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From English into X - how much does English knowledge matter?
Thread poster: S_G_C
564354352 (X)
564354352 (X)  Identity Verified
Denmark
Local time: 08:06
Danish to English
+ ...
A lot Dec 28, 2015

It is hugely important that you understand your source language and culture extremely well. How else can you make sure that what you communicate in your target language is a true rendition of the source text?

For instance, I would suggest that using 'Nazi' in any context to describe yourself is a sign of a lack of understanding of English culture. The term has such a negative connotation that a native English-speaker would be highly unlikely to use the word to describe himself/herse
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It is hugely important that you understand your source language and culture extremely well. How else can you make sure that what you communicate in your target language is a true rendition of the source text?

For instance, I would suggest that using 'Nazi' in any context to describe yourself is a sign of a lack of understanding of English culture. The term has such a negative connotation that a native English-speaker would be highly unlikely to use the word to describe himself/herself.

Just a thought...

As for the rest... We all make mistakes when we translate, but hopefully, we correct them when we proofread our own work before shipping it off to paying clients...
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Gabriele Demuth
Gabriele Demuth  Identity Verified
United Kingdom
Local time: 07:06
English to German
Not typing errors! Dec 28, 2015

jyuan_us wrote:

Typo errors are the results of negligence and beginner errors are the results of ignorance. I don't think "mistaking it's and its, there and their, writing i instead of I or using the double negation in a sentence" can be categorized as beginner errors.


Apart from i and I these are not typing errors as many people genuinely cannot distinguish which one should be used, their or there, and apostrophes as well, not everybody knows how to use them, but I think these are errors you see from English native speakers and English native children.

[Edited at 2015-12-28 07:41 GMT]


 
Heinrich Pesch
Heinrich Pesch  Identity Verified
Finland
Local time: 09:06
Member (2003)
Finnish to German
+ ...
Interesting subject Dec 28, 2015

In Finnish written and spoken language are almost identical, the same is true for Estonian. Written English is very complex compared to spoken English.
I sometimes wonder why nobody even suggests to modernise written English.

In a conversation over the phone you cannot differentiate its and it's, why should it be important to make the distinction in written text? In a spoken sentence "there" and "their" sound the same, and nobody asks, what did you mean, is there an "i" in the
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In Finnish written and spoken language are almost identical, the same is true for Estonian. Written English is very complex compared to spoken English.
I sometimes wonder why nobody even suggests to modernise written English.

In a conversation over the phone you cannot differentiate its and it's, why should it be important to make the distinction in written text? In a spoken sentence "there" and "their" sound the same, and nobody asks, what did you mean, is there an "i" in their? But in a book they need the "i". And teese there children with it (spelling errors intended).

I know, history is very important to the British, why straighten a road when the winding path was good enough for the army of Richard II?

But English language is the modern Latin, everybody needs it. So written English needs to be modernised and simplified.

Feel free to throw your stones at me.
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Lingua 5B
Lingua 5B  Identity Verified
Bosnia and Herzegovina
Local time: 08:06
Member (2009)
English to Croatian
+ ...
English spelling system Dec 28, 2015

Yes, it's confusing to the native children too. In my native language, one sound = one letter (systematically), which makes it quite straightforward. Basically in English you need to memorize the word visually or think about its function in the sentence (its = possessive pronoun, eg.)

The OP refers to forum posts, while people post here having varying levels of English, sometimes not working with English at all. Often times, they just need to send a message across quickly, receive s
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Yes, it's confusing to the native children too. In my native language, one sound = one letter (systematically), which makes it quite straightforward. Basically in English you need to memorize the word visually or think about its function in the sentence (its = possessive pronoun, eg.)

The OP refers to forum posts, while people post here having varying levels of English, sometimes not working with English at all. Often times, they just need to send a message across quickly, receive some troubleshooting help, etc. (perfect English is not vital).

OP, there will be contexts where your perfection will be relevant (such as in your work, or when going FOR?? college).



[Edited at 2015-12-28 09:22 GMT]
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Samuel Murray
Samuel Murray  Identity Verified
Netherlands
Local time: 08:06
Member (2006)
English to Afrikaans
+ ...
@Sorana Dec 28, 2015

Sorana_M. wrote:
I have never ever managed to figure out why some people who seem to master the more complex English language and grammar twists make such beginner errors as mistaking it's and its, there and their, writing i instead of I or using the double negation in a sentence?


