Posted 4 years, 8 months ago around lunchtime by oso
If you’re a blog skimmer rather than reader, please comment on this one question, would you be willing to occasionally volunteer some time to translate important blog posts from Spanish (or any other language) into English for Global Voices? And if so, how frequently and what types of blog posts?
As I’ve written before and as I’ll continue to write until things change: delightedly surprised am I that the world wide web remains such a text-centric medium. Just when the written word seemed slated for undistinguished extinction in contemporary life, it has mounted – via the internet – a Clintonian sized comeback.
The advantages of text over audio and video are many, but universal communication is not one of them. Text will not give you intonation of voice, no hand gestures, sympathetic smiles, facial expressions, nor awkward laughter. Which is exactly how I managed to communicate with other travelers at Kabul Hostel this morning when we didn’t speak the same language. In short, try going to any country in the world and watching a soap opera in the local language and you’ll realize just how much you’re able to understand without “understanding” anything.
It was the fourth session, The future of the Global Conversation, that I had most been looking forward to in the weeks leading up to the GV Summit. Not because I am a fan of futuristic hypothesizing, but because the issue of translation was promised to play a central part in the conversation. Specifically, I wanted to take a look at the toolset being developed by the Blogamundo guys to help volunteers translate blog posts and web pages from one language to another. Unfortunately, Murphy’s Law would not be overcome and tech problems prevented us from seeing the goods.
Instead, in my opinion, what turned out to be one of the most memorable tangential monologues of the conference (of which there were plenty) came from one very articulate and magnetic Sharon Hom, the executive director of Human Rights in China, who commented on her experience at the International Women’s Forum in Beijing. Sharon, equally fluent in Mandarin and English obviously chose not to wear translator’s headphones at the Forum. But then she heard a speaker use some term like “non-hegemonic reification” and thought to herself, now, how in the hell are they going to translate that. Grasping for the headphones, she said that the translation – by the best in the business – in no way represented what the speaker was trying to get across. It dawned on her that other words besides “non-hegemonic reification” might also present difficulties to translators and so she set out to create an English-Chinese lexicon of global terms which would be understood by speakers of both languages. In the end, UNESCO wound up publishing the list as the “English-Chinese Lexicon of Women and Law.” But you might be surprised by some of the words, which she said were most difficult to find agreement on. Words like family, sexuality, and gender. Her point was as pertinent as it was obvious: the difficulty in translation lies in conveying ideas and concepts, not words and sentences.
Translating such concepts as family, sexuality, and gender seems to be much easier between Spanish and English than Mandarin and English. But that’s not always the case. A translator for Televisa and I were once discussing the Mexican media’s use of the word “embargo” which means “seizure” in Spanish (as in if you don’t pay your credit cards they come and “embargar” your household items). And so when you try and report on the United States’ “embargo on Cuba” it sounds very much like we are planning our takeover any day now. Which could, in fact, account for some Latin American paranoia that we will do just that. But the translator told me that the Mexican media has gone ahead and adopted the American use of the word embargo in political context even if it may confuse some readers.
This is certainly not the first time that American influence has played its part on southernly neighbors’ word meanings. Control, lonche, sándwich, cóctel, ponche, bar, chance, and lobista are all easy examples. Furthermore, like the change in meaning of “embargo,” Latin Americans now uses educación where Spaniards still say pedagogía or eneñanza. Argumento replaces discusión, audiencia for concurrencia, and complexión takes the place of tez. Or there is my favorite, maybellín, which is replacing maquillaje.
The point is, even in the same language, one person’s American persea is another’s Palta and yet another’s testicle, or “aguacate.” And so the difficulties of translating global ideas into local contexts becomes almost as daunting as the reverse: conveying local nuances to a global audience.
I’m about to get kicked out of the brand new library here in Gracia (thank you god for the coquettish girl who let me use her password for wi-fi!) so I’ll have to finish this tomorrow. Please do comment on that first question though even if it’s telling me to fuck off unless Global Voices would be willing to pay you money to do translations. Peas and love to all.
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I could translate things from Spanish, but it would probably be a challenge if its from any other country besides Mexico. As long as the post was heavily technical (such as new gadgets) or legal/politcal, I think I would be able to translate.
Also, I just noticed two things. I can’t believe you haven’t seen Machuca, which is easily one of the best movies I’ve seen all year. I like to think I know something about Chilean film just ’cause I took a class on it a long time ago.
Two, eek! You’ve associated my last name with my blog. I’m a little paranoid about that.
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I’d be willing to translate to and from spanish. I would prefer articles having to do with culture, media and society, but if anything else needs translating and no one else is willing to tackle them, I’d take them as well.
