Browsing by Author "Aksoy,N.B."

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Citation - Scopus: 3
Adventures of the Graphic Novel in Turkey
(Brill, 2019) Aksoy,N.B.; English Translation and Interpretation
This chapter describes how the graphic novel was initially translated, adapted, and appropriated in the Turkish cultural and literary polysystem from the West in the early years of the Turkish Republic (1923). The transfer enabled the graphic novel to be used as popular genre to contribute to the construction of a national identity of Turkishness through icons and heroes of Turkish history going back to Central Asia before moving to Asia Minor (Anatolia). Hence, the evolution of the graphic novel in Turkey goes parallel with the growth of popular culture under the influence of state-led westernisation efforts in the Turkish society. The initiatives towards creating a modern, west-oriented society necessitated the dissemination of culture among layers of society which was producing its dynamics to absorb these efforts within the frame of economic and social developments on a global scale. Steps towards creating a modern Turkish literature and to enrich culture and strengthen a national identity fit in with the adoption of the graphic novel genre in the early years. The translations enabled Turkish artists to develop their own examples in the genre to produce an awareness of national identity and links with history in a creative and easily comprehensible way. The graphic novel as an accessible form of production became a part of the developing cultural polysystem. According to Tynjanov, literature of a nation or culture contains a multi-layered structure of elements which relate to and interact with each other.1 The evolution of the graphic novel in the Turkish polysystem comprised several layers of texts, i.e. visual texts, and verbal texts. It does not hold such a significant role now in the cultural polysystem but has become an influential genre in creating global fantastic icons, norms and images. © Inter-Disciplinary Press 2016. All rights reserved.
Citation - Scopus: 1
Assessing the Role of Style in Literary Translation
(Ovidius University, 2017) Aksoy,N.B.; English Translation and Interpretation
Literary translation and its characteristics have been a point of attraction in literary and academic circles for so many years. It has been generally accepted that since style is the most distinguishing element of a literary text, its recreation in translation is of utmost importance. Hence, in order to understand the hows and whys of literary translation, a sound and definite description of what a literary text is, is needed as a first step. A source text of literature does not have the same qualities as those of its translated version since the translation carries in itself the shadows of both the source and the target linguistic and literary elements. In order to overcome the challenges of literary translation then, it is a prerequisite for the translator to be a very good reader of literature in order to fully grasp all the literary, stylistic and cultural qualities of the source text, with all its intended meanings and effects. © 2017 Ovidius University. All rights reserved.
Exile as a Spatial Metaphor in the Postcolonial Short Story
(Ovidius University, 2019) Aksoy,N.B.; English Translation and Interpretation
The aim of this paper is to examine how the theme of exile embedded in spatial metaphors is taken up in the postcolonial short story. I will begin by contextualizing the postcolonial short story, its characteristic features and major themes. My argument will focus on in what way and why the theme of exile is an important issue in postcolonial literature and on the manifestations of the exile theme as a metaphor of space in the short story genre. The role of space will also be discussed within this context since it is firmly bound to the idea of postcolonialism in its literary, psychological and sociological sense. My argument will be illustrated through stories by representative postcolonial writers whose works display a distinctly “post-colonial” concern with the theme of exile. © 2019 Ovidius University. All rights reserved.
Gendered Space in Alexander Mccall Smith’s the No. 1 Ladies’ Detective Agency
(Ovidius University, 2021) Aksoy,N.B.; English Translation and Interpretation
Classic detective fiction provides an ideal space where issues of gender identities can be investigated along with the changing modes of crime fiction. Previously, in detective or crime fiction, women were displayed as victims or villains attached with social and cultural stereotypes. However, beginning in the 80s and 90s female characters started to be represented as detectives and investigators, which allowed space to the renegotiating of women’s place in social and gender norms. Against this background, Alexander McCall Smith comes to the fore as a unique author who has managed to create the Mma Ramontswe character, owner of Ladies’ No. 1 Detective Agency in an African setting, mainly Botswana, the country where he lived as a child and as a youth. Mma Ramotswe is an unconventional detective conducting her amateur profession in a space predominantly inhabited by herself and a fellow assistant lady detective. The novels evolving around No. 1 Ladies’ Detective Agency in serial form develop in two tracks. Firstly, the office of the agency is essentially a space for lady detectives which provides a metaphorical opportunity to explore gender roles in the less known country of Botswana, a former British colony, within the frame of postcolonial issues that are dealt with extreme subtlety by the author. Secondly, the outer space, which is Africa, where the stories occur is a geographical space recreated by a Scottish, white, medical law professor who never refrains from displaying his partiality towards Africa. Hence, the outer space becomes subject to a representation by the interpretation of a male author belonging to the colonial culture. Consequently, my presentation will focus on the discussion of metaphorical representation of gendered space in the detective fiction of Alexander McCall Smith and the social, cultural and postcolonial aspects of the representation of Africa being the outer space of these novels. © 2021 Ovidius University. All rights reserved.
