ABSTRACT
The aim of this foundational chapter is to explore some of the main ways that ontology – that is, the study of being – is relevant to translation. It begins by considering the importance of the broad questions of being and the peculiar difficulty of reflecting on them directly. This is followed by a discussion of major concepts in the history of Western ontology: categories and categorization; sameness, difference and identity; change and stability; and being and non-being. The final section introduces three major traditions of ontological thought: substance ontology, process ontology, and flat ontology. This chapter shows throughout that the ontological positions we adopt have significant implications for how we think about translation and that there is much to be gained from explicit reflection on questions of being.