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The main problem that I see is with expediency and automation, which is what you would hope to accomplish with an electronic medium so you can communicate in real time. If one could forgo those, and had the resources, then I think that effective translations can still be accomplished. Here in the ivory tower we have faced similar issues trying to translate neuropsychological tests. The trick in our case is to retain the context and tap the same supposed brain ability we are trying to measure with each test; that is, to see if the test is equally valid for use with people of different cultures/languages. We are so far doing this in Mandarin, Marathi, Portuguese, and Spanish. I am most familiar with Spanish, and given the cultural similarities with English speakers, it’s probably less challenging than translating or trans-contextualizing into Eastern languages. Nevertheless, I’ve seen good resullts by using translators that understand the context and intent, and by using a representative panel, rather than a single person, to ensure linguistic neutrality (e.g, for different Spanish speaking countries). Most standard translations use the back-translation method, which I am not a fan of but is useful if there aren’t competent bilinguals around to check the results. I wouldn’t know how to translate “non-hegemonic reification” into Spanish (I don’t know what it means in English), but if someone understood the context in both cultural settings they could probably come up with something close.
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No I wouldn’t be willing because I (unfortunately) don’t know any other languages. JINGOISM RULES
“One thing I would recommend, Grace. Take the time in school to learn a foreign language. I myself didn’t and I feel I’ve paid a price for it.”
-Luke Wilson, Bottle Rocket
Also – did you know my Firefox crashes every once in a while when I try to visit your site? I’m not sure if anyone else has this problem….
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I don’t even know if I used the word “jingoism” properly there. I was also considering “ethnocentrism” and “ignorance.”
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Wenas TArdes don Oso.
Espero que te encuentres muy bien
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My Spanish translating is so basic that I couldn’t promise to help out. I can translate for myself, and I even stink at that.
And Cindy – I’m with you on being paranoid about my blog being associated with my last name. Luckily a less-than-famous 19th century author shares my name, and google loves her.
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perhaps in the future when i have more time, i can volunteer. i’ve witnessed bad translations and their such a pet peeve. they can be so detremental in govt or school settings.
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Yo me apunto a la traducción.
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I’d be willing to translate into spanish or english (or swedish if you need) I do have enough time to spare and I enjoy translating different stuff.
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You can put me down for some translation as well, homes. Un abrazo.
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Me ofrezco a traducir del español al inglés (o viceversa) uno o dos artículos por mes (dependiendo de la extensión de los mismos) de cualquier temática. Espero de esta manera poder colaborar con la comunidad de bloggers mundial.
Saludos, Sonoman.X
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Everyone who has volunteered should now be a member of the google group. If you’re not, please let me know. Medea has already finished our first translation which I’ll be posting on Global Voices in a couple hours. I’ll also hopefully be posting the follow up to this post in a couple hours as well.
Swervecurve,
Expediency was definitely a problem when I was doing all the translations so this can only make things faster. In fact, after Medea volunteered to translate the first post, she got a great translation back to me in just a few hours. She did mention though that she struggled a tad with the Bolivian slang which brings up your other point. If an Argentinean asks a Mexican what diario he or she reads, the response would probably be something like, “what do you mean, what do I read daily?” I know that the folks behind Wiktionary are doing some work in etymology and common translation problems. I should probably get in touch with them.
Did you ever hear the NPR piece by the guy who fed quotes from Hallmark Valentines Day cards into Google Translate and then re-translated those translations back into English? It was hilarious.
Bobbo,
Usually I’m lost when you quote movies (every other sentence), but that one rang true. Bottle Rocket = amazing. As does the word Jingoism, which I try to always slip into casual conversation. Though, I think it woulda been better suited for the next post. Sorry that Firefox is not playing nice. I’m on an early beta of WordPress 2.0 which is really weighted down with Javascript. I’ve been meaning to upgrade and hopefully will soon.
Irasali,
Bad translations used to be my pet peeve as well until I saw how bad my own were. It really is an art that would take a lifetime to master. A translator needs to be able to understand the heart of every concept which he/she is translating. Which means, I guess, that they need to understand everything in the world.
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[...] It was amazing to watch people meet each other at the Global Voices conference earlier this month – David Sasaki and Georgia Popplewell, for instance, who’ve become a dream team covering the Americas, but hadn’t met face to face before coming to London. (BTW, don’t miss David’s excellent recent post on translation and language…) [...]
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I´ll be happy to help translating post from English the Spanish and Spanish to English..
Besides I´m learning Chinese soon also I will be able to help with this language.
Bye
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[...] This post is the follow up to this one. [...]
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You mean the world to me ….translated into spanish??