It is fair to say that Spanish translation is the U.S. is divided equally between the domestic and international market. These markets each have their own idiosyncrasies that represent only one aspect of the language problem in the United States.

U.S. based translations face a very different situation from that experienced by markets in other Spanish speaking countries. On the one hand is the domestic market, where the target audience is highly heterogeneous, submerged in bilingual media and at times with low educational level. This is a population that innocently uses Spanglish. On the other hand is the international one, in which translations can be aimed at any of the 22 countries of the Hispanic world, or to all countries equally.

The U.S. market makes the translation process more difficult for the translator and the translation company. Typically, translations into Spanish need to have very specific guidelines or the translation can be plagued with differences. Translators from different backgrounds tend to use different terms and forms of expression. Reason why it is so important to keep in mind that Spanish speakers often react strongly to the use of words that are not common in their countries. Of course all this has a solution: if translators work with a glossary and a style manual, customers will ultimately receive a satisfactory translation.

However, the Spanish language is basically the same for all countries. The most noticeable differences between the various forms of expression in Spanish are at the level of speech. The lower the educational level of the speaker, the more pronounced is the difference of expression. But no matter what dialect is used, if it is written in good basic Spanish, any Spanish speaker will understand it.

Having said that, it is important to recognize the idiosyncrasies of the market. For example, when translating for a U.S. audience, numerals should be the same as in English. That is, one dollar and fifty cents is written one point fifty and not one comma fifty. The reason for this is obvious: U.S. Spanish speakers live in a world that expresses decimal points with a period and not a comma as in their countries of origin. Changing it would be extremely confusing and may even cause lawsuits. Moreover, some Latin American countries are increasingly adopting the decimal separator. For example: Dominican Republic, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Mexico, Nicaragua, Panama, Peru and Puerto Rico.

Spanglish

The most troubling aspect of the U.S. market is Spanglish. In short, it is the use of English words and, in many cases, combined with an English syntax. Requests to translate in Spanglish already exist in the market. This is obviously for marketing purposes to reach to a potential buyer and sell a product. However, Spanglish is not a dialect and its use should not be encouraged. Promoting Spanglish can have unpredictable consequences for the evolution, or rather the involution of Spanish or Hispanic heritage in the United States.

Although it seems like Twitter has been with us a lifetime, the Spanish version is only one year old.

Thanks to a community of volunteer translators the service began operating in Spanish on November 2, 2009. Gradually, it spread throughout Spanish-speaking users.

Twitter managed to grow globally even more after adding this service. In fact, it grew nearly 736% in Spain and Latin America, a significant figure that has helped microblogging reach more than 145 million members and growing.

There are a number of organizations who are advocates of the importance of language, localization, and global content. As frequent industry contributors, they organize events to promote quality standarization and help strengthen a community that spreads across the globe. Translation Manager, Localization Managers, Translation company owners and operators, among others, meet at such events to discuss the latest industry trends, ideas and insights from around the world. Below are a few of the conferences being held this year and early next year.

LISA Forum Europe: Building Quality, Building Customers

The program will feature tracks on defining localization quality, assessing quality, planning quality, and on the impacts of various technologies and development methodologies on localization quality.

The Multilingual Web: Where Are We?

The MultilingualWeb project, funded by the European Commission and coordinated by the W3C, is looking at best practices and standards related to all aspects of creating, localizing and deploying the multilingual Web. The project will raise visibility of what’s available and identify gaps via a series of four events, over two years. This is the first event.

ATA 51st Annual Conference

The ATA Annual Conference is held each fall in a major city or popular resort area. This four-day event showcases panel discussions, expert presentations, training workshops, and scholarly papers. The conference also features a job marketplace, a vendor exhibit hall, certification testing, and networking sessions designed to build professional contacts for attendees.

GALA 2011: The Language of Business. The Business of Language.

GALA 2011 will bring together the community of professionals involved in global content delivery. This community consists of all parties charged with transforming original content (software code, website content, product information, technical documentation, marketing materials, and more) into translated and localized content for consumption by people around the world.

