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Author:   Andrew Offenburger ,  Patricia Nelson Limerick
Publisher:   University of Nebraska Press
Imprint:   University of Nebraska Press
ISBN:  

9781496243416

ISBN 10:   1496243412
Pages:   290
Publication Date:   30 October 2025
Audience:   Professional and scholarly ,  Professional & Vocational
Format:   Hardback
Publisher's Status:   Active
Availability:   Not yet available  
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Table of Contents

Introduction: Patricia Nelson Limerick and Andrew Offenburger Vignette: A Message and Dance for Zebulon Pike Part 1: Interpreting for and with Empire Chapter 1:   From Indigenous Interpreters to Creole Control: Race, Translation, and Exclusion in Yucatan, 1560-1633 Mark Lentz Vignette: Misinterpreting for James Wilkinson Chapter 2:   Captains of Civility: The Indigenous Interpreters of North America Who Attempted to School Settler Colonists on the Ideals of Civil Community Nicole Eustace Vignette: Maungwudaus Maintains Peace Chapter 3:   William Wells…Interpreter? Cameron Shriver Vignette: Ma-Son-Ne John Simpson Smith Part 2: Along the Borders of Consolidating Power Chapter 4:   Translating Slavery Alice Baumgartner Vignette: Jeffrey Deroine, Freedman and Ioway Interpreter Chapter 5:    The Interpreter Generation: Boarding School Survivors, Euro-American Scholars, and Chiricahua Apache History in the Twentieth Century Paul Conrad Vignette 5: Changing Names Chapter 6:   Diplomacy in the Aftermath of Pancho Villa’s Raid: Consul Antonio Landín in Columbus, 1917–1920     Brandon Morgan Vignette 6: John Collier: No Hands Raised Chapter 7:   Interpreters of Diné dóó Gáamalii Oral Histories Farina King Vignette 7: Rough Interpretations Part 3: Interpreting in Practice Chapter 8:    ‘Do You Solemnly Swear to Interpret Accurately and Without Bias?’: The Development of Professional Court Interpreting in the Twentieth Century                     Taylor Cozzens Vignette 8: Dueling Interpretations Chapter 9:   Puente, ຂົວ, Bridge: Interpreting for Social Transformation in Storm Lake, Iowa Andrew Offenburger Vignette 9: Interpreting for and in Vietnam Chapter 10: Keeping Faith: Interpreters in the Global War on Terror Zachary Guiliano Vignette 10: Call Me Philip Morris  

Reviews

“Brilliantly conceived. Translating Past to Present encourages a level of awareness about the work in which historians engage that will both inspire and deepen our own understanding of the perspectives we bring to our research and writing. It also alerts us—with a hearty dose of good humor and occasional irony—to just what can go wrong with the interpretive process and the complex misunderstandings to which this can give rise. One can hear the echoes of the wonderful conversations that produced this collection of essays as one reads!”—Andrea Geiger, author of Converging Empires: Citizens and Subjects in the North Pacific Borderlands, 1867–1945 “Translating Past to Present provides a fine model that other historians, ethnologists, and anthropologists can turn to as a reference point. From archives across North America to oral histories to family conversations, the works covered are richly researched and thoroughly documented. It will be of great use to specialists in borderlands and Latin American studies, as well as ethnohistorians. No one should be able to look at transcripts the same way after reading this book.”—David C. Beyreis, author of Blood in the Borderlands: Conflict, Kinship, and the Bent Family, 1821–1920

“Brilliantly conceived. Translating Past to Present encourages a level of awareness about the work in which historians engage that will both inspire and deepen our own understanding of the perspectives we bring to our research and writing. It also alerts us-with a hearty dose of good humor and occasional irony-to just what can go wrong with the interpretive process and the complex misunderstandings to which this can give rise. One can hear the echoes of the wonderful conversations that produced this collection of essays as one reads!”-Andrea Geiger, author of Converging Empires: Citizens and Subjects in the North Pacific Borderlands, 1867–1945 “Translating Past to Present provides a fine model that other historians, ethnologists, and anthropologists can turn to as a reference point. From archives across North America to oral histories to family conversations, the works covered are richly researched and thoroughly documented. It will be of great use to specialists in borderlands and Latin American studies, as well as ethnohistorians. No one should be able to look at transcripts the same way after reading this book.”-David C. Beyreis, author of Blood in the Borderlands: Conflict, Kinship, and the Bent Family, 1821–1920

Author Information

Andrew Offenburger is an associate professor of history at Miami University. He is the author of Frontiers in the Gilded Age: Adventure, Capitalism, and Dispossession from Southern Africa to the U.S.–Mexican Borderlands, 1880–1917 and editor of The Aimless Life: Music, Mines, and Revolution from the Rocky Mountains to Mexico (Bison, 2021). Patricia Nelson Limerick is a professor of history and director of the Applied History Initiative at the University of Colorado. She is the author of Desert Passages: Encounters with the American Deserts, The Legacy of Conquest: The Unbroken Past of the American West, and Something in the Soil: Legacies and Reckonings in the New West.  

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