The Satanic Verses is the best example of how culture has been translated to create as big a controversy as THE RUSHDIE AFFAIR. Understanding the text with the discourse of religion was easier since the dream sequences of Gibreel (the protagonist) is filled with allegories on islam and its history. Through this project we tried to understand how SALMAN RUSHDIE translated actual facts; took influences and inspiration from the questioned past of islam; and had the courage to doubt his own faith and islam’s authenticity. Before deciding on our source text, we analysed and compared the various concepts to work on. Hence we chose the discourse of religion out of other discourses like politics, gender, resistance, violence etc., as it was the most evidently found discourses in the indian context. Moreover the translation form that we opted for was cultural translation out of other forms like transcreation, communicative, literal, etc., since the role and implication of culture in translation studies plays a pivotal role in the indian context. After deciding on the above two concepts we searched for an example (a case) which could be a movie, novel, article etc., that displayed significant characteristics of the applications of above two concepts. After researching on a number of examples we decided to stick to The Satanic Verses as it served the best example to explain cultural translation with religion as a discourse. DISCOURSE: Any pan human idea which decides your socio-cultural attitudes or implications or aspects. DISCOURSE AS RELIGION: Religion is a discourse because while living in a society, following a specific culture; a person starts accepting some stereotypes related to religion. Person to person the perception may vary. However, religious discourse is unavoidable. It seems to affect our views on all things. An individual does give it a thought irrespective to what extent he/she might be rational or practical or modern.Religious discourse includes not only statements of personal experiences, but also ethical admonitions, creeds, moral codes, ritual procedures, myths, parables, and so on. Religious discourse extends over an almost indefinite range. It appears to arise out of collective experiences of particular peoples and, does not so much determine what we think, feel, and do as to describe what is thinkable, feel able, and doable. Discourse establishes social stereotypes CONCLUSION Clearly, what has most offended Muslims in Rushdie's novel is his use of indecent language in association with sacred characters in Islam, through sequences involving dream, fantasy or madness. In several passages the sacred is even discussed through everyday language of the streets. Rushdie's book has a place in the history of thought, because he has dared to challenge and explore the supremacy of faith in the minds of millions.

1. THE SATANIC
VERSES
RELIGION AS DISCOURSE AND
CULTURAL TRANSLATION

2. MADE BY-
SHREYA SOOD 13280
SHRISHMA KUDADAH 13281
SIMRAN SONI 13292
SUGANDHA PRIYA 13297
VANDITA NIM 13311
25TH MARCH 2014

3. RELIGION AS DISCOURSE
 Religion is a discourse because while living in a society, following a
specific culture; a person starts accepting some stereotypes related to
religion.
 Discourse is unavoidable.
 Religious discourse extends over an almost indefinite range.

4. FEW STEREOTYPES:
 CLOTHING
 ORNAMENTS & ARTICLES
 SIGNS & SYMBOLS
 DIFFERENT NAMES IN
DIFFERENT RELIGIONS
 RELATION TO TERRORISM

5. CULTURAL TRANSLATION
 Culture :total approach to life of particular groups of people and their ways of
behaviour
 Practice of translation involves cultural differences
 To initiate the target-language reader into the sensibilities of the source
language culture
 Withdraws the separation between the source and the target language

6. PROBLEMS DURING
CULTURAL TRANSLATION
complex task
some societies and cultures are dominant compared to
others
words and phrases grounded in one culture-
impossible to translate in terms of another

7. EXAMPLES
 use plurals to address elders to show their respect
 Indians live with extended families- concept alien in western countries
 different words for each relation
 unaware of family values
 Beliefs and feelings change from culture to culture
 Dress codes or ornaments and their symbols

8. better understanding of language and
culture
translators help enlarge the vocabulary
of the target language-coin new
expressions

10. CHAPTERS
1. Angel Gibreel
2. Mahound
3. Ellowen Deeowen
4. Ayesha
5. A city visible but
unseen
6. Return to Jahilia
7. The angel Azraeel
8. The parting of the
Arabian Sea
9. A wonderful lamp

14. GIBREEL
FARISHTA

15. SALADIN
CHAMCHA

24. INTRODUCTION
 Rushdie believes culture belongs to everyone & one can interpret in
his/her own way.
 The „Satanic Verses‟ can be understood as revisionist interpretation of
Islamic history.
 It shows dominant discourses as nationalism, religious essentialism,
etc.

25. TITLE OF THE
NOVEL
REACTIONS ACROSS THE WORLD RUSHDIE’S CLAIM
THE SATANIC
VERSES
• “The Satanic Qur’an” for the
impossibility of finding equal terms
(equivalence) in several Asiatic
languages, is very often misread,
through the aggrandizement of the
mass media, as a sacrilegious insult by
many pious Muslims who have no
idea about the content of the book.
• The offence lies in the implications
resulting from translating it into the
Arabic – Al-Ayat ash-Shaytaniya, the
Persian – Ayat-e Shetani, and the
Turkish – Seytan Aytleri, which would
lead to a broad retranslation as The
Satanic Qur’an.
Although Rushdie claims that
“the phrase comes from al-
Tabari, one of the canonical
Islamic sources” (The
Observer, January 22, 1989).

26. MUHAMMAD
 The Arab prophet who, according to Islam, was the last messenger of
Allah.
 The ‘Quran’ is believed by Muslims to have been revealed to
Muhammad from God.
 Muhammad established in the light of Quran the religious, social &
political tenets.
 Greatest of all prophets.
 For conservative Muslim, Islam is way more than just a religion.

