Translation and Major Categories in the Study of Religions: The Case of "Religion" and "Spirituality" in West Bengal

Researching Global Religious Landscapes - A Methodology between Universalism and Particularism - Peter Nynäs

Måns Broo [+-]
Åbo Akademi University
Dr. Måns Broo is lecturer in the Study of Religions at Åbo Akademi University, Finland, and an associate research fellow at the Oxford Centre for Hindu Studies. His research interests include historical and contemporary forms of yoga, Gaudiya Vaishnavism and globalised Hinduism. His most recent monograph is a Finnish translation of the Shandilya- and Narada-bhakti-sutra (Gaudeamus 2021).
Marcus Moberg [+-]
Åbo Akademi University
Dr. Marcus Moberg is Professor in the Study of Religions at Åbo Akademi University. His main research interests include the sociology of religion, religion and media, and discourse theory and analysis in the Study of Religion. Moberg acted as Senior Researcher in the Centre of Excellence Young Adults and Religion in a Global Perspective at ÅAU (2014–18). Recent publications include Religion, Discourse, and Society (Routledge 2021) and Digital Media, Young Adults and Religion: An International Perspective (co-edited with Sofia Sjö, Routledge 2020).
Peter Nynäs [+-]
Åbo Akademi University
Dr. Theol. Peter Nynäs is Professor of Study of Religions at Åbo Akademi University (ÅAU), Finland and Dean of the Faculty of Arts, Psychology and Theology. He is Director and PI of the Åbo Akademi University Centre of Excellence in Research Young Adults and Religion in a Global Perspective Project (2015–2019) and earlier the Centre of Excellence in Research Post-secular Culture and a Changing Religious Landscape in Finland Project (2010–2014). Among the books he has edited are On the Outskirts of "the Church”: Diversities, Fluidities, and New Spaces of Religion in Finland (with R. Illman and T. Martikainen, LIT-Verlag, 2015), Religion, Gender, and Sexuality in Everyday Life (with A. Yip, Ashgate, 2012), and The Diversity of Worldviews among Young Adults: Contemporary (Non)Religiosity and Spirituality through the Lens of an International Mixed Method Study (with A. Keysar, J. Kontala, B.-W. Kwaku Golo, M. Lassander, M. Shterin, S. Sjö, and P. Stenner, Springer, 2021).
Mallarika Sarkar Das [+-]
University of Calcutta
Dr Mallarika Sarkar Das is the Assistant Professor and M. Phil Coordinator of the Department of Sociology, University of Calcutta. She served as research assistant for the Åbo Akademi University Centre of Excellence Young Adults and Religion in a Global Perspective Project (2015–2019) in India. Her area of specialization is Social gerontology and her main research interests include Sociology of ageing, Urban Sociology and Social exclusion. Dr Sarkar Developed 36 modules (e-content) on Religion and Healing under UGC-MHRD e-PG Pathshala project entitled “ Comparative Study of Religions” and acted as Co-I in a UGC-UPE Project titled, ‘Situating Look East: the Cultural Politics of Connected History.’
Sohini Ray [+-]
Indian Institute of Management, Joka
Sohini Ray has been a Teaching Associate in Indian Institute of Management, Joka. She has received her Master’s degree and MPhil in Sociology from Jadavpur University and Graduation from St. Xavier's College, Kolkata. She served as research assistant for the Åbo Akademi University Centre of Excellence Young Adults and Religion in a Global Perspective Project (2015–2019) in India.

Description

The translation of research instruments presents a window to the many difficult conceptual problems related to the commensurability or incommensurability. We often face them in cross-cultural studies involving different cultures and languages. In this chapter we examine the process of translating the Faith Q-set (FQS) into Bengali. This case study reflects many of the issues that we came across working with translations of the Faith Q-set from English to eleven different target languages. The impact of linguistic, conceptual and cultural differences become evident in this study, and we question the ideal that one can overcome cross-cultural boundaries and modestly prefer to refer to the quality of a translation process with respect to target groups. Yet, in contrast to the impact of cultural differences and with the support form a translingual practice approach (Liu 1995; Herrmann 2016) we emphasize that comprehensibility and understanding still emerge through different forms of linguistic contact, interaction and interpretation. This happens on a historical and societal level as well as on a micro level within the interviews.

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Citation

Broo, Måns; Moberg, Marcus; Nynäs, Peter; Sarkar Das, Mallarika; Ray, Sohini. Translation and Major Categories in the Study of Religions: The Case of "Religion" and "Spirituality" in West Bengal. Researching Global Religious Landscapes - A Methodology between Universalism and Particularism. Equinox eBooks Publishing, United Kingdom. Feb 2024. ISBN 9781800503915. https://www.equinoxpub.com/home/view-chapter/?id=44295. Date accessed: 09 Jun 2023 doi: 10.1558/equinox.44295. Feb 2024

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