This site uses cookies. Some of these cookies are essential to the operation of the site, while others help to improve your experience by providing insights into how the site is being used. For more information, please see the ProZ.com privacy policy.
Cookie settings
  1. KudoZ™ Top
  2. Spanish to English

hacer tajos

English translation: "make cuts"

16:21 Mar 30, 2002
Spanish to English translations [PRO]
Art/Literary / Chilean cultural criticism
Spanish term or phrase: hacer tajos
... la escena de los '80 usaba el saber para "hacer tajos" en la superficie de los conocimientos (Foucault) y no para racionalizar procesos de comprensión con las técnicas y metodologías seguras de una verdad disciplinaria.

Is "hacer tajos" in quotes because of Foucault, or because it is an idiomatic expression? Does it have any special meaning?
Theodore Quester
United States
Local time: 07:33
English translation:"make cuts"
Explanation:
This comes from Foucault, who along with Bachelard, Canguilhem, Althusser are the French thinkers who developed the concept of "coupure épistémolique".



--------------------------------------------------
Note added at 2002-03-30 16:34:04 (GMT)
--------------------------------------------------

References: French school of post-modernist and structuralists

--------------------------------------------------
Note added at 2002-03-30 16:34:41 (GMT)
--------------------------------------------------

Sorry: coupure épistémologique
Selected response from:

Jane Lamb-Ruiz (X)
Grading comment
Graded automatically based on peer agreement. KudoZ.
4 KudoZ points were awarded for this answer



Summary of answers provided
5 +3"make cuts"
Jane Lamb-Ruiz (X)
4 +2scratch the surface
Bill Greendyk
5 +1cut slits
Gabriela Tenenbaum (X)
4 +1slash
Phillip Berryman
4to dig deeper under the surface
JH Trads
4to shred
LEALZ
3to crack
Paul Roige (X)
3diseccionar
chanio
3make nicks
julitravel


  

Answers


11 mins   confidence: Answerer confidence 4/5Answerer confidence 4/5 peer agreement (net): +2
scratch the surface


Explanation:
Hi Theodore,

In my opinion, it is in quotations because it's used as a figurative idiomatic expression here. "Hacer tajos" would mean to "make cuts" in the surface. The closest English idiom would be 'to scratch the surface'.

Hope it helps.

Bill Greendyk
United States
Local time: 07:33
Native speaker of: Native in EnglishEnglish
PRO pts in pair: 527

Peer comments on this answer (and responses from the answerer)
agree  Robert INGLEDEW: That is exactly what I thought.
3 hrs
  -> Thanks, Robert!
agree  Tania Marques-Cardoso
1 day 4 hrs
Login to enter a peer comment (or grade)

11 mins   confidence: Answerer confidence 5/5 peer agreement (net): +3
"make cuts"


Explanation:
This comes from Foucault, who along with Bachelard, Canguilhem, Althusser are the French thinkers who developed the concept of "coupure épistémolique".



--------------------------------------------------
Note added at 2002-03-30 16:34:04 (GMT)
--------------------------------------------------

References: French school of post-modernist and structuralists

--------------------------------------------------
Note added at 2002-03-30 16:34:41 (GMT)
--------------------------------------------------

Sorry: coupure épistémologique

Jane Lamb-Ruiz (X)
Native speaker of: Native in EnglishEnglish, Native in PortuguesePortuguese
PRO pts in pair: 7709
Grading comment
Graded automatically based on peer agreement. KudoZ.

