MIA Cross-Language

Languages, Part 4b

http://marxists.org/xlang/index.htm

MIA Cross-Language

MIA is a large archive of literature in many languages. Its nature allows the MIA operators to create an extra category called “Cross-Language” (X-Lang) so that readers can easily move, for example, directly between a work in one language, to the same work in another language.

What this points to is the possibility of, through the Internet, effectively publishing one work in many languages.

Seeing the way that the requirement for publication in all official languages is handled (e.g. by the SA National Planning Commission) in South Africa, it is clear that there is no standard. The way the NDP is published is in full in English, with Mickey Mouse versions for everybody other than English-speakers.

Probably the best option is for each column in a South African “X-Lang” table, representing one of the languages, to be edited by separate agencies accountable to their language groups.

So, for example, if the a document like the NDP is not published in any given SA official language, then an agency responsible for that language would have the resources to go ahead and make and publish a translation.

X-Lang in Political Education

Language is an issue when it comes to political education. The above diagram can show how it will be possible to compile parallel material for the Communist University, for example, in all of the official languages, and to run the Communist University as a simultaneous multi-lingual provider of political-education reading material for discussion.

What a pleasure it will be to sit in a study circle, having a discussion in Zulu, Pedi, Sotho or Xhosa, about Marx or Lenin or Agitprop, or about African Revolutionary Writers

Language is a revolutionary issue.

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