Globalización, cultura del Otro y traducción

In its early stages, the globalization process relied on economic criteria so as to guarantee the flux of manufactured goods from North to South, and of energetic resources and raw materials from South to North. From economic and financial transnationalism, globalization moves on towards the universalization of value systems. However, the latter process has been challenged relatively suceessfully by anti-globalization movements, migratory fluxes of workers from South to North, and identity conservadurism at the ethnic and cultural levels. Thus, transnational economic fluidity has not an equivalent in the exchange of cultural values, reflecting the state of crisis that affects the recognition of the Other and the elements configuring the systems of representation. In this context, translation would be understood as direct style, while representation (giving voice to the Other) would constitute indirect style. From such premises, this article explores the place of translation in relation to actual and objective knowledge of the Other, as well as to its representation as mediatised and selective knowledge.