Europe: The World of Yesterday?

Stefan Zweig Centre Salzburg
5/6 November 2011

“I have nothing more of my past with me than what I have retained in my mind.” This is how Stefan Zweig described the situation in Brazilian exile in the early 1940s, in which he wrote down his memories of a lost Europe. The Europe remembered by Zweig as “the world of yesterday” is – in a different form – long since resurrected. Yet its languages seem to be failing again, where people are involved, who often have little of their past with them and whose present is marked by all kinds of uncertainties, whether on the way or already in the midst of Europe: people in exile, refugees, migrants, as Zweig was. Perhaps the languages of Europe therefore need a translation that is something other than a translation into themselves (and one another), specifically an opening into the languages of exile and migration, into the languages of the world. If they refuse this – who knows whether Europe will not, for this very reason, prove once again to be the world of yesterday?

Participants: Ibrahim Cindark, Mascha Dabić, Waltraud Kolb, Peter Waterhouse, Rubia Salgado, Gabriele Slezak.

Following a workshop with experts from various language studies fields (translation studies, sociolinguistics, German as a second language, etc.), there will be a public panel discussion on the topic on the evening of 5th November.

“Which language does Europe speak? An Exile's Perspective.” Speakers: Boris Buden, Ibrahim Cindark, Waltraud Kolb.

In cooperation with: Stefan Zweig Centre Salzburg