Metaglossia: The Translation World

El profesor de genética de Harvard Medical School George Church ha desmentido la noticia publicada en el periódico ‘The Daily Mail’ según la cual estaría buscando una mujer para dar a luz a un Neandertal. 

El 20 de enero el periódico británico publicó que Church está a punto de reconstruir el ADN del hombre de Neandertal y su próximo paso podría ser la gestación de uno, por lo que está buscando “una mujer valiente”. Los medios del mundo extendieron rápidamente la noticia.

Ce projet aberrant d'un professeur de Harvard impliquait la recherche d'une mère porteuse volontaire. Une information totalement fausse...

In working through the edits for the commentary on the Sermon on the Mount I saw a change in the NIV 2011 I had not noticed because when the 2011 came out I was already beyond Matthew 5:31-32. I have read the NIV 2011 on the Sermon a number of times but this one translation just didn’t jump out at me the way it did last Friday.

TNIV:  But I tell you that anyone who divorces his wife, except for sexual immorality,causes her to become an adulteress, and anyone who marries the divorced woman commits adultery.

NIV2011: But I tell you that anyone who divorces his wife, except for sexual immorality, makes her the victim of adultery, and anyone who marries a divorced woman commits adultery.

The most basic form and reason of misunderstanding, is not able to understand what the other person is saying. Even, if you understand the word, then you do not understand the meaning sometimes.

They live and translate among us. We pity them, we ridicule them, we fear them. But have you ever considered that you yourself may be one of them, that you too may be slowly becoming a zombie trans...

THE former boss of a controversial, Delph-based court translation company has blamed interpreters for failures in the...

Any business operating within the global market encounters its fair share of challenges. But one which can be easily side-stepped is the problem of miscommunication due to poor translation.

When translating documents, marketing materials or any information from one language to another, it is vital that companies consider how the end product will reflect on them professionally. A high quality, professionally delivered translation will convey a polished approach and can make locals in the target country more likely to listen to what your company has to say, as well as consider what it has to offer.

The quality of translation can make the difference in a marketing campaign as well as in the public’s perception of a product. For example, in 2004 the company “Waterpik”, famous in America for dental instruments, met with trouble when promoting their product to customers in Denmark. When the company tried to translate its name, ‘Water’ was translated to the Danish ‘vand’, and the company added their trademark ‘Pik’ to then end, resulting in ‘VandPik’ which is a Danish euphemism for an early morning erection.

Be king of more than just content. Be king of the world marketplace.
Posted by Joshua on Tue, 10/09/2012 - 03:43

I have heard the phrase “content is king” more times than I care to count. Stacking a website with content that can bring in readers and keep them coming back for more is important. What many companies and businesses forget, however, is the importance of translating that content. Branching out into a variety of languages and cultures through quality, translated content is a solid marketing and SEO strategy.

Most businesses focus on bringing in talented writers, but many do not take full advantage of the writing being produced. Crafting and obtaining great content is difficult and time consuming, but the ways in which such content can be used are worth the time and effort. Seeking out human translation services to translate quality articles allows businesses to provide content in a variety of languages.

OneHourTranslation gives websites and businesses the services needed to push content to the next level. Being the “king of content” in one country is nice, but being the king of world content is even better. Since OneHourTranslation uses trained, professional human translators, content is translated word for word, eliminating the concern over improper translation that some softwares and services deliver.

Yes, quality content can be expensive and hard to find. Once you have it, however, finding a consistent translation service with a consistent cost is much easier. Websites and companies which want to corner a certain language should consider having all content on their website translated. Translation services are much more effective in changing large amounts of content than a single, independent contractor. Human translation such as OneHourTranslation is a better choice than software in almost any case.

Those who want to reach a wider audience with a smaller amount of content should consider a different approach. A business that has a successful article in one language should consider translating that article into many languages. Services for translation such as OneHourTranslation offer over 65 different languages to translate to and from. With quality content such as a well trafficked blog or article set, translating into each language is a good idea.

On the other side of the coin is content that is poorly translated. A blog post that is translated into a garbled, hard to understand chunk of text is a damaging thing for a business. Although well translated articles can mean an entirely new audience, a poorly translated article can mean the loss of an entire customer base. Make sure to choose translation services that are known for their quality translations.

As ThinkProgress detailed Tuesday, right-wing and mainstream news sources have extensively misrepresented a new report by the conservative Government Accountability Institute (GAI), suggesting incorrectly that the report details widespread foreign...

As ThinkProgress detailed Tuesday, right-wing and mainstream news sources have extensively misrepresented a new report by the conservative Government Accountability Institute (GAI), suggesting incorrectly that the report details widespread foreign...

WILMINGTON, NC (WWAY) -- As the NCDOT prepares for another weekend of closing the Cape Fear Memorial Bridge, some drivers are a little confused by how it's being publicized.

There are multiple signs warning drivers that the bridge will be closed, ut when exactly is a little hard to understand. On Tuesday afternoon, signs said the bridge would be closed 8 p.m. to 5 a.m. this Friday through Monday, which has some drivers thinking the bridge will be open during daytime hours. That is not the case.

