Translator, British Museum agree after it used her work without permit
5 Min Read
A disagreement between the British Museum and writer Yilin Wang was resolved after the museum used her translations of revolutionary and feminist poet Qiu Jin's 19th-century poetry for their show.
-
The British Museum (Credit to the Trustees of the British Museum)
This week, a translator who had her work improperly utilized by the British Museum was successful after negotiating a settlement with the organization after two months of discussions and internet activism, with a little assistance from the followers of K-pop superstars BTS.
After it was revealed that the museum had used poet Yilin Wang's translations of revolutionary and feminist poet Qiu Jin's 19th-century poetry for their show "China's hidden century," the institution came under fire in June.
It didn't get in touch with Vancouver-based Wang or make an offer to pay her for the translations, and the exhibition didn't give her any credit for her efforts.
The original poetry and Wang's translations were eventually taken out of display when the institution later acknowledged that it had "inadvertently omitted" these steps. Many onlookers found such acts offensive and said it should have offered to pay for the translations rather than denying museum visitors access to the poems.
According to the settlement, which Wang and the museum reached last Friday, the poetry and translations will once again be used, but this time with proper acknowledgment and payment, Wang told CNN in a phone conversation. This, according to her, was a crucial step towards acknowledging the intricate and frequently unnoticed labor of translators.
"I'm tired but I'm relieved," she said. "I was able to get everything I wanted, I'm pretty happy about that … (but) I have some frustration around how long that was. I wish I didn’t have to go through all that … in order to have things addressed."
Wang didn't like the museum's response to the initial online uproar in June, so she started an online fundraising to pay for legal counsel. There was an outpouring of support for her from various online communities, including academic organizations, other translators and writers, and even the BTS superfan group known as ARMY (Adorable Representative M.C. for Youth)
Wang was well known in the community because one of her peers had contributed to translating the official BTS book. The community has a long history of coming together to support issues like planting trees in BTS' honor and contributing to movements like Black Lives Matter.
The word of Wang's fundraiser was relayed through a friend who is a translator, and ARMY responded. The fans "had a whole fundraising campaign going on … coordinating and boosting it on social media," Wang said. "They really care about translators, which I really appreciate."
"It really showed me the collective power, as communities coming together to demand accountability from institutions," she added.
Wang was able to get legal counsel. Hartwig Fischer, the director of the British Museum, contacted her shortly after. She described Fischer's letter as apologetic, starting another month of discussions before they reached the final settlement.
By the end of this week, the museum will reinstate Wang's translations in the show, with credit and payment, in accordance with the settlement's terms, of which CNN saw a redacted copy.
Additionally, it will post a spotlight page with a poem by Qiu Jin to the museum's website and make a second donation to help Chinese poetry translators equal to their license fee payment.
Most importantly, Wang said, was that the museum committed to developing a clearance procedure for translations by the end of the year.
"It's a positive step in terms of hopefully encouraging all other museums and similar institutions to make sure they also have a clear policy in place, and making sure translators are paid properly and credited," Wang said.
The British Museum issued another apology to Wang in a news release earlier this week for what it called a "oversight."
"The museum currently does not have a policy specifically addressing the clearance of translations and, as part of its review, will ensure that translations are specifically addressed in its clearances policies and that translators are appropriately credited in future," it said.
"The British Museum takes copyright permission seriously and recognizes the importance of the role of translators and the value of their work, which in many cases helps to further the museum's research and widen public access through display," it added.
The triumph, according to Wang, was significant in that it would spread knowledge of Qiu Jin and her poems.
"She was a queer feminist poet whose work has been kind of overlooked in translation," Wang said. "I started translating her because I felt like her work is very timely, and I want it to be read by a wider audience … and to be treated with the respect it deserves."
