Melissa Wallace

The body/text: A discourse of translation and betrayal in L’últim patriarca by Najat El Hachm

Speaking directly from the heart of the permanently displaced collective of Amazigh in Catalonia, Lúltim patriarca is narrated by a Catalan-speaking, assimilated, and educated Muslim woman. Portending a new diasporic literary tradition, this paper will examine how the narrator translates / negotiates meaning as a woman, as an outsider, and as a writer, nourished by both a Berber oral tradition and a Catalan written one. In a variety of ways, sometimes subtle and sometimes shockingly transgressive, the narrator reconfigures the fragmented narratives inscribed on her body and in her intellect, colonizing and claiming the language of her expression. Najat El Hamchi’s unnamed narrator achieves a final penetration (of the body, of discourse, of the patriarchy) that will dramatically disrupt established social and sexual hierarchies.

Keywords: fictionalized practice of translation, rewriting, translation as betrayal

Biography

Melissa Wallace is an Assistant Professor of Translation and Interpreting Studies at the University of Texas at San Antonio where she directs the Graduate Certificate Program in Translation Studies. She received her PhD in Translation and Interpreting Studies from the University of Alicante, Spain, and completed BAs in Spanish and Linguistics at the University of Wisconsin. A certified court interpreter since 2005, Professor Wallace continues to interpret regularly in court and occasionally in healthcare settings. Her research focuses on indicators of aptitude on court interpreter certification exams, interpreter and translator training, and policy innovations as language access activism.