The dark side: an introduction

In the introduction to The Dark Side of Translation, volume editor Federico Italiano explores semantically and theoretically-all while offering a comprehensive survey of the state of research-two paradigms of 'darkness' on which the concept of the edited collection is based, and through which the dark side of translation can be understood and investigated. Whereas the first paradigm defines the dark side of translation in the frame of a post-colonial, power-knowledge argument (the 'Star Wars paradigm'), the second identifies darkness as obscurity and repression, as something that enshrouds and covers, preventing us consciously or unconsciously from seeing (the 'Pink Floyd paradigm'). In the last part of the introduction, Italiano introduces the four sections of the book: (post-)colonial translations and hegemonic practices; the Holocaust and the translator's ambiguity; the translation of climate change discourses and the ecology of knowledge; and translation as zombification-providing a detailed description of each chapter.