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Les maisons de la sagesse | Barbara Cassin | TEDxMarseille


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[Music]
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here is how to do with the differences
I think that’s what we need
today and that’s what I’m trying
to explore with you but with my
means the means to me it’s the words
if I am an explorer of some
thing it’s an explorer of what
can the words and more exactly
still for me the difference to know
do with the differences
it can be built around a
practical and an idea that is that of
translation between two cultures between
two languages is the translation
this know-how with the differences
that’s how I defined it gave me
envy and gave me need to manufacture
a project a little bit crazy I the
recognize in which I would like you
lead this project it’s a project that
I called house of bayt wisdom
al hikma is an old bagdad thing
in the fifteenth century but these were
houses that were built around
of the translation or everyone was coming
all scholars all countries all
the generations and he was translating
just what would it be a
wisdom house today at the 21st
century
in Marseille for example or
aubervilliers which are my two lands
working
they have the wisdom you see that’s it
huh
the way in which was represented
in Persian
in bagdad books a lot of books
but people a lot of people then
what would that be a house of the
wisdom today well me this the
click to want to do this is a
sentence is a number the sentence that’s
this one a sentence of hannah arendt who
wrote
in exile and she obviously writes
nobody wants to know that history
contemporary has spawned a new type
of human beings those who have been sent
in concentration camps by
their enemies and in the camps
of internment by their friends sentence not
anything and the figure is by
example of the number of drowned in 2016
the number of drowned in the Mediterranean this
that we could count 5000 but that’s
what we could count and here I am
I told myself that we had to stop
to have the laziness that had to stop
to be afraid that we had to get out of this
crazy imaginary of a society without
strangers and try with each his
ways to make something like
ten have a hospitality company with
this wonderful words in french oat who
means whoever greets and whoever
who is welcomed both teeth into
perfect reciprocity so a
society say reciprocal hospitality
and why the translation seems to me the
good way to do that and good because
it is a language-to-language hospitality
there was a troubadour in the
languedoc who was saying here is translate
it is the hostel of the distant
here we are a little hostel
far away and that’s why I’m going to you
propose to reflect with me these
houses wisdom I was at calais by
example and here is the picture I took
at calais dismantling of the southern zone
nothing more this sign opening on the
empty on bits of toys that
was hanging that sign that said that
a school that had been manufactured
built by the people themselves
dunes school
but there was more than this sign
in all languages ​​and for you
to say how I got there I
I’ll do a little bit of
course told you that I was
Greek philosophy specialist
yes it’s true that my first
translations my first surprise my
first astonishment of language it’s between
the ancient Greek and the French there is a
Greek word that is truly
untranslatable that stops is the word
logos logos it means at once
speech moreau speech everything you
like his demonstration of undermining
and reason speech and reason besides
the Latin translated by ratio is at
ratio a phrase speech game and
greek impetus
in other words the Greeks have the logos they
have the talk and the reason it’s like
that they see they see
owner of the universal and that’s what
which we inherit and we inherit from
that to know that the others are
barbarians
I had an exposure to mucem that
maybe some of you have seen
I think there was I ‘m wrong
60000 people who we so I was
maybe in this exhibition
sap mucem which was named after babel
translate you see babel babel bab
blah blah blah barbarians barbara me all that
it’s the same thing 1
that’s what we do not understand it’s a
onomatopoeia to say what we do not
not understand and suddenly when the Greeks
define man as a gifted animal
from logos to whoever does not understand
who does not have the logos not everything to
made sure it was a man a barbarian
is not really a man is in this
wall of barbarians you see this
beautiful blah blah blah who is a
contemporary painting of mel bochner and
and next to you see vases that has
dictated Greek barbarians included the
Greek barbarians
and then we because we are always the
barbarous of us then I know
not if it’s right or left because
than
well this is where we caravaneers along
nose we the barbarian of the Chinese here and
then a good Berber doll of
the other side what all this is the
same thing it’s on the other hand it’s
the other that we do not understand is
to say also it is of the other that one does not
not translate and you see why I
I’m interested at this point
thing like a house of wisdom
I give it a place of
translation not necessarily a house that
has doors and windows or
books though it may help but
let’s say a network a place device
and action
and these are these places and its
actions I want to talk to you about
now
so the first the first action
it’s the action of the welcome we welcome
how do we welcome low on
welcomes by not taking oneself
for the universal by not taking oneself
even for the world tour
we welcome paying attention to
differences and one of the things that
I had done in this exhibition at
mucem that brought me a lot
with all the associations with
associations that also went into the
baumettes etc
it was to ask the question what is the
word of your native language that you
missing the most when you’re in
french what’s the word you’re missing
the most and we got 7 6 but what
was beautiful the word you miss
and for example there was a woman that
marked me a lot because we
asked people but why do you
lack