27. ‘MAHOUND’ IN SATANIC
VERSES
 Name used by Christian writers in past to vilify
Muhammad
 Word means ‘devil’ or ‘false Prophet’
 Use of this character, very painful for Muslims
 Two sides: Angelic & Demonic

28. SUBMISSION INSTEAD OF
ISLAM
Against the fatal certitudes of orthodox Islam, the theme
of doubt, and loss of faith, is one of the most persistent in
Rushdie's book.
This was sufficient to bring the charge of apostasy, and
the penalty of death, upon him, particularly from Iran.
('The name of the new religion is Submission', p.125).

29. Islam is a religious tradition which in many
influential quarters is self-consciously seeking to purify itself from modernizing, liberal tendencies
Islam is a religious tradition which in many
influential quarters is self-consciously seeking to purify itself from modernizing, liberal tendencies
Islam is a religious tradition which in many
influential quarters is self-consciously seeking to purify itself from modernizing, liberal tendencies
Islam is a religious tradition which in many
influential quarters is self-consciously seeking to purify itself from modernizing, liberal tendencies
Islam is a religious tradition which in many
influential quarters is self-consciously seeking to purify itself from modernizing, liberal tendencies
Islam is a religious tradition which in many
influential quarters is self-consciously seeking to purify itself from modernizing, liberal tendencies
Islam is a religious tradition which in many
influential quarters is self-consciously seeking to purify itself from modernizing, liberal tendencies
Islam is a religious tradition which in many
influential quarters is self-consciously seeking to purify itself from modernizing, liberal tendencies

30. HIJAB
ACTUAL SATANIC VERSES
• veil covers head and chest
• females beyond the age of puberty
• in presence of adult males
•METAPHYSICAL DIMESION:
"the veil which separates man or the
world from God"
•use of the name 'The Curtain' for
the Jahilia brothel
•alludes to Muhammad’s divinely
inspired decree

31. “W H O R E S A N D W R I T E R S , M A H O U N D - W E A R E
T H E P E O P L E YO U C A N ‟ T F O RG I V E . ”
S A I D B Y B A A L , PA G E 4 0 , T H E S A TA N I C V E R S E S
 insight into the Jahilia plotline and
theocracies more generally
 treat women and dissident writers
especially harshly
 refers to Mahound‟s biggest flaw –
his pride
 whores hurt Mahound‟s pride by
adopting the personalities of
Mahound‟s wives
 reveals Mahound‟s narcissism

32. AYESHAThe bloody and unsuccessful military campaign
conducted after Muhammad’s death by his favourite wife,
Ayesha, against the fourth Khalifa, the prophet’s son- in-
law, Ali, is a historical reference often cited by
fundamentalists (both Sunni and Shi’ite) as proof that
women should not enter public life (Aravamudan 13).

33. The story of Ayesha makes free
use of a widely reported episode
that happened in Karachi in 1983
when Naseem Fatima led thirty
eight Shi‟a followers into the sea
which they expected to part for
them.

34. RUSHDIE‟S TRANSLATION
He takes from Islamic history Ayesha, the name of the Prophet‟s
favourite wife, and uses the same name for the most popular of
the prostitutes in the Jahilia brothel, for the Muslim visionary
who led her fellow villagers to drown in the sea, and for one of
the girl prostitutes in London. Sacred and profane versions of
womanhood become fused and indistinguishable by this
linguistic sleight of hand.
He has shown the bloody image of Prophet‟s favourite wife.

35. CRITICISM OF ISLAM
BY THE INTRODUCTION OF SALMAN
Mahound failed to detect the Persian scribe
Salman‟s deliberate alteration of God‟s
verses .
Salman the Persian, an immigrant convert
to Islam and the scribe of the dream
prophet Mahound

36.  Salman shares a first name with Rushdie; in addition, his Persian
ethnicity makes him an outsider among the followers of Submission.
 Salman‟s position as a scribe, and his invention of the spike pit (in
the novel) show that he is more intellectually inclined than his peers,
and that he has a creative personality – both qualities that Rushdie
might well identify with.
 Salman, when he starts deliberately mis-transcribing Mahound‟s
dictation, discovers that his “poor words could not be distinguished
from the Revelation by God‟s own Messenger” (367).

37. Salman also refers to “one of Muhammad‟s closest companions
a major figure in Islamic history, Salman al-Farsi
(„Salman the Persian‟)”
“some fringe Islamic sects hold that he was actually the angel
Gabriel in disguise”

38. J OEL KUORTTI OFFER S A NOTHER
A NNOTA TION OF THE HISTOR ICA L FA CT
W HICH RUSHDIE‟S FICTIONA L EPISODE IS
BA SED UPON:
 A similar tradition is recorded, where the Muhammad
employed ‘Abd-Allah Ibn Abi Sarh as his scribe
 But the latter began to make changes in the recitation and
finally lost his faith as these verses were accepted by
Muhammad
 Later ‘Abd-Allah was sentenced to death and pardoned in
the same way as Salman Farsi

39. CONCLUSION
 use of indecent language with sacred characters in Islam
 the sacred is discussed through everyday language of the streets
 dared to challenge the supremacy of faith in the minds of millions
 more universal statement: the way power corrupts ideals, because every
person has both angelic and satanic potential.
 conflict between fact and fantasy, truth and falsehood

40. THANK YOU