Writings on Translation

Forthcoming in July 2025

An exploration of the philosophical dimensions of translation, reframing Arabic and European cultural histories to celebrate translation as a practice that preserves and proliferates cultural differences.

Abdessalam Benabdelali is a revered Moroccan philosopher and translator whose work maps an invaluable history of the status of translation in contemporary Arabic thought and language. This volume, bringing together essays from two linked Arabic works by Benabdelali—On Translation (2006) and Hosting the Stranger (2014), represents one of the first extended philosophical explorations of translation by a contemporary Arab philosopher. These works reframe Arabic and European cultural histories around translation in order to counter hegemonic discourses and celebrate translation as a form of philosophical thought and practice, one that both preserves and proliferates difference. Whether discussing eighteenth-century European perceptions of Arabic culture, classical Arabic literature and its express intent to resist all translation, or contemporary Arabic authors who write in anticipation of translation, Writings on Translation nimbly outlines the key philosophical questions at stake in translation. It concludes with an impassioned argument for translations that ‘host the stranger’ and allow texts to ‘lift off and migrate’.