<abstract xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"><p>Language use is the consequence of certain dynamics in people’s lives. It is obvious that translation implies, even etymologically, movement, mobility, exchange. These phenomena are more topical than ever nowadays, in the age of globalization. In the present essay, I analyze the translation of identities in the work of Oksana Marafioti, a contemporary writer of Roma origins who emigrated from the Soviet Union to the United States of America. Her memoir <italic>American Gypsy</italic> is an effort to trans-late towards a multiple, volatile, fluid identity where the languages spoken by Marafioti lead to belongings and rejections. The author records, in exquisite wording, the painful process of translating from a culture to another culture, from a language to another language.</p></abstract>

Language use is the consequence of certain dynamics in people’s lives. It is obvious that translation implies, even etymologically, movement, mobility, exchange. These phenomena are more topical than ever nowadays, in the age of globalization. In the present essay, I analyze the translation of identities in the work of Oksana Marafioti, a contemporary writer of Roma origins who emigrated from the Soviet Union to the United States of America. Her memoir American Gypsy is an effort to trans-late towards a multiple, volatile, fluid identity where the languages spoken by Marafioti lead to belongings and rejections. The author records, in exquisite wording, the painful process of translating from a culture to another culture, from a language to another language.

Oksana Marafioti: Translating Identities

American, British and Canadian Studies

This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 3.0 License.

{"article-title":"Oksana Marafioti: Translating Identities"}

Language use is the consequence of certain dynamics in people’s lives. It is obvious that translation implies, even etymologically, movement, mobility,...

Oksana Marafioti: Translating Identities

Published Online: Jun 22, 2019

Page range: 63 - 82

DOI: https://doi.org/10.2478/abcsj-2019-0006

Keywords
translation, identity, culture, language, Soviet Union, the United States, Roma, Gypsy

© 2019 ABC Studies, Journal of the Academic Anglophone Society of Romania, published by Sciendo

This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 3.0 License.

Oksana Marafioti: Translating Identities

Published Online: Jun 22, 2019

Page range: 63 - 82

DOI: https://doi.org/10.2478/abcsj-2019-0006

Keywordstranslation, identity, culture, language, Soviet Union, the United States, Roma, Gypsy

© 2019 ABC Studies, Journal of the Academic Anglophone Society of Romania, published by Sciendo

This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 3.0 License.

Keywords
translation, identity, culture, language, Soviet Union, the United States, Roma, Gypsy