ITI Conference 2011

ITI Conference 2011 is the flagship conference of the Institute of Translation and Interpreting, and marks ITI’s 25th anniversary. There will be plenary sessions, panel discussions, workshops and talks on practical aspects of interpreting and translation, such as technology for interpreters and translators, project management and running your business, as well as the training of interpreters and translators and professional development.

What to read:

Online resources

The book club Mosaico for ideas about what to buy

Críticas and publisher catalogs such as Ediciones Serres, Random House Español, and Ediciones TUTOR

A dictionary is a simple tool which helps us with the pronouciation, spelling and grammar needed for correct and effective communication. A glossary is an alphabetical list of technical terms in some specialized field of knowledge. The list below are helpful resources for general and specialized terminology in English and Spanish aimed for students, teachers, professionals and the general public.

English and Spanish Dictionaries and Glossaries

Biology Glossary English – Spanish glossary of technical terms used in ecology, evolution, and systematics

Business Dictionary English to Spanish terminology and vocabulary

Child Welfare Glossary English – Spanish child welfare terms from the Child Welfare  Children’s Bureau

Deaf & Blind Glossary English – Spanish glossary of concepts and terms from the National Consortium of Deaf-Blindness

English Spanish Glossaries Portals and search engines that take you to a large number of glossaries on every topic imaginable, as well as general dictionaries, encyclopedias and other resources for translators. If you are looking for a very particular glossary that does not fall in the other categories, check the portals in this section

In a previous post, Justin had mentioned that there are language differences in countries where English is the official language (e.g. in England, the Unites States, Australia and Canada). There are also differences in countries where Spanish is natively spoken, for instance Spain, Latin America, and even Spanish speakers in the United States.

Although a large part of the Spanish language is shared by its speakers (what we call “Neutral Spanish”), there are many words, phrases, idioms, and mannerisms that are not found in all linguistic varieties.
Before we begin translating a text (novel, document, web page, etc.), it is important for the client to define the target audience in order to localize the product for that specific market, by accounting for the differences of each market.

What does localization mean?

One word can be used to talk about the same thing in different parts of the world. For example, peanut can be maní in South America, cacahuate in Mexico, or cacahuete in Spain. Although the national varieties of a term may be understood, even if it sounds odd, some may not recognize the term or will find it to have a negative or offensive connotation, which leads to a misunderstanding of the text. A translator who is a native Spanish speaker or a specialized translator will identify the difference and know which version to choose in order to produce a translation adapted to that target audience without losing the meaning or the tone of the original. However, if you want to cover a broad spectrum of Spanish speakers, a neutral version of Spanish is the solution. But we can continue to discuss that some other day.

People with little to no experience with a foreign language often assume that the process of translating is just replacing word A (source language) with word B (target language). This is how the most primitive machine translations functioned, subsequently butchering even the simplest of sentences:

Original

I am studying Spanish before I travel to Mexico.

Translation:

Soy estudiando Español antes de Viajo hasta México.

So after thoroughly confusing anyone you’re attempting to communicate with, one begins to realize that there are a LOT of factors that can complicate a translation. Things like verb tenses, phrasal verbs, slang and regionalisms will all throw the simple “find and replace” method out of whack.

The worst part about these mistakes is that they can happen to even seasoned translators after too much work.  So just remember that it’s never as easy as it seems!

As translators, we need our memories to operate at a certain level in order to remember vocabulary, rules, collocations, maxims, exceptions to rules, etc. A few things that can help us with our memories comes from a great website known as The Brain Power Pages (where you can also find tips on taking full advantage of your brain’s capabilities, exercises, intelligence tests, riddles, puzzles and more).

Steve Gillman (creator and author of the site) has a special recipe for improving one’s memory which includes these ten tips:

1. Repeat: repeating a telephone number in your head over and over again will help you remember it. It’s even better if you “sing it” in your head. If you do this everyday, you’ll remember things long term as opposed to short term.

