[atlarge-discuss] Translation issues (was Re: [atlarge-discuss] Outreach,Incorporation and Latest statistics on Net use...)

[espresso@e-scape.net]

At 17:30 -0700 2002/08/15, Jeff Williams wrote:
>> Within our group are native speakers of several languages who might not be translators but could do rough translation at a pinch. However, when it comes to things like a Constitution and bylaws, not to mention good public relations materials or committee reports, I suspect rough isn't good enough.
>
>  I think your right here Judyth!  However there are a number of software
>translation tools available that could do much of this work...

As a translator in constant contact with other translators around the world, I can assure you (and anyone else who doesn't know it yet) that those handy "instant translation" things on the Web, and even the more sophisticated computer-assisted translation tools, are a long, long way from producing intelligible documents human beings would actually want to read. 

I once had a client who wanted to save some money by having his association's bylaws "translated" by Power Translator (software being sold to businesses as adequate to translate their correspondence, spec sheets and such) and paying me a lot less for "just an edit" of the results. Please believe me when I tell you that while what the program produced somewhat resembled French if you didn't look at it too closely, it captured the meaning of the original about 20% of the time.

A short-and-sweet example of the problem with computerized translations is the sentence "30 000 ventilateurs attendaient l'alumette" for the English "30,000 fans attended the match". Think of a stadium-full of electric fans all waiting to blow out a match... One of my own real-life encounters with a Babelfish translation had all instances of "Bell" (the communications conglomerate) translated into a "cloche" of the ringing variety.

This is NOT a good way to convince people of other language groups that we are sensitive to their needs, as well as being completely useless when it  comes to legal documents where precise meaning matters.

>  I can get just about any kind of document translated into Chinese >(Several dialects), Japanese, French, German, Spanish, Portuguese, Polish >and of course Russian.

That is excellent ... as long as you mean they'll be translated into something native speakers would recognize as good usage in their own languages. Otherwise, speaking from experience here, those documents will be perceived the same way we perceive those "real signs from foreign hotels" and "real product instructions" which keep circulating around the Net as jokes.

Regards,

Judyth

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Judyth Mermelstein     "cogito ergo lego ergo cogito..."
Montreal, QC           <espresso@e-scape.net>
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"History teaches us that men and nations behave wisely once 
they have exhausted all other alternatives." (Abba Eban)
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See the UNESCO OBSERVATORY ON THE INFORMATION SOCIETY!
http://www.unesco.org/webworld/observatory  



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