Guest lecture by Şebnem Susam-Saraeva in celebration of International Translation Day and the European Day of Languages

The Department of Translation and Interpreting Studies at Boğaziçi University cordially invites you to a lecture by Dr Şebnem Susam-Saraeva (University of Edinburgh) on “Translation Rights of the More-Than-Human: Thoughts on Whale Bioacoustics”, organized in celebration of International Translation Day and the European Day of Languages.

The lecture will be held on 30 September 2025, at 5:00 pm (Istanbul time, GMT+3).

Please join us online via https://bulive.bogazici.edu.tr/b/erd-ams-ro0-ixi

Şebnem Susam-Saraeva graduated from the Department of Translation and Interpreting Studies in Boğaziçi in 1992 and now holds a Personal Chair in Translation Studies at the University of Edinburgh, Scotland, U.K. Her past research included translation of literary theories, retranslations, research methodology in translation studies, internationalisation of the discipline, non-professionals translating/interpreting, translation and gender, translation and popular music, and ethical & representational issues in translation. Her recent work focuses on translation/interpreting in maternal health and on eco-translation, particularly interspecies communication. She is the author of Translation and Popular Music. Transcultural Intimacy in Turkish-Greek Relations (2015) and Theories on the Move. Translation’s Role in the Travels of Literary Theories (2006), and editor of Translation and Music (2008), Non-Professionals Translating and Interpreting. Participatory and Engaged Perspectives (2012, with Luis Pérez-González) and Routledge Handbook of Translation and Health (2021, with Eva Spišiaková). Susam-Saraeva’s literary translations into Turkish include Kazuo Ishiguro’s The Remains of the Day (1993, 24 reprints by 2025). She is also the winner of the PEN Wales Translation Challenge 2017 with her poetry translation from Küçük İskender.

Translation Rights of the More-Than-Human: Thoughts on Whale Bioacoustics

Eco-translation has opened up translation studies to multiple forms of communication that take place in the more-than-human world, challenging the barriers that persist between humanities and life sciences. The lecture will discuss issues of translation, representation and ethics in relation to the communication systems of cetaceans (dolphins, whales and porpoises). It will explore ‘language’, ‘translation’ and ‘(un)translatability’ in the context of whales, then focus on why the colonial and patriarchal-capitalist heritage is relevant to the bioacoustics research carried out on whale vocalisations. It will then turn to the thorny question of ‘who has the right to translate/represent’ whales and to issues of ‘translation rights’ of the more-than-human. The objective is to expand our understanding of what translation entails, while offering some insights from the humanities for research on marine bioacoustics.