Mona Baker

Mona Baker (2009)

Mona Baker , Arabic : منی بیکر, (born September 20, 1953 in Cairo ) is an Egyptian-British professor of translation studies at the University of Manchester , Institute of Science and Technology (UMIST). Her academic interest is particularly in the role of ethics in science and education as well as the application of narrative theory in the field of translation. The Cairo-born scientist works with the languages ​​Arabic and English.

Career

Egyptian-born Mona Baker earned her bachelor's degree in English and Comparative Literature from the American University in Cairo . This was followed by a degree in applied linguistics at the University of Birmingham, which she completed with an MA. She then did her doctorate and habilitation at the University of Manchester Institute of Science and Technology (UMIST), where she still holds a chair today. In 1995, Baker founded the publishing house St. Jerome Publishing and the international specialist journal for translators The Translator .

Memberships and visiting professorships

In 2004, Mona Baker was co-founder and co-vice president of the International Association for Translation and Intercultural Studies (IATIS). Since 2009 she has been an honorary member of the International Association of Professional Translators and Interpreter (IAPTI).

Political commitment

On her homepage, Baker calls for a boycott of Israel. In 2002, the professor signed a petition against Israeli academics and research, then dismissed two Israeli linguists from the editorial team as editor of The Translator . The professor said, “Israel has gone beyond mere war crimes. It's horrible what's going on there. Many of us would like to talk about it as a Holocaust that the world will perceive at some point, much too late, of course, like last time. ”She added,“ I regret that the Israeli state exists ”. She allegedly has nothing against Israelis as such: the two academics should have kept their jobs if they had been prepared to move to Great Britain and break away from their home country. The petition was signed by 700 academics from different countries, including 10 Israelis. This action sparked a heated debate about the extent to which politics and science can be separated.

Response from academics

The discharged Gideon Toury replied, “I am quite content to be an Israeli. In fact, I owe my life to that. The only reason I'm here is because my father and mother - each for themselves - managed to leave Germany in the mid and late 1930s and go to Palestine, as the country was then called. They were the only ones in their families who succeeded. "

His colleague, the dismissed Professor Schlesinger, who worked for Amnesty International in the field of supplying Palestinian cities in the West Bank, said she doubted a boycott of Israeli academics would result in Israeli withdrawal from the West Bank.

Shakespeare expert Professor Stephen Greenblatt from Harvard described Baker's actions as "hideous", "dangerous" and "intellectually and morally bankrupt". He said, "The exclusion of scholars by passport or color, religion or political party affiliation spoils the integrity of intellectual work."

After these events, many academics refused to come to Israel to take part in conferences or research projects, on the one hand for security reasons, on the other hand because such participation could also have been interpreted as a political statement.

Works

• Critical Concepts: Translation Studies . Routledge, London / New York 2009, ISBN 978-0-415-34422-7 .
• Critical Readings in Translation Studies . Routledge, London / New York 2009, ISBN 978-0-415-46955-5 .
• Routledge Encyclopedia of Translation Studies . Routledge, London / New York 2011, ISBN 978-0-415-60984-5 .
• Translation and Conflict: A Narrative Account . Routledge, London / New York 2006, ISBN 0-415-38396-X .
• In Other Words: A Coursebook on Translation . Routledge, London / New York 2010, ISBN 978-0-415-03085-4 .

Web links

• Literature by and about Mona Baker in the WorldCat bibliographic database
• Mona Baker's homepage

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Prabook
2. ↑ Entry in the archive of the International Association of Professional Translators and Interpreters (AIPTI) aipti.org, accessed on September 14, 2013.
3. ↑ Expert profile ( memento of September 21, 2013 in the Internet Archive ) in The Women and Memory Forum whoisshe.wmf.org.eg, accessed on September 14, 2013.
4. ↑ Professor profile on the University of Manchester website manchester.ac.uk, Retrieved September 13, 2013.
5. ^ Prof Mona Baker - Personal details. ( Memento of September 21, 2013 in the Internet Archive ) Professor profile (personal information) on the University of Manchester website, accessed on September 13, 2013.
6. ↑ Founding Members . IATIS. Retrieved September 14, 2013.
7. ↑ homepage Mona Baker monabaker.com, Accessed on September 15, 2013.
8. ↑ Rachel Giora: Milestones in the History of the Israeli BDS Movement. In: The Palestine Portal. January 18, 2010, accessed September 16, 2013.
9. ↑ ^{a b c} Hannes Stein: "Israelis out!" Gloss. In: The world. July 10, 2002, accessed September 16, 2013.
10. ^ ^{A b c} Suzanne Goldenberg, Will Woodward: Israeli boycott divides academics. In: The Guardian. July 8, 2002, accessed September 16, 2013.