When someone writes "its" instead of "it's", then it is not always because he doesn't know the difference, but because he was too quick to click "Post reply", and didn't see his mistake. Also keep in mind that the ProZ.com forum system only allows some people to fix such errors immediately (others have to wait several hours before they can fix their mistakes).

I find that when I type, I sometimes make mistakes that I would like to call a typing error, except that those errors are also of the type that you mention. I might type "Hope to year from you soon", but (a) I have no difficulty in telling "hear" and "year" apart and (b) I see the error immediately after I type it, and I correct it. I suppose many other people suffer from #a but then fail to proceed to #b. I have the same problem in my native language with certain letter or sound combinations. I think some people are just bad proofreaders of their own work.


 
Dan Lucas
Dan Lucas  Identity Verified
United Kingdom
Local time: 07:06
Member (2014)
Japanese to English
A nice idea, but impractical Dec 28, 2015

Heinrich Pesch wrote:
But English language is the modern Latin, everybody needs it. So written English needs to be modernised and simplified.

Yes, but nobody "owns" English in the way Italy "owns" Italian or Japan "owns" Japanese.

Most of us have personal experience of the diversity and vitality as it is used outside the UK. Some of us - mainly those who have lived outside Europe, I suspect - believe that the variants of English used in other countries are neither better nor worse; they are merely different.

What it comes down to is that Britain is no longer in a position to mandate how English is used. On the other hand, no other country is in such a position either. Countries in which English is used by an appreciable fraction of the population include the UK, the US, Canada, India, New Zealand and Australia. Perhaps South Africa should also be included.

Without some kind of central authority, who or what would decide which parts of written English should be simplified and which should be left alone? It's been a topic of discussion for centuries.

Either way, enforcement would not be feasible. English-speaking countries seem to have enough difficulty on agreeing on the best method of teaching English within their own borders. Asking for cooperation between countries would be asking too much.

Regards
Dan


 
Lingua 5B
Lingua 5B  Identity Verified
Bosnia and Herzegovina
Local time: 08:06
Member (2009)
English to Croatian
+ ...
Yes, good question. Dec 28, 2015

Once upon a time, double negation was correct English (at least in American English, just read some old American literary works and you will see), so obviously meanwhile someone decided it's now "incorrect".

It's just progression and development of language, things happen spontaneously. Nobody should lose their sleep over it.


 
polyglot45
polyglot45
English to French
+ ...
standards of English Dec 28, 2015

While I am fully conscious that there are lots of translators who, like Phil Goddard (surprisingly), claim to translate from languages they do not write perfectly, I still strongly believe that the better your mastery of your source language(s), the more likely you will produce more than just a "workhorse" translation.

Not only do you need to understand the grammar and spelling differences but you also need to understand the culture of your source language because words can have dif
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While I am fully conscious that there are lots of translators who, like Phil Goddard (surprisingly), claim to translate from languages they do not write perfectly, I still strongly believe that the better your mastery of your source language(s), the more likely you will produce more than just a "workhorse" translation.

Not only do you need to understand the grammar and spelling differences but you also need to understand the culture of your source language because words can have different meanings depending on context and, if you ignore how the other system works, you can completely miss vital nuances.

I used to teach translation into English at high level to apprentice translators for whom English was not their mother tongue. Now I am a great believer in working into your mother tongue as opposed to any other language, so you may wonder why I accepted such a task.

The answer is simple: I discussed the issue of principle with the course directors and we were all agreed that the students in question would probably never work into English in their professional lives but that working in both directions opens your eyes to aspects of the language pair that you might never otherwise realise.

In English plurals are often used where Romance languages, in particular, would use a singular noun. Romance languages are heavy on nouns, whereas English tends to favour verbs. There are lots of words that, on paper look the same in, say, English and French but which either have totally different or partially different meanings.

Having previously taught English translation to English mother tongue speakers, I have to admit that teaching it to non-English speakers was even an eye-opener for me, in that I found myself identifying differences that I had never previously consciously put into words, things that I had always done instinctively but never translated into principles. Discussing with former students, it has also emerged that they had gained in awareness from what might have seemed a sterile exercise, given that they were not planning to work into English as a career.