The bridge will be closed from 8 p.m. Friday to 5 a.m. Monday. The DOT says the signs should be changed by Tuesday night.

“We've had a couple people call with concerns about the signs being confusing, so I’ve contacted the contractor to make some changes to the signs so that when drivers read them they can read them in two panels and it will be more easily understood,” says Ben Hughes, the DOT asst. resident engineer.

Hughes says because of limitations on how much can be written on the signs, the DOT stuck with only warning drivers about the weekend bridge closures.

Meanwhile, some wonder how the closure will affect the Pleasure Island Seafood, Blues and Jazz Festival this weekend A member of the Pleasure Island Chamber of Commerce says though the timing is not ideal, they expect to be sold out of tickets in the next few days.

HAMPTON — You could say it's just a petite faux pas. But at least one concerned provocateur claims incorrectly translated signs at Hampton Beach were confusing to French-Canadian visitors and demonstrated an utter lack of savoir-faire.

The signs were apparently erected as part of the state's $14.5 million redevelopment project at Hampton Beach, where a major chunk of the tourism-based economy is fueled by French-Canadian visitors. Now state parks officials are replacing the signs rather than risk bidding any tourism dollars adieu.

One sign warning French speakers about rip currents was supposed to say, "If you're in trouble, wave for assistance," but instead it read, "if you need help, ocean wave."

Though the signs are being replaced, the gaffe brought a harsh riposte from Richard L. Fortin, a former member of the state American and Canadian French Cultural Exchange Commission.

Gunpowder and Lead is privileged to occasionally host accomplished guest bloggers with expertise in realms far outside of our own. This post was written by the very talented, ‘Andrea’ aka @AgentAbleTango. Apart from having a Masters in International Relations and Bachelors in Russian, Andrea has a background in Intelligence, Information Assurance and Language Training. She also one of those people that speaks more languages than the rest of us can name. –Sky

A recent article in the Kabul Press by Matthew Nasuti highlighted an interesting, and inconvenient, fact about wartime spending in Afghanistan – the US pays “annual salaries of up to $237,000” (not including bonuses or cost of living expenses) to its contracted Pashto translators. The salary highlights the importance of a critical skill and also gives insight into a greater challenge that has plagued the US Department of Defense for decades. There are not enough capable linguists in the military with the necessary language abilities required to perform essential engagement in Afghanistan, so these tasks fall to contractors at great cost. More broadly, Americans struggle with a foreign language skills deficit when compared with other nations and this has hampered our abilities to successfully navigate conflict and forge peace. The lack of diverse and in-depth language and cultural knowledge threatens our long-term national security and places us at a disadvantage in global society.

The answer to the foreign language challenges that now face the DoD can be found at the source of their own military language program. The US instituted their first language school in San Francisco in order to train personnel to translate intercepted Japanese communications. Because the need was so great for the intelligence these communications could provide and since Japanese was not widely spoken in the US, the military turned to Nisei, or Second-Generation, Japanese Americans to assist in the undertaking. The Nisei served the US military both as translators and instructors for other troops. Although many among them had faced internment personally or had family who were interned during wartime, they served with honor and great distinction, providing pivotal skills and information that assisted in American success during the war. Additionally, there were other native speaking communities that proved vital to success in WWII – native Navajo speakers developed a code that was not based on traditional known encryption methods but rather on a language that was exclusively practiced and regionally known to those in the American Southwest – making it practically unbreakable to any foreign forces.

It's not just those translating Chinese and Japanese into English who sometimes encounter problems. Today's Doonesbury:

A discussion here on Language Log a little more than a year ago ("Sorkh Razil: Language Log asks you", 10/22/2010) concluded that the cartoonist, Gary Trudeau, was more plausibly correct when he told us that "Sorkh Razil" is Pashtu (also spelled Pakhto, Pushto, Pukhto, Pashto, Paxto or Pushtu), e.g. in the footnote in the first panel of this strip from October 2010:

Chine et Japon, "Lost in Translation"
LE MONDE | 01.10.2012 à 14h41 • Mis à jour le 01.10.2012 à 14h42

Par Sylvie Kauffmann (L'air du monde)

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Dormez tranquilles. Le calme devrait régner cette semaine sur le front des îles Diaoyu/Senkaku, ces cinq rochers arides que se disputent la Chine et le Japon en mer de Chine orientale : les Chinois sont partis en vacances d'automne. Tous, ou presque. C'est la "Semaine d'or", celle où, hormis les problèmes des transports pris d'assaut, il ne se passe rien dans l'empire du Milieu. Une sorte de trêve des confiseurs à l'orientale. On leur a même annoncé, à la veille de la grande transhumance, l'exclusion du parti et le procès prochain de Bo Xilai, ex-étoile montante du Parti, pour mettre fin à l'insoutenable suspense qui aurait pu gâcher leur repos bien mérité.
Parmi les Chinois qui ne partent pas en vacances, on trouve les marins du premier porte-avions du pays, mis à l'eau justement ces tout derniers jours. Et d'autres marins continuent de faire des ronds dans l'eau à bord des navires de guerre dépêchés à proximité des îles disputées, pour tenir compagnie aux dizaines de bâtiments japonais et taïwanais croisant dans les mêmes eaux, sans parler des bateaux de pêcheurs. Car Taïwan aussi revendique ces îles. La poussée de fièvre entre Pékin et Tokyo ces dernières semaines, accompagnée de violentes manifestations contre les intérêts japonais en Chine, est retombée mais la tension reste vive.

