July 2012 - The Translation People

Archive for July, 2012

The Bavarian State Library opens a new exhibition on constructed world languages: 125 years of Esperanto

July 25th, 2012

Up until 9th September, the Bavarian State Library in Munich will be home to an interesting new exhibition which will cover the theme “Utopia and reality, constructed languages for the globalised world”. The exhibition will not only celebrate the 125^th anniversary of Esperanto, but also the 100^th year anniversary of Johann Martin Schleyer’s death. Johan Martin Schleyer was the German Catholic priest who invented Volapuk, another constructed language.

By illustrating how understanding can be simplified through an easy-to-learn language, common to all, the inventor of the artificial language Volapuk paved the way for the much more successful language Esperanto. Volapuk spread quite rapidly from southern Germany to other countries in Europe and even overseas. This led to the formation of associations, magazines and books in Volapuk and even the use of the language at international conventions.

However, following its initial triumph Volapük did die a quick death, this was due to language reform and Schleyer’s regimented development of the language. Even if his constructed language featured regular pronunciation, grammar and word formation, it was still relatively difficult to remember. Before Esperanto became popular, Volapuk’s time had already passed.

In 1887 the Polish physician Ludwig Zamenhof Lejzer published the first ever textbook for a universal world language: Esperanto. Zamenhof wanted constructed language, as Schleyer did, to end the Babylonian confusion of words. His first dictionary contained 1000 word roots that emerged from different languages. Unlike Volapük, Esperanto is formed of a simple combination of easier to remember words and sounds like a mix of Italian and Russian.

Although Esperanto has disappeared from the consciousness of most people, this language is still not dying out as quickly as you might think:

• According to a recent EU report between 200,000 and three million people Esperanto, worldwide.

• Vatican Radio broadcasts in Esperanto, Firefox is translated into Esperanto , and with more than 135,000 Wikipedia articles in Esperanto, the language is in 22^nd place out of the 272 Wikipedia languages.

If you are interested in learning more about Esperanto, The Esperanto Association offers a wealth of information.

Posted in Language focus, News | Comment »

A tour de Français!

July 24th, 2012

Congratulations to Bradley Wiggins for his fantastic win of the epic 3200 km cycle road race – The Tour de France! On Sunday 22nd July 2012 he became the first Briton to win the prestigious event, which has been running since 1903.

The Tour de France is a race very close to the heart of the French people. They traditionally hold winners of the Tour with initial suspicion, always secretly hoping that a Frenchman will appear on the podium in Paris. However, the Brit seems to have won the hearts of the French by cycling like a gentleman and slowing the peloton when other riders had crashes that were out of their control, and by speaking the local language: French. Bradley is fluent in French, which he learned during the several years he spent working with French cycling teams. By communicating with the locals in their own language, and of course cycling the race of his life, he’s managed not only to win the French tour, but also perhaps a little bit of French applause. Just another example of the importance of communicating with your audience in a language they understand!

We wish Bradley the very best of luck for the London 2012 Olympics next week!

Posted in News | Comment »

The Olympic Games and Languages

July 23rd, 2012

With so much in the news about London 2012, it interested us from a language service provider’s point of view to find out what role languages play in the Olympics games.

And interesting it is: With 205 countries sending athletes to London this week to compete in the games, you could be forgiven for thinking that the number of languages used officially in the games would be just as numerous. Think again – English and French are the only official languages of the IOC and the Olympic Movement, and so those 2 languages, along with the language of the hosting country, should it be different to English or French are the only official languages used in the games.

It would certainly be a massive feat to have all material, communication, advertising and marketing material etc. published into all of the official languages of the 205 competing countries, but why English and French? Google “Why are English and French the official languages of the Olympic Movement?” and the results are surprisingly fruitless. It isn’t hard though to suggest answers to the question. French is an easy one: it was a Frenchman, Pierre de Coubertin, who was responsible for bringing us the Olympics as we know them today. For English however, we can only assume that English is used because of its reputation as a global language, whether you are an advocate of that reputation or not.

So how are the organisers of London 2012 dealing with the official languages? The London 2012 website is available in both English and French versions. It would appear though, that that’s as far as it goes. In their Web accessibility statement, the organisers state that they consider the needs of “People whose mother tongue is not English”. What if you’re coming to the games from another country and have little or no knowledge of English or French? Could the organisers of London 2012 have had their website translated into more languages, and other materials as well? How far should you go when staging an international event?

