Love languages? Looking for a stimulating career path or some freelance work on the side? Becoming a translator may be for you. Professional translation has been growing rapidly in the past decade, yet remains a mystery to many outside the field. What does it take to get started in the translation industry? What does a professional translator do? For the next few weeks, I’m going to take you through the steps of what you need to know and what you need to do to get started.

Language Knowledge and Education

First off, you need to know one language exceptionally well. You mean two, right? I’ll get to other languages later. I’m talking about your native language, be it English, Spanish or Farsi. This is something that is often overlooked in the translation field.

A translator is first and foremost a writer (of someone else’s material). Hopefully you paid attention in your grammar courses and are a voracious reader. You need to have a grasp of different genres of writing in your native language, know the rules of punctuation and basically have such a strong grasp of this language’s structure and use that you can spot a missing comma from 30 yards away in the dark. This can be learned in school (from elementary upwards) or can be acquired on one’s own through reading, private study and writing.

Now, what about your second, third or ninth language? Ideally, this will be your source language, or the language you are actually translating. The value of a good foreign language course cannot be snubbed, be it learning the colors in kindergarten or writing your thesis on the greats of Russian literature. These classes will introduce you to different cultural aspects, grammar structure and more. Formal University study is not a prerequisite, but a strong desire to learn this new language certainly is.

In my opinion, the key to truly understanding the vocabulary, grammar and basically every other aspect of the written language itself comes from reading everything in that language that you can get your hands on. Reading different styles and types of writing in this language will serve you well. Whether it’s a novel, bird watching magazine, online cookbook or instructions on how to put together a ping-pong table, it’s going to teach you something new or reinforce what you already know.

So those are the basics on what you need to know to get started as a translator. In the coming weeks, I’ll talk about the actual act of translating, the translation industry and some other significant topics.

Trusted Translations has launched its multilingual translation sites in Portuguese, French, German, Dutch, Chinese and Japanese.

These are the homes of the main sites in those languages, as well as a short description of each site in its language.

Portuguese Site:

Tradução
Líder em Traduções de Português: Trusted Translations, Inc. Traduções de português de qualidade ao melhor preço, realizadas por tradutor/equipes de tradução especializados.

French Site:

Traduction
Leader en traduction en français: Trusted Translations, Inc. Des traductions en français de qualité aux meilleurs prix réalisées par des équipes de traducteurs spécialisés.

Dutch Site:

Vertaling
Leider in Nederlandstalige Vertaling: Trusted Translations, Inc. Nederlandstalige kwaliteitsvertalingen door gespecialiseerde vertalersteams tegen de beste prijs.

Italian Site:

Traduzione
Azienda Leader nella Traduzione in Italiano: Trusted Translations, Inc. traduzioni in italiano di qualità e ai migliori prezzi, effettuate da team di traduttori esperti.

German Site:

Übersetzung
Führend auf dem Gebiet von Übersetzungen aus dem Deutschen: Trusted Translations, Inc. Übersetzungen von höchster Qualität aus dem Deutschen, angefertigt von professionellen Fachübersetzer-Teams zu besten Preisen.

Japanese Site:

翻訳
リーズナブルな料金でご提供する経験豊かな翻訳家チームによる確かな品質の日本語翻訳。

Chinese Site:

翻譯
专家级翻译团队以最优价格提供高质量中文翻译

The objective of any company making a product or providing a service is of course selling that product or service. To do so, companies hire creative marketing specialists, sociologists and publicists; they perform tests, studies, statistical analyses, advertising campaigns and so on.

An astronomical sum of money invested in all of this…  but why don’t they spend a few bucks on making sure that they are getting a quality translation when they are planning to sell abroad?  Although it may seem like a small detail, why not consult an expert when planning to advertise your product in different languages?

In a similar vein, what about the government officials who decide on the designs for bilingual signs for tourists? Why don’t they consult a translator? It is a small investment that can pay off huge dividends in the long term. Lucky for us, “smart” companies get it.