Peer comments on this answer (and responses from the answerer)
agree  mgonzalez (X)
21 mins
agree  Yolanda Morato: that's the term!
4 hrs
agree  Haydée González: I like this one, thank you for the explanations
21 hrs
Login to enter a peer comment (or grade)

16 mins   confidence: Answerer confidence 3/5Answerer confidence 3/5
to crack


Explanation:
Depends on context. It sounds like that to me though but... Don't think it's got anything to do with Foucault at all. It's just that the guy didn't perhaps know how to express it better. Hope it helps :-)

Paul Roige (X)
Spain
Local time: 13:33
Native speaker of: Native in SpanishSpanish, Native in CatalanCatalan
PRO pts in pair: 442
Login to enter a peer comment (or grade)

28 mins   confidence: Answerer confidence 5/5 peer agreement (net): +1
cut slits


Explanation:
I think they are quoting Foucault's words:

"Pertenece a Foucault un pensamiento digno de mención al afirmar que el saber no ha sido hecho para comprender sino para hacer tajos,..."

I would use any word that would convey the idea of something that goes "deep" in other's minds.


Saludos #:)


    Reference: http://www.ricardobarletta.com/tex_intelec.html
    Reference: http://www.udec.cl/~litterae/pensador.htm
Gabriela Tenenbaum (X)
Uruguay
Local time: 08:33
Native speaker of: Native in SpanishSpanish
PRO pts in pair: 113

Peer comments on this answer (and responses from the answerer)
agree  AndrewBM
21 hrs
  -> Thanks, AndrewBM! #:))
Login to enter a peer comment (or grade)

41 mins   confidence: Answerer confidence 4/5Answerer confidence 4/5 peer agreement (net): +1
slash


Explanation:
The contrast is between traditional scholarship which very carefully goes about amassing evidence in a delimited field and presenting arguments as opposed to the whimsical anything-goes style intended to disrupt such an intellectual style. Eg. in "The Order of Things" Foucault relativizes the way we categorize. "Coupure epistemologique" in Spanish is "ruptura epist---" I would suggestion that gives the idea of slashing, "slash away" etc.

Phillip Berryman
Local time: 07:33
Native speaker of: Native in EnglishEnglish
PRO pts in pair: 147

Peer comments on this answer (and responses from the answerer)
agree  Dr. Chrys Chrystello
12 mins
Login to enter a peer comment (or grade)

1 hr   confidence: Answerer confidence 4/5Answerer confidence 4/5
to dig deeper under the surface


Explanation:
just for this context

HTH

JH Trads
United States
Local time: 07:33
Native speaker of: Native in SpanishSpanish, Native in FrenchFrench
PRO pts in pair: 915
Login to enter a peer comment (or grade)

5 hrs   confidence: Answerer confidence 3/5Answerer confidence 3/5
diseccionar


Explanation:
I am not an expert of Foucault. But I like his thinking. I think in his studies of the evolution in sciences through his examples in medicine. He spoke of the dissections and the autopsies as a way of checking the medical theories and improving their way of curing illnesses.
In a parallel way I feel that cutting should mean a way of finding out truth by seeing a portion of the continuum of reality. Just watching the state of reality in all its multiple layers at a lapse of time.

chanio
Login to enter a peer comment (or grade)

5 hrs   confidence: Answerer confidence 3/5Answerer confidence 3/5
make nicks


Explanation:
It looks as if they were small cuts, not going deep into the subject.

julitravel
Local time: 08:33
Native speaker of: Native in SpanishSpanish
PRO pts in pair: 34
Login to enter a peer comment (or grade)

6 hrs   confidence: Answerer confidence 4/5Answerer confidence 4/5
to shred


Explanation:
an option

LEALZ
United States
Local time: 04:33
Native speaker of: Native in SpanishSpanish
PRO pts in pair: 27
Login to enter a peer comment (or grade)



Login or register (free and only takes a few minutes) to participate in this question.

You will also have access to many other tools and opportunities designed for those who have language-related jobs (or are passionate about them). Participation is free and the site has a strict confidentiality policy.

Return to KudoZ list

KudoZ™ translation help

The KudoZ network provides a framework for translators and others to assist each other with translations or explanations of terms and short phrases.

See also:
ProZ.com term search
Search millions of term translations
Close search
Term search
  • All of ProZ.com
  • Term search
  • Jobs
  • Forums
  • Multiple search