present offers a new perspective on the historical significance of interpretation and translation. This collection explores how the current sparse historiography relates to a lack of transparency about interpretive acts, both in historical and contemporary practices, and calls attention to the subjectivity of interpretive acts and historians’ role in shaping how historical messages are represented. By summoning interpreters from the margins of history, Translating Past to Present spans broad geographies and chronologies to provide a long-overdue examination of the practices of interpretation in the American West.