Revolution in Colonial Translation: From Saint-Domingue to Haiti
Revolution in Colonial Translation: From Saint-Domingue to Haiti
Jeremy Popkin’s essay explores how French political concepts and discourse were appropriated in the Haitian Revolution and what was lost in translation. Its point of departure is the decision in 1793 by two representatives of the French Republic in Saint-Domingue to translate the 1685 Code Noir into Creole. Although this document, which reinforced the institution of slavery, was clearly at odds with the representatives’ revolutionary principles, it did guarantee certain rights and protections for the slaves. Popkin points to the many difficulties of translating ideas such as “liberty,” “rights” and “equality” into a colonial context, in which the slaves had very different political notions and the revolutionaries’ actions often contradicted their ideological principles.
Keywords: French Revolution, Haitian Revolution, Saint-Domingue, Code Noir, slavery, Creole, translation of political discourse
Edinburgh Scholarship Online requires a subscription or purchase to access the full text of books within the service. Public users can however freely search the site and view the abstracts and keywords for each book and chapter.
Please, subscribe or login to access full text content.
If you think you should have access to this title, please contact your librarian.
To troubleshoot, please check our FAQs, and if you can't find the answer there, please contact us.