Tout est en place pour que la moindre étincelle fasse repartir le conflit entre les deux grandes puissances d'Asie, deuxième et troisième économies mondiales. Il suffit de regarder les images prises d'avion sur ces batailles de canons à eau pour imaginer les conséquences du moindre dérapage.

Some of the luster of President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono’s visit to New York faded earlier this week after he apparently fumbled a press conference ...

Translations, Interpreting, Language Assessment - DCU Language Services has over 20 years experience in providing The Complete Language Solution...

The Ministry of Railways recently announced a change to the way it would write the English versions of Chinese station names. Instead of English for north and south for example, the new versions will use pinyin translations. So Beijing South Railway Station will be known as Beijingnan Railway Station. A reporter from the Beijing News found last week that the name of that station had already been changed on the information screens and on tickets.

Though Wang Feng , the deputy chief of the Shanghai Railway Bureau, told a press conference last week that the train stations' names in Shanghai will remain the same for the present, the Shanghai Morning Post reported that the Shanghai South Railway Station is preparing its signage to become Shanghainan Railway Station and new tickets are on the way.

The Ministry of Railways said it was difficult to change all the titles in the country in a short time but it would do this step by step, the Beijing News reported.

This is a move that defies logic and can only confuse foreign travelers. Most foreigners don't understand pinyin. Using the word "nan" instead of the instantly recognizable "south" is a recipe for disaster.

The irony is that this will have no effect whatsoever on Chinese travelers. It certainly will have no effect on the person who decided on this policy change. There will be no change in the way the Chinese signage is presented. But it will leave thousands of foreign travelers confused and possibly unable to choose the right direction, right station or right platform.

It had little to do with any recalcitrance on the part of the Chicago Shortstop at grasping exactly what was unfolding from the South Africans in their World Twenty20 match at Hambantota.

23 September 2012 | JON SWIFT

But it became abundantly clear that a game foisted on the world by the English, was not and endeavour likely to find broad appeal in the Land of the Free.

The Shortstop patently possesses a quick mind – though logic would tell you that patrolling the area between second and third base on a baseball diamond demands agility of mind as well as physique.

“I can see,” said the Shortstop a brief way into the rain-shortened match, “that this is very definitely not an American thing.”

It was a pointedly pertinent remark which intrigued Dave the Silent, who contended himself by sitting back and assuming the role of an impartial observer.

“Yes well,” he did interject before withdrawing from any further immediate comment, “cricket is very English, and as an American, you would understand that history shows the English couldn’t properly plan a tea party.”

El entrenador del Hapoel y sus problemas de traducción - El Hapoel Kiryat ha conocido San Mamés, estadio en el que se medirá al Athletic en partido de la Europa League.

The easiest way to get to notice really awful translations available on the web is by far watching films. Although many viewers can understand spoken English or any other popular foreign language of their choice quite well, they are not in the habit of turning off the subtitle option. When background noise is too loud, they may come in handy. Yet, more often than not, one gets to read incredibly awkward language which not only ruins the pleasure of watching a film but also raises questions like ‘Who on earth did this pitiful translation?’ or ‘Why didn’t they hire a specialist to do the subtitles?’. I believe you can guess the answers to these questions: Most of the people involved in this kind of job are not qualified translators; they just happen to know the ABC of a foreign language and are right there when the job needs to be done.

Indeed, being proficient in a foreign language does not mean only knowing a few grammar rules and having the ability to grasp the global meaning of a complex sentence. The dialogue in a film usually implies more than that; it sets the tone of a certain conversation and plays an important part in shaping the characters’ personalities. If the translation of their words and sentences sounds as if a machine had done the language transfer, the wit of a dialogue is gone; on top of that, the sense of humour of a character and a whole lot of feelings will dramatically diminish in terms of intensity and variation.

A GREENS' bid to tighten food labelling laws went before the Federal Parliament for the third time this year on Monday.

The bill seeks to change current laws which allow some foods to be labelled "Made in Australia" when the food was grown overseas and re-packaged here.

Greens MP Adam Bandt read the bill in the House of Representatives. It is due for a second reading on Tuesday.

"The language (on food labels) is unnecessarily confusing," he said.

"We can have clear labelling that lets Australians know if they are buying Australian-grown food, and if that product has been processed in Australia."

While the 2008 Blewett Review recommended changes to food labelling laws and the government response said it would take action within two years, little has been done.

Various government ministers have said the issue requires the agreement of the states and that the government was working with the states, but no resolutions have been reached in the four years since the review was completed.

On the same day Mr Bandt again raised the issue, food labelling campaign group Australian Made Australia Grown released survey results revealing 40% of consumers surveyed found it hard to decipher the language on food labels.

Mistranslations in your product or literature will give you a bad image and can drive your client to look elsewhere. Mind Your Translation!