On a lighter note, I was recently doing a translation of a text with lots of names, figures and formulae. I therefore opted to copy the file and overtype. I still don't know how the original file was programmed but, every time I typed a word beginning in "i", the computer obligingly put a capital "I" and every time I typed "its", the computer merrily transformed it into "it's". I had to triple re-read to make sure I missed none of these "mistakes". Sometimes the machine thinks it knows better than you do !
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Kay Denney
Kay Denney  Identity Verified
France
Local time: 08:06
French to English
with all due respect Dec 28, 2015

Gitte Hovedskov, MCIL wrote:
...I would suggest that using 'Nazi' in any context to describe yourself is a sign of a lack of understanding of English culture. The term has such a negative connotation that a native English-speaker would be highly unlikely to use the word to describe himself/herself.



may I beg to differ? I personally refer to myself as a "grammar Nazi" and call my colleague with whom I share an office and kitchen "the towel Nazi" because she is a total stickler for proper tea towel and hand towel use. I try to use each towel as intended, especially if she is there, but at home anything goes, and when I invite my colleague round, I keep her out of my kitchen

I think people of my parents' generation would find this usage of "Nazi" shocking. I think it originated in the States, which did not get invaded or even bombed by Nazis, so there is less controversy there. Although I have read American descendants of Jews who fled the Nazis condemning the term. Anyway, I wouldn't use the word in the presence of my parents for example and would be careful using it with Jewish friends around. But among most friends, which would include atheists, Christians, Muslims and Hindus who well know that I abhor any form of racism or ostracism, I feel free to use it.

In the same way that I called my BFF a "tart" on FB the other day. She posted a photo of herself showing a fair bit of cleavage as she spooned mincemeat into her pastry cases, and we were discussing the difference between pies and tarts. She knows very well that I don't judge her sex life, we were just having a laugh, it's what our friendship is about. I'm all for political correctness but there are limits!


 
Kay Denney
Kay Denney  Identity Verified
France
Local time: 08:06
French to English
I agree Dec 28, 2015

philgoddard wrote:

I translate French into English. I'm not very good at writing French, but that's not what I'm being paid to do.


with Phil, but up to a certain extent. You do need a firm grasp of spelling, in order to understand even when the French contains typos/spelling mistakes/imprecisions.

I remember proofreading the sentence "Depuis (2014), nous avons constaté que quand ils viennent le premier jour, il ne reste qu'un jour" translated as "Since (2014), we have observed that when they come on the first day, there's only one day left". That is the correct translation looking at it word for word. The context was a discussion of attendance at a 2-day trade fair, so it was correct to say that there was only one day left after the first day. Grammatically correct, but a rather daft statement. The sentence clearly required a different reading: "Depuis (2014), nous avons constaté que quand ils viennent le premier jour, ils ne restent qu'un jour" which would translate as "Since (2014), we have observed that when they come on the first day, they only stay for one day" (i.e. in previous years, first-day visitors used to stay for the second day as well). My litmus paper test is to dictate the sentence to my native French colleague, to see whether her understanding matched mine and it usually does.


 
Tom in London
Tom in London
United Kingdom
Local time: 07:06
Member (2008)
Italian to English
Language in the UK Dec 28, 2015

For language insomniacs in the UK, every Sunday night/Monday morning at 0100 there's always an interesting (and fun) discussion on BBC Radio 5 about the correct use of the English language and how it's changing.

I happened to catch last night's. It's available here on the BBC iPlayer

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b06smdhv

Starting at 01:06 approx.
<
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For language insomniacs in the UK, every Sunday night/Monday morning at 0100 there's always an interesting (and fun) discussion on BBC Radio 5 about the correct use of the English language and how it's changing.

I happened to catch last night's. It's available here on the BBC iPlayer

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b06smdhv

Starting at 01:06 approx.

One of the guests is Caroline Taggart, Author of "New Words for Old: Recycling Our Language for the Modern World"

http://tinyurl.com/hbn7vpj

Enjoy !

[Edited at 2015-12-28 12:13 GMT]
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Christine Andersen
Christine Andersen  Identity Verified
Denmark
Local time: 08:06
Member (2003)
Danish to English
+ ...
Modernising /modernizing English is impossible Dec 28, 2015

Heinrich Pesch wrote:

...
I know, history is very important to the British, why straighten a road when the winding path was good enough for the army of Richard II?

But English language is the modern Latin, everybody needs it. So written English needs to be modernised and simplified.

Feel free to throw your stones at me.


I wouldn't dream of throwing stones at you. I have attempted to modernise English myself, but ended up dutifully following style guides and specified sets of rules as far as possible.

