I posted a piece on Paper Republic about the need to discuss translation as a way of promoting translation in English-speaking societies:

My view of translation is that it is, and should be conceived as, a broad-based social movement, one related to broad-based social movements for more internationalism and immigrants’ rights in otherwise xenophobic cultures. We translators and our supporters have already gained considerable victories in raising awareness of translation, particularly in book reviews—take a look at this piece praising How Translation Reviews Should Be Done, using as its example a review published in, of all places, the LARB—but we have further to go. Just as Harvey Milk is supposed to have inaugurated the fight for Gay Freedom (later called Gay Pride) by saying, “I am tired of the conspiracy of silence, so I’m going to talk about it. And I want you to talk about it. You must come out,” I believe that we as translators and people who care about translation need to end the conspiracy of silence and talk about translation. Talk about how translation exists in our lives, how it affects us, what it can do, what it cannot do, and overall increase our own and each others’ understanding of translation.

For the full entry, click the image above.