so there was a woman who said ben
here I am in Arabic I know how to say
I love it I love to want to die before
him if I say that in French is
ridiculous
there is a word in Arabic to say so
that’s the word of the word
lack I reworked that with one of
places that could be a house of the
wisdom
a colleges a college at the beautiful of
May at the beautiful wasteland of May a college
and that’s what these classes of
newcomer college students where we speak
20 languages
here is for example the demo they told me
thank you thank you and yaou a word
Armenian who means that lack is
even more than that so the home
glossary of the French bureaucracy
I propose you that is to say that
when people arrive
not only are there words that
are missing but we act as if they
were like us as if there were
no difference ie as if
for example to Tamils ​​who arrive
as if he could answer the
question is what are you married
divorced pacsés one asks what is
your age and how old are you
everything so simple your name and your first name
but it’s not that simple at all
It’s not easy to have a name and a
name it’s not easy to have a
birth date stabilize it’s not going
no sense of knowing if one is a refugee
expatriates it’s up to all these categories
are categories that brings us back to
our schemas and this glossary of the
French bureaucracy that we are in
train with newcomers
with their children and parents
well, it’s something that has to
make the administration think
back do not believe it’s so simple
the values ​​of the republic do not
believe that a questionnaire
administrative it does not already contain
full of judgment full of prejudices
full of culture for the best and
for the worst
so you see first actions of these
houses of wisdom the home
second action that I would call a
word that I do not love insertion
it turns out that we worked hard
in Marseille precisely as a result of
this exhibition and especially with
an organism that I find magical that
is said that is the LED micro to
micro to microcredit by micro credit
businesses and entrepreneurs who
want to do something and there
what we propose is
value the life course of people
who like that can benefit from a
microcredit
so we worked with the arts of the
street for example with steam generérik and
we saw
we chose courses that we
seemed very important that we
seemed to show what a
migratory heritage you see that
it’s a fatma hand that figures who
is placed on the walls of a restaurant
Mexican opened by a good Berber then
a Mexican restaurant opened by a
Berber who makes draw by one of his
friends at Aix a fatma hand but as
if it was frida kahlo he had
painted and ben they explain it and that if
you want it’s a
it is an extraordinary apprehension of
its migratory heritage so I’ll you
in other shows here it is a
also Haitian restaurant and you see
you have a planter and in front of the bridge
from brooklyn
well it’s like that at eugénie it’s
like that it’s between brooklyn bridge
and a Haitian planter and there you have
there relents revival and this way
what was called this car
completely crazy inside we have
completely boned that was redone in
tribute and a garage with which
had benefited from a microcredit to
create his garage a Russian garage and to
inside when we’re from ambon the
seats are upset we hear her
life story we hear what they
tell about his garage
so you see the second time it’s
this kind of two reports to another
with objects and their history
something like a museum bank and
we have already done that for example
in africa museum banks like that
ie objects their history and
a microcredit and the third is
even more complicated the third thing
which I would like to talk to you about
the third action that I lead in these
houses of wisdom and that I would like
that we lead
it’s a reflection action a step in
back on what’s blocking and what
blocks today perhaps more than
everything is fundamentalism that is
say the religions exacerbated and for
try then in the Mediterranean it’s the
three monotheisms the torah the bible the
quran to try that it’s unlocked a
little we can talk and well we
do a job on what I call
the untranslatable of the three monotheistic
it does not mean at all that it’s
not translated it means we
think together about how is this
that we say god in his so-called books
sacred in these languages
how do you say god
is it said the book how is this
we say each other as we say
community as they say the woman
and here I show you the violence of
translations
here you have on the one hand a Bible and
which is eternally taken over by
catechism pictures you have eve who
left the coast of adam
it is the man alone the word to say that
other usually throughout the torah
that translates to next to them then
dream she came out of the coast of adam
it’s a little bit of guys that’s the
woman it’s a sub-man a little
serving like that or well or she
was born next to him and that’s rodin la
hand of God’s hand who represents
the man and the woman in the process of
to wake up together and that’s an effect
of translation do you choose
that sap as far as healy and eve
does you choose that she is
whether she was born on the coast of Adam or
do you choose that she
be awake next to adam but that’s it
the kind of things we have
to work so you see house of
wisdom a network of place and action
these actions for now they have been
done with a lot of actors
Marseille a lot of actors to
aubervilliers and they are centered on
three times three temporalities the reception
insertion and step back the
reflection here it is house of the
wisdom in which I would like you
train because everyone could have
to go with his means
everyone has to do something there
know how to do it and that’s it
aristotle said democracy is the
less bad of so-called era diets
it was good it’s the least bad of
diets and then he added and if I
looking for a good model of democracy
maybe the best model is
the picnic
that is, everyone brings what he has
if everyone to wear tomatoes this is
the catastrophe
but if everyone brings what he has then
maybe we can do something
thank you
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