2. Write it down: “Let the paper remember it for you.” Besides having the info handy for later, the act of writing it down will help it “stick” in your head.

3. Clear your mind: relax and clear your mind (take three deep breaths through your nose as you relax your muscles) as often as you can, as this allows things we need to remember to “come” to us.

4. Feed your brain: we have to feed our bodies with good proteins and complex carbs to give the brain more energy and allow it to function better: granola, cereals, trail mix, fish. What’s more, being hungry can distract you and interfere with your ability to remember things.

5. Drink enough liquids: dehydration can distract us, keeps us from thinking clearly and restricts our memory. Try drinking a glass of water and see if your brain seems a little sharper.

6. Exercise: physical exercise gives the brain oxygen: it improves the brain’s functioning both immediately (after ten minutes on the treadmill, for example) and in the long term.

7. Learn Mnemonic Techniques: mental associations to remember names, numbers, lists of items, etc. are usually quite useful for making things “stick.”
8. Imagine how you will use it: if you think of how you could use the info, you have a better chance of remembering it later. For example, if you are learning an algorithm in class, imagining that you’re using it during an exam can help you remember it better. Or if you’ve just learned someone’s name you can imagine running into them again and calling them by their name.

9. Avoid toxins: smoking is the most obvious one. Although some feel that it helps them concentrate in the short term, the subsequent damage affects the brain in general, including the memory. The same goes for some medications and of course illegal drugs.

10. Reduce stress: when you’re stressed, your body releases cortisone (or hydro-cortisone), which at high levels interferes with the part of the memory that holds recent memories. Things like meditation and mind control techniques can help with this.
Will our translations be better with these tips? Will we actually remember to use them? I guess we’ll see…

According to recent research from the University of Virginia (reported at BBC online and mentioned by Steve Gillman on The Brain Power Pages), a great deal of our mental abilities can reach their top potential by the age of 22, and begin to deteriorate at the age of 27… Bad news.

But all’s not lost. Gillman himself has provided tons of advice on maximizing mental capabilities through his website devoted to teaching people how to better use their brains, stimulate their minds as much as possible and more.

We’ve talked before about how learning another languages helps us keep our neurons in good shape. Yes! We’re already on the right track!)
The expert’s “tip of the month” is useful for a lot of people, including translators who frequently spend eight, ten, twelve hours seated in front of the computer… and it never hurts to sharpen our mental abilities.

Sit up Straight!
Posture affects the thought process. You can check this yourself next time right from your chair. Try and perform some math problems in your head while slouched in your chair, head drooped and mouth hanging open. Now, do some mental math while sitting up straight, with your mouth closed and your eyes pointed straight ahead or slightly above your plane of vision. Gillman is a firm believer that it’s much easier the second way and says that if you need to concentrate, you should  “close your mouth and sit up straight!”
In my next couple of blogs I’m going to pass along some of Gillman’s tips on improving your memory (if I remember to do so…)

“Translation is like a woman. If it is beautiful, it is not faithful. If it is faithful, it is most certainly not beautiful.”

—- Yevgeny Yevtushenko

The quote above is from Russian poet Yevgeny Yevtushenko, author of Babi Yar and known critic of the Soviet government. While this quotation is undeniably misogynistic, it does present an interesting point of view and reality of translations.

While translators generally focus on producing a translation  that is faithful to the original, what does one do when translating poetry, when portraying a feeling, a mood, is more important than meaning? How much creative freedom is granted to the translator?

Poetry is so nuanced, so particular, that it could be likened to recreating a piano sonata on a bass drum. The result may be interesting and may have a certain style to it, but it will never produce the same feeling as the original.