There are a number of web sites that have compiled some funny examples of these bad translations.  But surely some of these mistranslations, while still funny, are counter productive for the companies (hotels, restaurants or countries), as they negatively affect their image, thereby leading to fewer sales. Here are just a few examples.
How many instruction manuals have we seen that are translation nightmares? This bubble blowing pistol had a note, translated from Japanese to English, that said, “WHILE SOLUTION IS NOT TOXIC IT WILL NOT MAKE CHILD EDIBLE.”
It seems to me that couples visiting Tokyo will pick other hotels over this one, whose rules state: “GUESTS ARE REQUESTED NOT TO SMOKE OR DO OTHER DISGUSTING BEHAVIORS IN BED.”
A doctor in Rome must have noticed his dwindling number of female clients after hanging this sign: “SPECIALIST IN WOMEN AND OTHER DISEASES”
When General Motors introduced its Chevy Nova into South American markets, they didn’t realize what “no va”meant (doesn’t go). When they finally realized why they weren’t selling any Novas, they renamed it the Caribe for the Hispanic market.
When advertising a new ball point pen in Mexico, Parker’s ads should have said, “No goteará en su bolsillo y no lo avergonzará” (Won’t leak in your pocket and embarrass you). But as the company thought that the Spanish word for embarrass was “embarazar,” they said, “No goteará en su bolsillo y no lo embarazará” (Won’t leak in your pocket and impregnate you).
This last example was seen by a colleague, in the city of Buenos Aires. A large wine dealer on an important corner in town had a sign in Spanish on one of the streets and one in English on the other. In Spanish it read, “VINOS AÑEJOS – VINOS NUEVOS” and in English: “OLD WINES – ACTUAL WINES” They probably didn’t understand why customers were suspicious of their “vinos añejos”…

To avoid  falling into the trap of a literal translation (an exceedingly strict adherence to the source text’s composition and grammatical structure), which is justifiable only in some isolated cases, we generally use a variety of methods. These are almost always done automatically, without knowing which approach we are using or what it is called. These strategies, which are quite useful when we cannot find the perfect structure to match the original, are:
ADAPTATION: a cultural or social element from the original text is replaced with a different, but corresponding element in the translation. This is usually something that is more familiar to the intended audience. This is valuable when translating poetry, plays and advertising.
LOAN: this is an untranslated word from the original language (usually written in italics). Examples: fiesta, loco.
CALQUE: is the creation of a neologism with the source language’s structure. Example: fútbol, a word created from the English “football.”
MODULATION: the message’s form is altered by a change in perspective or semantics. A phrase’s angle is adjusted so that it sounds better in the target language:
•    Original in English: It is not difficult to show.
•    Literal Spanish translation: No es difícil de demostrar.
•    Modulated Spanish translation: Es fácil de demostrar.
TRANSPOSITIONING: changing one part of speech for another without changing the meaning of the message.
•    Original in English: After he comes back.
•    Literal Spanish translation: Después de que él regrese.
•    Transposed Spanish translation: Después de su regreso.
EQUIVALENCY: using a word whose meaning is a synonym of another word in the source.

“Just like a musician, an interpreter must have a keen ear for accents as well as a certain aptitude for languages,” states an article published this week in the Orlando Sentinel. The article is on the prosperous business of translations, which, according to the ATA spokesperson, is a 17 billion dollar-a-year industry worldwide.  The article highlights the work of Cuban Erik Camayd-Freixas, a simultaneous translator who has been the voice of the Hispanic community for televised events like George W. Bush’s declaration of war in Iraq, the Mass given by Pope Benedict XVI in Yankee Stadium and Barack Obama’s victory speech on election day. His deep voice, neutral inflection and precise enunciation have been keys to his success.
“When I’m interpreting, I can’t react. It has to look as natural as possible,” said Camayd-Freixas, who is also the Director of Florida International University’s Interpreting and Translation. The article also points out that one of the challenges in simultaneous translating is being able to express one’s self as if he were the speaker. After passing an audition, like an actor, an interpreter must then prepare for their part by studying related vocabulary and learning as much as possible about the topic to be discussed, as well as the person that he or she will be interpreting.
In the American Translators Association’s annual conference, ATA President Jiri Stejskal commented that one of the organization’s biggest challenges is “educating the public on the need for using professional translators and interpreters,” given that not doing so can leave a lot of things to chance.  “It does not matter if it’s a million dollar contract or a manual on medical equipment, a translation error can cost a lot of money, even a life, or as we’ve seen, the elections,”  said Kirk Anderson, association spokesman (See previous posts–  “Election Mistranslations and Mistakes” and “Fatal Mistakes”).

He went on to mention some of the words and phrases John McCain used in his campaign as examples, including “maverick” (res sin marca/ inconformista, disidente) and “You betcha” (puedes apostarlo), declaring that, while these do not have an exact translation and are very “English,” their Spanish versions did not have the same impact as the originals.