WOMEN TRANSLATORS IN NINETEENTH-CENTURY BRAZIL AND PORTUGAL: COMPARATIVE HISTORIOGRAPHY AND FEMINIST EPISTEMOLOGY

Resumo

This paper focuses on revisiting the History of Translation in Brazil and Portugal in the 19th century from a feminist perspective. It aims at contributing to shaping a Comparative History of Translation carried out by and for women in both countries. To this end, we focus on lusophone written culture and on the differences among Portuguese and Brazilian women's translation experiences in the 1800s. This paper addresses both individualizing and differentiating comparative history methodologies. Whereas the former focuses on what is characteristic and distinctive in the history of women translators in Brazil and Portugal , the latter reveals is revealed by categories of historical analysis, namely: religion, colonialism, and the education of women. We go one to show that, in Comparative Translation History, both methods of analysis underscore the significant role played by women as agents of translation, while also highlighting the singularities of the individual histories of Portuguese-speaking women translators in Brazil and Portugal.