As we’ve talked about in previous posts, while it is possible to drag out the old typewriter and our trusty Simon & Schuster’s and put a translation down on legal paper, we live in the twenty-first century and these days we have: a) a computer, b) a fairly high-speed internet connection, and c) one or more computer translation programs (not essential, but very valuable): a CAT tool like Trados, for example.
Furthermore, we keep our trusty dictionaries on hand (that is, in our computer bookmarks and favorites) a bilingual one, a monolingual one in the source language to check definitions, a monolingual one in our native language to make sure the term we chose is correct, and finally some specialized dictionaries for the particular text:  medical, technical, legal, etc. For the most specific texts, we can check a glossary, bilingual if possible. Maybe the client has sent a “memory” or glossary which may serve as reference or simply tell how the client prefers certain terms are translated.
Ok, now we are ready. What steps do we take?
The first thing to do is read the text. A lot of translation professors recommended reading the entire text before starting the translation. While useful, this is not always easy when we’ve got a tight deadline (as we almost always do…). But it is useful to skim the first few paragraphs to see what we are dealing with, be it a technical manual for some machine, a lease or a love letter… We don’t translate each word by itself, which means that going over the original will let us see what the general topic is and help us keep the proper vocabulary (and style) in mind.
But then halfway through the project comes the big conundrum: what to do with a “problem” word or phrase, something we can’t find in a dictionary, in the glossaries… We’ve mentioned “Googling” words before, and while it’s not a definitive resource, it can help us find out if the word at least exists, is used somewhere, the phrase is correct, etc.
Finally, it is ideal if we can consult a specialist in the field or expert on the topic we are translating (a doctor, engineer, computer tech, etc.), but this is usually a luxury due to the difficulty in getting in touch with the person you need while facing time constraints.
My advice, and what I’ve learned from my personal experience, is to consult a colleague: a different perspective can’t hurt and teamwork can be an excellent idea. Another translator can “help us think,” give us an option we hadn’t thought of or corroborate something we hadn’t been able to verify any other way.
If we also have the good fortune to have a colleague who is a native speaker of the source language in our corner, then this is an added bonus. But this is only if we’re lucky enough to have them.

She is known by many names: Malinalli, Malintzin(Spanish transliterations of her original name– the tzin suffix was added to indicate hierarchy and nobility), “Doña Marina,” or most commonly, La Malinche. Malineli Tenepatl (c.1502 – c.1529), a Mexican girl born into the upper class, was presented to Mayan chiefs in Tabasco following a war between the Mayans and Aztecs. As a result of this situation she fluidly spoke both her native language, Nahuatl, and the language of her new owners, Mayan.

The chiefs gave the young slave to Hernán Cortés after he defeated the Tabascans at the Battle of Centla. Cortes christened her “Marina” and gave her to one of his captains. Upon learning that she spoke Nahuatl, he began to use her as a Nahuatl-Mayan interpreter, with Jerónimo de Aguilar (a Spanish survivor of a shipwreck who was freed from captivity by Cortés) completing the circle by translating Mayan into Spanish. All of the exchanges between the Spanish and Aztecs were carried out in this manner, using three languages and two interpreters, until Malintzin learned Spanish: it is most likely that this did not take very long, based on the fact the indigenous records usually leave out Jerónimo de Aguilar and reference Malintzin as having been the sole interpreter.

Apart from serving as interpreter, Malintzin advised the Spanish on the local customs and military tactics, possibly performing what would today be called “intel” and “diplomacy.”

There are many legends and conjectures about Malinche, but the facts are harder to come by. The Spanish word “Malinchismo” is derived from her name, a term meaning a preference for something foreign over local, to want to appear foreign over Mexican, and opportunistic and willing to betray one’s own country to aid foreigners. The reality however is that as an orphan passed between tribes and countries, Malintzin did not have a country to sell.

A few people also consider Malinche to be the “First Mother of Mexico,” initiating the birth of a country and in a more general sense, motherhood itself.

