Panel 5: Memories and Fantasies of Genocides

Panel 5: Memories and Fantasies of Genocides Mark Hobbs, University of Winchester, United Kingdom: "Destroying Memory: The Attack on Holocaust Conscience and Memory in Britain 1942-2011" Download paper (login required) Kristen Dyck, Washington State University: "Hate Rock: White-Power Music in International Perspective" Download paper (login required) Audrey Mallet, Concordia University, Canada: “The Old Jewish Strangler and Other Ghost Stories: Poles’ Struggle to Come to Terms with the Holocaust” Download paper (login required) Tea Rozman-Clark, University of Nova Gorica, Slovenia: “Oral History: UN Peacekeepers and Local Population of the UN Safe Area Srebrenica” Download paper (login required) Chair: Kimberly Partee and Kathrin Haurand, Clark UniversityComment: Cecilie Felicia Stokholm Banke, Danish Institute for International Studies, Copenhagen

Different modes of translation for hid, grim and sickle mRNAs in Drosophila

Protein synthesis is inhibited during apoptosis. However, the translation of many mRNAs still proceeds driven by internal ribosome entry sites (IRESs). Here we show that the 5'UTR of hid and grim mRNAs promote translation of uncapped-mRNA reporters in cell-free embryonic extracts and that hid and grim mRNA 5'UTRs drive IRES-mediated translation. The translation of capped-reporters proceeds in the presence of cap competitor and in extracts where cap-dependent translation is impaired. We show that the endogenous hid and grim mRNAs are present in polysomes of heat-shocked embryos, indicating that cap recognition is not required for translation. In contrast, sickle mRNA is translated in a cap-dependent manner in all these assays. Our results show that IRES-dependent initiation may play a role in the translation of Drosophila proapoptotic genes and suggest a variety of regulatory pathways.

Transcriptional silencing of nonsense codon-containing immunoglobulin micro genes requires translation of its mRNA

Eukaryotes have evolved quality control mechanisms that prevent the expression of genes in which the protein coding potential is crippled by the presence of a premature translation-termination codon (PTC). In addition to nonsense-mediated mRNA decay (NMD), a well documented posttranscriptional consequence of the presence of a PTC in an mRNA, we recently reported the transcriptional silencing of PTC-containing immunoglobulin (Ig) mu and gamma minigenes when they are stably integrated into the genome of HeLa cells. Here we demonstrate that this transcriptional silencing of PTC-containing Ig-mu constructs requires active translation of the cognate mRNA, as it is not observed under conditions where translation of the PTC-containing mRNA is inhibited through an iron-responsive element in the 5'-untranslated region. Furthermore, RNA interference-mediated depletion of the essential NMD factor Upf1 not only abolishes NMD but also reduces the extent of nonsense-mediated transcriptional gene silencing (NMTGS). Collectively, our data indicate that NMTGS and NMD are linked, relying on the same mechanism for PTC recognition, and that the NMTGS pathway branches from the NMD pathway at a step after Upf1 function.

Finnish Fighting Words: Printing the Työmies Translation Project

The Työmies translation project involves the translation of that newspaper’s accounts of significant events from Michigan’s 1913-1914 Copper Strike. Työmies was a Finnish-language newspaper, published in Hancock, Michigan, whose socialist-unionist perspective on the strike differed markedly from that of the local English-language newspapers. This project is the first time significant portions of Työmies have been translated into English. In June of 2013, the presenter printed the translation of the Työmies account of the strike’s first day on a hand-operated Chandler & Price platen press. Thus, the presentation describes this unique project: the translation itself, the presenter’s search for necessary type and equipment, and the printing of the broadsides. The presentation will include a history of Työmies and the Strike, with an emphasis on ways in which human culture and language is reflected in the material culture of printing.

The stem-loop binding protein stimulates histone translation at an early step in the initiation pathway

Metazoan replication-dependent histone mRNAs do not have a poly(A) tail but end instead in a conserved stem-loop structure. Efficient translation of these mRNAs is dependent on the stem-loop binding protein (SLBP). Here we explore the mechanism by which SLBP stimulates translation in vertebrate cells, using the tethered function assay and analyzing protein-protein interactions. We show for the first time that translational stimulation by SLBP increases during oocyte maturation and that SLBP stimulates translation at the level of initiation. We demonstrate that SLBP can interact directly with subunit h of eIF3 and with Paip1; however, neither of these interactions is sufficient to mediate its effects on translation. We find that Xenopus SLBP1 functions primarily at an early stage in the cap-dependent initiation pathway, targeting small ribosomal subunit recruitment. Analysis of IRES-driven translation in Xenopus oocytes suggests that SLBP activity requires eIF4E. We propose a model in which a novel factor contacts eIF4E bound to the 5' cap and SLBP bound to the 3' end simultaneously, mediating formation of an alternative end-to-end complex.

Translation und Transgression. Interkulturelle Aspekte der Übersetzung(swissenschaft)

Der Titel des Bandes - Translation und Transgression - ist zugleich Programm. Er verbindet die Darstellung von Formen und Verfahren, Problemen und Chancen der Übersetzung mit Antworten auf die Frage, wie Übersetzen und Dolmetschen dafür fruchtbar gemacht werden kann, Differenzen zwischen Kulturen zu erkennen, zu verstehen, zu verringern, zu überbrücken. Das Buch versammelt Beiträge namhafter Germanisten aus aller Welt sowohl zur alltags- und berufspraktischen Übersetzung als auch zur fachlichen und literarischen Translation anhand von Beispielen mit Bezug auf zahlreiche Sprachenpaare, jeweils verstanden als Praxis transkulturellen Handelns von Kulturmittlern. Es handelt sich dabei um die translationswissenschaftlichen Ergebnisse eines von der Gesellschaft für interkulturelle Germanistik und der Universität Vilnius gemeinsam durchgeführten Kongresses in Litauen.