Dr. Spencer Hawkins

Dr. Spencer Hawkins

Office: 128-F

Phone: 290 3431

Dr. Spencer Hawkins completed his doctorate in Comparative Literature at University of Michigan, Ann Arbor in 2014. His ideas about translation draw on 20th century German theories of rhetoric—and on Hans Blumenberg’s metaphorology, especially. Reading metaphoric imagery and reading translated works both prompt us to reflect on the past: metaphors evoke the way it felt to perceive things in our personal past, whereas translations recall the historical past in which the source text was written. As a translator, Hawkins shows special concern for a text’s historical background and its use of metaphor.

He has recently completed a translation of Hans Blumenberg’s The Laughter of the Thracian Woman: A Protohistory of Theory, with annotations and a critical afterword, forthcoming with Bloomsbury. In 2014, he became secretary for the International Comparative Literature Association’s Committee on Translation Studies, and is co-sponsoring their 2015 conference panel for the American Comparative Literature Association on “The Rights to Translation.”