Personally, one of the things about translating that gets under my skin is having to check over it once I’m done. I hate it. But after a few jobs where I wanted to bang my head against the wall because I hadn’t gone back over it and spotted my stupid mistake (but of course someone else did, and was kind enough to point it out to me)…..Well, let’s just say that I accepted that reviewing translations is a must and cannot be avoided. And it may seem unnecessary if our translation is going to be revised by an editor, but isn’t it better for us to correct our errors before they do?

My solution? I always try to leave at least a couple of minutes before delivery time for going back over it. 10 or 15 minutes is plenty. The first three or four minutes are to relax: I finished the job. I’m no longer looking for words, I’m not after that exact phrase. I’m done translating. I go to the kitchen for some juice, maybe eat an apple, or step out on the balcony for some fresh air. And then I come back to face the final step.

I run spell check (for Word documents, which are the most common for me), which is necessary and helpful. But you have to remember that it’s not perfect: spell check doesn’t know when “sí” needs an accent and when it doesn’t, when you want to say “tale” or “tall” or when you’ve mistakenly written “his high-heels.” You have to reread the text, there’s no way around it. Sit down and read it closely and carefully. The little break between translating and reviewing helps you distance yourself from it a bit, making it seem “newer.” Being so into the text causes our eyes to play tricks on us, leading us to believe that we had written evrey word perfectly…

If there is one thing that almost all translators can agree upon, it’s that two of the most things to translate, no matter what the language, are jokes and poetry. Jokes, because they usually have a play on words or phrases with a “double meaning” that are practically impossible to transfer from one language to another.

Take this English one-liner for example:

“Did you hear about the guy whose whole left side was cut off? He’s all right now.”

One possible translation would be: “¿Te enteraste de ese chico al que le cortaron todo el lado izquierdo? Ahora está bien.” It would be technically correct, understandable, but missing the punch line. The joke works in English because “right” here means “bien” and “derecho.” Maybe you could make a play on words with “derecho” in the sense of “recto,” or maybe in the sense of laws… Eventually, and with a good bit of work, a good translator could get some kind of humor out of it.  But it would never be the same joke.

And poetry holds even greater challenges, even if it the original does not rhyme or you decide not to try and make the translation rhyme, it still involves meter, cadence, and rhythm that tend to be most difficult to translate. If it’s not a translation, you’re writing a new poem… A poem is a unique combination of special words- and not others– that are also laid out in a unique arrangement. How does one do that? So then, does everyone need to learn the original language in order to read the poem? Exactly how many languages do we need to learn? Right.
Every language has its own ways to twist words around, its own double meanings and plays on words. It’s not exactly vital to translate jokes since every country or region has its own style of humor. But for poetry, I feel that we translators don’t have a choice. we wouldn’t have access to Russian poetry, Greek classics, Latin sonnets, or Japanese haikus if a translator hadn’t first taken on the task of translating them. And although it may not turn out “perfect,” I think we should keep trying…

Maybe one of the higher ups forgot that the handbook has to be in Spanish as well as English. Maybe part of the PowerPoint presentation is missing and needs to be translated into English for tomorrow’s meeting. Whatever the case, if you’re the client, you need it now. And if you’re the translator, you need to do it now. Here are a few tips on what both sides (client & translator) can do to make a situation known for causing nervous breakdowns go as smoothly as possible.

For the Client: Make sure that the translator or translation company has all the information they need, plus anything else you can provide (glossary, translation memory, translation style guide, etc.) so that there are no hold ups once the ball gets rolling. Answer any questions coming from the other side as quickly and as thoroughly as possible. And above all, remember that a quality translation takes time and hard work. Miracles can happen, but impossible demands will not get them.

For the Translator: Take a deep breath. Get all of your materials together, make sure you’re clear on the exact specifications of the project, and then get to work. Here’s the trick though: take a lot of short breaks. I know it seems impossible, but force yourself to do it. Rush projects typically result in low quality not because of the time crunch per se, but because a translator spends 8 consecutive hours translating and errors get made, the translator zones out, and the translation itself becomes more and more literal. So take 5 minutes and take a walk or eat an apple. Whatever you need to stay fresh. And follow the golden rule of course, save early and save often!

