Paper details

Paper authors	Jeremy Allouche
In panel on	Beyond the Local: Cultural translatability in humanitarian interventions
Paper presenter(s) will be presenting	In-Person / Online

Abstract

Conventional approaches to humanitarian interventions, even those focused on local and bottom-up solutions, continue to rely on cultural referents that are rooted in western epistemologies. This constitutes a fundamental limitation in their capacity to understand and support forms of social and political organisation that are relevant to mitigate humanitarian crises. In particular, the language and cultural referents which prevail in humanitarian organisations can prove to be a persistent limitation in the identification of culturally relevant forms of resilience to crises. Such issues can be exacerbated by the typically short timeframe of humanitarian interventions, which curtail the time consuming translation that is necessary to overcome such limitations. They can also be exacerbated in conflict-affected contexts, where the dialogue necessary to establish common understanding can be stifled as a result of social polarization. This paper will explore the question of translation of different forms of knowledge and understanding in the humanitarian context.

Back