Translation

This section of the site includes short items on the following:

• Translators' Day
• titles and professions
• famous mistranslations
• interpreters on the phone
• computer translation

Mark this date

September 30 is St. Jerome's Day. Jerome translated the Bible into Latin, a feat for which he was named patron saint of translators and interpretors.

Translating titles and professions

English is one of the few major world languages not to assign genders to its nouns and articles. This has saved us a lot of grief as language and feminism collide. It is only this year, for example, that kids in France will be taught that a female doctor is une médecin, rather than un médicin, while a female engineer will be une ingénieure rather than un ingénieur.

In Canada, of course, using feminine versions of professions and titles is nothing new. However, this makes life difficult for translators. As translator Esther Matte told us, "It forces us translators to do quite a bit of gymnastics to deliver a text that is not too long and boring to read!" Matte tries to use vocabulary that fits both genders, such as "personnel" for "employees" instead of "employés et employées."

Great mistranslations

Some translators will give you literal, word-for-word translations. However, some major international corporations have discovered that translation requires a little common sense!

This seems to happen a great deal in Spanish.

• Frank Perdue's slogan, "It takes a tough man to make a tender chicken," takes on a whole new meaning in Spanish: "It takes a hard man to make a chicken aroused."
• A Parker Pen "won't leak in your pocket and embarrass you." Parker though that embarazar means "embarrass." It actually means "impregnate."
• In Latin America, Chevy's Nova became the Caribe when it transpired that nova means "it doesn't go."

• Coca-Cola ran afoul of the Chinese alphabet. The name on its bottles read ke-kou-ke-la, which meant "bite the wax tadpole." That got changed to ko-kou-ko-le, which means "happiness in the mouth."
• You may "come alive with the Pepsi Generation," but in Taiwan the slogan became "Pepsi Brings Your Ancestors Back from the Dead."
• Pepsi subsidiary Kentucky Fried Chicken may sell "finger-lickin' good" chicken, but the Chinese were told to "eat their fingers off."

Interpreters on the phone

Canadian organizations can now take calls in any of 140 languages, 24 hours a day. AT&T Language Line Services lets organizations bring interpreters into conference calls. Staff are trained in technical terms and in slang. It costs $250 to enrol, plus $70 a month and per-minute fees of up to $6.25.

Beware computer translations!

The software sounds too good to be true. For a few bucks up front, you're free of per-word translation fees forever. Sadly, you get what you pay for. Spectrum, a New York City newsletter for translators, tested one program.

The original message was "Je lit un livre par Henry Kissinger, 'Diplomacy.' Il parle souvent de Robespierre dans aussi qu'il était un grand leaders des affaires internationals parce qu'il comprennait la philosophe "raison d'état", c'est à dire "le nationalisme." Qu'est-ce que vous pensez de Robespierre, les françaises?"

It became, "I reads a book by Kissinger Henry, "Diplomacy." It speaks often of Robespierre in also as it etait a big leader of international parcequ matters' it comprennait the "raison d'etat" philosopher, this is has to say "le nationalisme." Do you think Robespiere, Francaises?"

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