Day of Translation 2025: Meeting the Present Moment: On Translators Navigating Cultural Taboos, Censorships, and Establishing Solidarity
Anton Hur, Parisa Saranj, and Jenna Tang talk about navigating linguistic and ideological borders at a time of growing censorship and cultural polarization.
On Thursday, September 18, 2025, Center for the Art of Translation presented its annual Day of Translation at The Center for Fiction in Brooklyn, NY. This panel, featuring writer and award-winning translator Anton Hur, writer and Persian translator Parisa Saranj, and writer and translator between Chinese, French, Spanish, and English Jenna Tang will discuss what it means, in concrete terms, to establish or contribute to one’s community through translation and how to deal with recurring issues such as exploitation and burnout.
With the rising number of book bans, political scrutiny of education and libraries, and refugees and migrants in limbo across the United States, how do translators navigate linguistic and ideological borders? What does it mean to translate literature in a time of growing censorship and cultural polarization? How can translators respond to book challenges, publisher hesitations, and various aspects of censorship, including self-censorship?