Language Choice, Nationalism and Ideology: The Anthropological Texts Translated to Hebrew as a Case Study.

Abstract The paper deals with the connection between the project of translating anthropological texts from a foreign language to Hebrew, and the associated ideological changes, shaping of sociological and cultural identities, and dissemination of scientific knowledge. At the beginning of the translation project the European Jewish readers were the target of the anthropological texts in Hebrew as a corollary to the revival of the Hebrew language, the dissemination of universal scientific knowledge in the Haskala era, and Zionist motivation. With the establishment of socialist Israel, texts that supported collectivist ideas were translated. Later, the requirements of academic study, the theoretical schools in the main anthropology centers and their connection to Israeli anthropology directed the choice of texts for translation. A century after the first texts appeared, the anthropological discipline has been enhanced by private publishers who were aware of the lacunae in classical anthropological texts and have, over the past few decades, published new translations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]