I have two very entertaining books on my shelf: Eats(,) Shoots & Leaves by Lynne Truss, and The Fight for English by David Crystal.

Lynne Truss is a stickler for correct use of commas and apostrophes, there and their etc. and makes a lot of very good points.
David Crystal - in the book I mentioned and many others - discusses why English varies as much as it does. The very short answer is that there never has been a single definitive form of English. It has always been a family of dialects and regional variants.

You can settle for a particular variant - American English as defined by the Chicago Manual of Style, just to take the most eye-catching on my shelf, or you can refer to the writers I grew up with in the UK - Arthur Murray, Fowler, Randolph Quirk, Ernest Gowers... as updated by Michael Swan, Greenbaum & Whitcut and others...

It is impossible to agree on phonetic spelling - native speakers from different regions simply do not pronounce the words the same way, and there is no standard that we all strive to achieve.
__________________________

To get back on topic:
All this actually makes it very important for a translator to be familiar with the specific variety of English used in the source.
After all, understanding the source is half of translation. This is not the same as writing it correctly, however. I translate from Norwegian and Swedish, which I understand well, but can barely speak or write. I never attempt to write Danish medical Latin either, but I translate from it.

Back to English: words like tire and tyre for instance, or kerb and curb are not interchangeable in UK English, while in the US tyre and kerb are not normally used.

There are countless other differences, which are not due to ignorance and are not actual errors. The language has simply developed differently down the centuries. Native speakers and writers of different English variants can and do misunderstand each other.

Just as modern Romance languages have developed from Latin (and there was probably never a single definitive form of Latin either...), there are even discussions about the English Languages in the plural, and whether there is a variant called Globish or something like that.
As soon as you try to standardise (standardize) English, it ceases to be the native language known to millions of people.

Native speakers are not always consistent, and do not always write their own variant correctly. To add to the confusion, English is widely used by non-natives as the 'new Latin' or as a lingua franca that is more widely understood (we hope) than many others. In theory a language like Esperanto or Interlingua would be more practical, but even they have their dialects or would very soon develop them.

I regularly edit and proofread texts written by Scandinavians in their particular variety of English and it is definitely an advantage to know the writer's native language! Scandi-English is a variety in itself...

Yes, it is vital to understand English - or any source language, of course, but that is not the same as being able to write it correctly, without the support of spelling checkers, AutoCorrect and other aids in a forum like this.

Happy translating and happy New Year!



Edited to correct myself: I have learnt/learned that Esperanto users try to avoid dialects, but at least one commentator finds this a weakness in the language!



[Edited at 2015-12-28 21:59 GMT]


 
Sandra & Kenneth Grossman
Sandra & Kenneth Grossman  Identity Verified
Israel
Local time: 10:06
French to English
+ ...
What is a "grammar Nazi"? Dec 28, 2015

One who sends people who make spelling mistakes to the gas chambers?

I find this type of language nauseating.

.


 
S_G_C
S_G_C
Romania
Local time: 09:06
English to Romanian
TOPIC STARTER
Didn't know that Dec 28, 2015



For instance, I would suggest that using 'Nazi' in any context to describe yourself is a sign of a lack of understanding of English culture. The term has such a negative connotation that a native English-speaker would be highly unlikely to use the word to describe himself/herself.



I didn't know that.

In Romanian, a "grammar Nazi" is a person who continuously corrects the others when he/she hears or sees them speaking or writing, up to the point of being a nuisance. A person obsessed with correct vocabulary and grammar. No gas chambers or anything like that implied.


 
S_G_C
S_G_C
Romania
Local time: 09:06
English to Romanian
TOPIC STARTER
FOR not correct? Dec 28, 2015

So going FOR college, like go for it!, meaning try it, don't miss this chance, is not OK?

And I wasn't only referring to some proz posts, in my free time, I sometimes read stuff in English and I spot such mistakes.

Nobody should lose their sleep over it.


I do...

but that is not the same as being able to write it correctly, without the support of spelling checkers, AutoCorrect and other aids in a forum like this.


I don't know what to say, I learned how to write English without any of these... I mean, Romania has been secluded from the rest of the world during the Communist regime, and even after its fall, in December '89, it took us a long time before we caught up with the rest of the world. I don't know when the first computers appeared in the world, but I learned to use one in 1998-1999. And that was at college, not at home, and not on a regular basis. Internet was not widely available, either.


[Edited at 2015-12-28 18:04 GMT]


 
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From English into X - how much does English knowledge matter?






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