ABSTRACT
Translation has increased in importance in Arabic-speaking countries in all aspects of life through the years – from medical prescriptions to instrument catalogues, legal and technical texts, to conference interpreting and from children’s books to the cinema and theatre. This chapter reviews some key issues, like censorship and ideology that are pertinent to translation policies since the early translations that took place in Lebanon, Syria, Iraq and Egypt, which were the first pioneering Arab countries in terms of translation. Politics started to become popular in the Arab world when early translators called for teaching basic political and administrative issues in addition to religious studies and Arabic language. As Van Dijk has noted, politics also works according to a certain ideological agenda, either evident or hidden, in order to reach certain political goals. According to Christina Schäffner and Susan Basnett there is a direct, though usually invisible link between politics, media, and translation.
