From the Congo to Putumayo: towards a language-centred approach to testimony in Roger Casement’s investigative writings

Citation

Ni Loingsigh A (2023) From the Congo to Putumayo: towards a language-centred approach to testimony in Roger Casement’s investigative writings [Language-centred approaches in Roger Casements Investigative Writing]. In: Epinoux E & Healey F (eds.) Cultural Perspectives on the Irish in Latin America. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge Scholars Press, pp. 134-50. https://www.cambridgescholars.com/product/978-1-5275-3013-3

Abstract
First paragraph: In his 1997 edition of Roger Casement’s Amazon Journal, Angus Mitchell provides a wealth of additional correspondence and writings that suggest Roger Casement’s two-month investigative journey into the rubber-tapping industry of Putumayo was uncommonly language-aware for its time. In particular, Casement’s two-week stay in the Peruvian Amazon port town of Iquitos — location of the operational headquarters of the British-registered Peruvian Amazon Company (PAC) — in September 1910 reveals Casement to have had a keen and critical understanding of the value of organising effective linguistic support in advance of his investigation and of being prepared to delay progressing his journey to the local PAC headquarters in La Chorerra while a translator is found.

Keywords
Casement; translation of testimony; language-centred investigation

People

Dr Aedin Ni Loingsigh

Lectureship in French and Francophone, French