Representations of Africa in Ben Okri's and Alexander Mccall Smith's Works
(Ovidius University, 2023) Aksoy,N.B.; English Translation and Interpretation
This presentation explores the representation of Africa in different novels by two different writers. The novels belong to late 20th and early 21st-century British fiction set in Africa. The two writers have different backgrounds in many ways except for their engagement, love and complicated relationship with the African continent. I argue that the representation by these writers reveals the meaning and significance of Africa in a postcolonial context as a space of nostalgia, loss, and eventually, hope in contemporary British fiction. © 2023 Ovidius University. All rights reserved.
SPACES AND PLACES OF MODERNITY AND THE MODERN ARTIST IN OĞUZ ATAY’S “RAILROAD STORYTELLERS - A DREAM”
(Konstantin Preslavsky University of Shumen, 2024) Aksoy,N.B.; English Translation and Interpretation
This paper examines Atay’s “Railroad Storytellers - A Dream” in terms of Atay’s modernist experimentation in his depiction of space and spatiality, emphasising his contribution to Turkish literature as a pioneer modernist author. Oğuz Atay’s distinctive and innovative style, which forms his affinities with the early Western modernists such as James Joyce and Virginia Woolf, establishes his significant place as a pioneer modernist author in Turkish literature in the 1970s. The concept of ‘house/ home’ by Gaston Bachelard in The Poetics of Space (1957, 2014) is instrumental for me as it pertains to the predicament of three storytellers as artists in the nameless and remote railroad station. The narrator of the story and his fellow storytellers gradually sink into disconnection, confusion, misery and poverty in an environment that represents the cold and unwelcoming face of technological modernisation symbolised by the space of the train station. The narrator’s quest for finding a ‘home’ to connect him to his readers and where he could exist as an artist comes to life in his attempt to write a letter to his readers, telling them he is still ‘here’ and asking them where they are. No matter how blighted that effort is since the narrator has no address to send the letters to, the endings for Atay’s story imply a need for connection with his readers expressed in the impossible meeting of the ‘here’ with the ‘where’ in spite or because of the estrangement and alienation of the artist/author in the modern world. Hence, the possibility of space as a ‘home’ for the author/narrator dwindles in the not forthcoming answer to the letter that will never reach its destination. Copyright © 2024 N. Berrin Aksoy.
Technology-Based Innovations in the Teaching of Translation: an Insight Into Whys and Hows
(Ovidius University, 2019) Aksoy,N.B.; English Translation and Interpretation
Technological developments in all the activities of social, economic and communicative areas of modern life brought forth a higher demand in translation services, which in turn, necessitates a review of translation teaching at the university level. Traditional teaching methods which heavily rely on teacher-oriented approaches where students are passive learners who focus on the study of linguistic exercises and manual translation tasks by themselves, are no longer sufficient to produce graduates who can compete in the booming computerised worklife in the translation profession. Hence, the integration of Machine Translation (MT) and Computer-Assisted Tools (CAT) becomes a priority in the translation teaching curriculum in order to enable students to deal with the challenging market conditions upon graduation. Students who have experience in the use of computer technologies by means of getting acquainted with them during their education will develop the necessary skills to produce terminologically-consistent, time-efficient and correct translations as required by translation companies and working environment. Also, with the help of use of computer technologies in their teamwork and project-based practices during their education and in their internship, students will develop interpersonal skills and network for better replacements upon graduation. © 2019 Ovidius University. All rights reserved.