We asked one of The Translation People team for their opinion. Hannah Snell, Account Manager in Birmingham, says “I think that, realistically, the organisers of London 2012 should have translated their website into more languages. What is really interesting is that French doesn’t come as high up as you think it would in the list of the languages with the most speakers.” If you research the figures, the top 5 languages, based on the number of native speakers, are Mandarin, Spanish, English, Hindi-Urdu and Arabic. If the London 2012 website was translated into these 5 languages, it could potentially reach up to 2 billion people, whereas the figure for English and French alone is well under half a billion.

Whatever your opinion, the multitude of nationalities and languages coming together in London this week will certainly make for surely the most multicultural summer we’ve ever seen! Bring on the games!

Sources:

http://www.olympic.org

http://www.london2012.com

Posted in Language focus, News, Translation Industry News | Comment »

Multiple-language learners may fall short of professional translation capabilities

July 23rd, 2012

Even if you have learned a second language to a good level of fluency, your ability to convert sentences between it and your native tongue may still fall short of professional translation agencies’ capabilities.

That is because, unlike truly bilingual people who have grown up speaking more than one language naturally, those who learn at a later age are usually taught the second language in isolation.

Researchers at the University of the Basque Country are now looking at new ways to approach Spanish, Basque, English and French, to identify new linguistic similarities and differences between them that could be used to teach foreign languages in a more joined-up way in future.

“We are studying what happens if we take the languages … out of their watertight compartments,” says the group’s coordinator Durk Gorter.

“In theory – and if we take into consideration other previous research – the results ought to be very good.”

The research highlights the difference between simply speaking a language, and professional translation between two tongues.

In the absence of more joined-up education, translation agencies can continue to provide the level of service required for the final text to still make good grammatical sense.

Source: EurekAlert

Posted in Language focus | Comment »

Google campaigning to save the world’s endangered languages

July 20th, 2012

3000 languages are currently at risk of becoming extinct. This amounts to approximately half of all living languages. Search engine giant Google recently launched a website designed to help save endangered languages. On this website, each language has its own page, listing facts such as number of speakers, areas where the language is spoken, and dialects. In addition, the portal serves as a forum for gathering audio samples and contributions from scholars, as well as for putting native speakers in touch with each other. Although engaging itself heavily in the implementation of this project, Google will soon be handing over the reins to the First Peoples’ Cultural Council and the Institute for Language Information & Technology.

www.endangeredlanguages.com

Posted in Language focus | Comment »

Birmingham team relocates to larger premises

July 16th, 2012

To meet the demands of a growing team and following the continued year-on-year success of the company, The Translation People is pleased to announce that its Birmingham office has relocated to larger premises.

Although still based in Birmingham, the team have moved from Concorde House to a larger office in Vienna House, situated in Birmingham International Park. The new premises offer excellent transport links and additional, much-needed space to support the company as it continues to grow through 2012 and beyond.

The Birmingham team are all very excited about the benefits of the new premises. Gail Owen, Branch Manager, commented: “The Birmingham team have been rapidly increasing sales throughout the last 12 months, which is fantastic for the business. We had outgrown the old offices and are very pleased that our new environment offers enough space to allow us to welcome new faces to the team, which in turn will enable us to offer the best possible service and turnaround times to our clients.”

Posted in Company news, News | Comment »

Professional translation services ‘must interpret the message’

July 10th, 2012

Professional translation services must interpret the message – and not just the words – of the speaker, according to a University of Nottingham team.

Dr Xiaohui Yuan of the School of Cultures, Languages and Area Studies is among them, and is leading the Translating Cultures in International Mediation project to help identify what is important not just in the spoken word, but also in the body language and non-verbal communication of the speaker.

By doing so, she and her team hope to draw conclusions that professional translation agencies can use in future to ensure their staff are fully trained on what to look for, and how to interpret non-verbal signals in their own translations for delegates at conferences, and other such listeners.

“Mediators must have a good grasp of the cultural differences that are at play, how language is used and the impact on the other party when that language is not their mother tongue,” she suggests.

The different kinds of translation services currently available for live events already help to deal with this concern, with chuchotage (‘whispered interpreting’) one option to deliver an almost-live translation of speech as it happens.

Similarly, simultaneous interpreting allows the speaker to continue uninterrupted, and closely follows the individual’s own message, making it easier for spectators to interpret their body language as well as their translated words.

http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2012-06/uon-tc062612.php