The Translation People are pleased to welcome Karen Hall as the newest member of the Glasgow Team. Karen came to Glasgow in 1999 to study Spanish and Portuguese and graduated in Hispanic Studies in 2004. After spending time travelling around Europe and working in a number of different industries the pull of languages was too strong and Karen moved to Leeds to begin an MA in Applied Translation Studies. The course was vocational, involving the study of many areas of translation including machine translation, subtitling for film and TV, linguistics and methodologies of translation. It was here that Karen was first introduced to the world of localisation project management and gained valuable experience of the wide array of computer-assisted translation tools used in the profession today to ensure translation quality and improve time-to-market.

On completing her studies Karen moved to Maidenhead where she worked as a Project Co-ordinator for SDL. Her main role was to manage translation projects for a variety of different clients from online gaming creators to electrical engineering companies. Here Karen experienced firsthand just how many factors are involved in producing a quality translation to meet her client’s needs. She developed her knowledge of translation technology and its many benefits to the translation industry along with her project management skills.

Before joining The Translation People Karen was Interpreting Co-ordinator for Scottish Refugee Council where she managed the Interpreting service for the charity, gaining valuable insight into exactly what is involved in providing an effective interpreting service. As part of this role she was also involved in a number of Scottish Government and NHS groups tasked with creating a framework for translation/interpreting service provision in order to ensure quality and consistency across Scotland.

Karen brings both her interpreting and translation experience to her role as an Account Manager with The Translation People. She is already enjoying working with and getting to know our extensive network of translators and clients. When she is not working Karen loves nothing more than to curl up with a good book, see a film or visit new places. She has recently become a Volunteer Mentor on a Refugee mentoring project in Glasgow where she hopes to put her English teaching skills to good use as well as perhaps picking up a new language herself!

The dawn of a new decade brings exciting times for The Translation People! Given The Translation People’s success in the French Market, January saw the appointment of a new representative in France. The Translation People are delighted to welcome Karen Mariet, former deputy director for Translantic Communications (a Paris-based translation agency) to the steadily expanding team. Karen will be based in western Paris, where The Translation People are currently in the process of setting up a French company. Karen, who is American by birth, has been living in Paris for thirty years – she speaks fluent French (in addition to reading German and Spanish) and will be the main contact for French clients.

After obtaining a Master’s degree from Middlebury College and the Paris Institute for Political Science, Karen attended Georgetown University where she earned a degree in translation. Karen began her linguistic career as a lexicographer for Les Editions Larousse, working as the American consultant for the Larousse Unabridged French-English / English-French Dictionary before firstly setting up as a freelance translator and then as a member of the Translantic team. Fascinated with language, Karen spends much of her free time reading, practising yoga and travelling.

The Translation People are pleased to welcome Denise Sauer to the Birmingham team. Denise completed her undergraduate studies in Würzburg, Germany, at the Würzburger Dolmetscherschule (school for translators and interpreters). She specialised in economics, with English being her first and Spanish her second foreign language. In 2008, after graduating as a certified translator and interpreter (German and English), she moved to Birmingham to start an MA course at Aston University. During her course, MA in Translation in a European Context, Denise studied theoretical concepts of translation amongst other subjects. The study of theoretical aspects aroused her interest in how translations can affect societies, which is also reflected in her MA dissertation, in which she analyses and describes the first English translation of Grimms’ fairy tales and its effects on English children’s literature in nineteenth century England.

After her studies, Denise worked as an in-house translator in Lichfield/Staffordshire. During this time, she  introduced memoQ to make translation processes in the company she worked for more efficient. In her new role as Account Manager, she is looking forward to working with different people from all sorts of cultures and to meeting customers’ translation needs. In her spare time, Denise likes to travel (particularly city trips) and horse riding, a hobby which she hopes she can take up again in Birmingham in the near future.

This week the Glasgow office have enjoyed the company of Ross McMullan, Japanese student. Here he describes his experience so far.

From the quaint south-west English city of Bath to the Scottish cultural hub of Glasgow I have come to spend a few weeks with The Translation People. Its only day two but I thought it best to commence blogging sooner, allowing me to perhaps write another entry before my time here has come to an end. So without further ado allow me to introduce myself.

My name is Ross McMullan. I am currently undertaking an MA in Interpreting and Translation at the University of Bath which is assuredly as hard as it sounds but highly rewarding. With a three week long Easter break I felt as though I needed to sharpen my skills acquired in the classroom with some cutting-edge business experience; looks like I have come to the right place. However, first of all I think I ought to explain more about why I am interested in interpreting and translation and, more markedly, why Japanese.

I began my studies in Japanese in the University of Edinburgh in September of 2004. Actually, at the outset Japanese was only an outside subject, a side dish accompanying French which was my main, if you will. But why study Japanese to begin with? This is a question I am often asked, particularly when I am in Japan, where my response is ‘socchi ni yama ga atta kara’, which literally translates as ‘because there was a mountain there’ in other words ‘because I fancied the challenge’. This is a more succinct explanation than, ‘I started with French but reckoned that going to Japan for a year would be well more interesting than France and also the banter in Japanese class is better’; it’s equivalent would be welcome in English. I suppose the verbose explanation above coupled with the fact that upon leaving secondary education I had a desire to continue learning language would form a plausible explanation.

I thoroughly enjoyed my time in Edinburgh and year abroad in Japan. Before graduation, however, I realised that being able to speak Japanese would not be enough on its own, particularly given that I was far off fluency at that time (and dare say am now, but considerably closer). In addition, whilst in Japan I had the opportunity to interpret on a very informal basis for family and friends who had come to visit; something which I thoroughly enjoyed. Therefore, I opted for the MA at the University of Bath to acquire practical interpreting and translation skills and hone my language skills.

However, the MA does not cover much of the business side of interpreting and translation; that’s where the internship with The Translation People comes into play. As I said, its only day two on the job but already my knowledge of how translation agencies interact with clients and translators has greatly increased. As someone with a potential career, fingers crossed, in interpreting and translation, seeing how clients, agencies, and translators interact is something which should prove beneficial in terms of perfecting self-marketing and increasing awareness of what to focus on and what to avoid in this highly underappreciated industry of irrefutable importance to international business.

I anticipate an informative two week long internship and look forward to positively reporting what I have taken on board and who knows; perhaps one day The Translation People will be calling me (better keep up the hard work then).