amuk: A Performance and Conversation on (Mis)Translation with Khairani Barokka

In her third collection of poetry amuk, Khairani Barokka sheds light on the devastating and ongoing effects of a single word’s (mis)translation—from the word ‘amuk’, which in Indonesian and Malay means ‘rage/to rage’, into the English phrase ‘running amok’, defined by the Oxford English Dictionary as ‘to run about in a violent or murderous frenzy’. Groundbreaking in its use of form, amuk deconstructs the brutal workings of oppressive systems to examine how, ‘through macheted etymology’, violence and suffering is replicated through (mis)translation. Crucially, however, amuk emphasises what exists in opposition to such hostile histories: hope, resistance, and joy.

This poetry performance of amuk will be followed by a conversation with Okka on translation and mistranslation, the ecological crisis, and the legacies of colonialism.

Register via Eventbrite, here.

Khairani Barokka is a translator, editor, writer, and artist from Jakarta with over two decades of professional translation experience. Okka’s work has been presented widely internationally, and centers disability justice as anticolonial praxis, and access as translation. Among her honors, she has been Modern Poetry in Translation’s inaugural Poet in Residence, a UNFPA Indonesian Young Leader Driving Social Change, an Artforum Must-See, and Associate Artist at the UK’s National Centre for Writing. Okka’s books include Indigenous Species (Tilted Axis, 2016), Rope (Nine Arches, 2017), and Ultimatum Orangutan (Nine Arches, 2021), shortlisted for the Barbellion Prize. Her latest book is amuk (Nine Arches, 2024).