About a century ago George Bernard Shaw remarked that England and the United States were two countries divided by a common language.  The differences in the Spanish spoken in Spain (not to mention in the different regions of Spain itself) and that spoken in Mexico, Cuba, Argentina, etc. can make it seem like everyone is not speaking the same language either.
When translating from English to Spanish, one of the problems we commonly face is knowing what country or region we are writing for, then adapting our text to the “flavor” of the intended audience. We may also have to take a text in English and put it into a Spanish with Caribbean slang, Catalan terms, or lunfardo from Buenos Aires. Maybe we’re not sure of the meaning or if the word we know is used in the same way there. Most times a translator will have to consult a local native speaker (if he or she is lucky enough to know one), search in a forum that has speakers from different countries, or look to a special resource, such as the one that I’d like to share with you now: the “Jergas de Habla Hispana” website. I’ve found it to be a useful tool for finding some of those “weird” words that don’t appear in other dictionaries, and though the site’s creators acknowledge that it’s not all-encompassing, they invite visitors to further enhance it.  http://www.jergasdehablahispana.org/

Harry Shaw is credited with saying, “There is no such thing as good writing. There is only good rewriting.” Believe it or not, translation is no different. In a best case scenario, a project will be translated, edited and then proofread by three different qualified translators. Most reputable Spanish translation companies provide these services as part of their normal translating process. Now maybe you don’t have time to give your document the full treatment, or you feel like you’d be wasting money by getting anything but a bare bones translation. Things come up out of the blue of course, but remember where that difference in time and money spent is going to show up: in the quality of the translation.

It comes as a surprise to many, but having a good translator does not always result in a good translation. A million things can go wrong: a misspelled word here, a missing phrase there, etc. These are the little things that, if not spotted, can blemish an important article, make you and your company look careless and possibly ruin a business opportunity.

As the world becomes more and more globalized, the realities of translation are reaching the mainstream. Machine translation does not work. No single translator is perfect. A project needs to be reviewed, revised, and corrected before it goes out. So a final quote to stress the importance of editing and proofreading.

“Writing without revising is the literary equivalent of waltzing gaily out of the house in your underwear.”
——- Patricia Fuller

I don’t know if it happens in every country, but I feel like in most places people’s speaking and writing is getting worse and worse. And we, the translators, are people too; meaning that, living in this century, in this society, we are no different. We are well aware of the rules, but we don’t use them in our daily lives: because it would sound awkward, because one wants to “fit in,” because we don’t have time for everything.

We use “bad words” and borrowed words, and we don’t even pay attention to the correct forms or structures of how things should be said or written, even though we are well aware of what is correct. It is estimated that kids today have a vocabulary of roughly 200 words, while a middle aged adult (40 years old) normally uses about two thousand. Television, radio and newspapers are certainly not helping, because they’ve fallen into using the same deprived language. New forms of communication- chatting, e-mail, text messages- ironically make communicating easier, but also force us to use fewer words, abbreviations, and the shortest of phrases.
I believe that translators, both young and old, belong to a special group of people that loves language, takes care of it, studies it and has obtained a richer vocabulary. In our job, we watch the rules and force ourselves to edit properly. And we have an important task: to continue preserving our language, to continue forcing ourselves to use it as it should be used and not allowing it to become impoverished.  The advantage is that for us, this is not a job that we do reluctantly, but rather a duty that we fulfill with a satisfying dignity.

When looking at the use of the Spanish language in the U.S., the numbers speak for themselves. According to the 2006 Census, the United States now has more than 35 million Spanish speakers, meaning there are more people speaking Spanish in the U.S. than in Venezuela, Chile, or Cuba. In fact, the U.S. currently has the sixth largest Spanish-speaking population in the world. The annual growth rate for the Latino community in the U.S. is approaching 4%, more than triple the overall growth rate, and experts say that by the year 2050, more than 25% of the U.S. population will speak Spanish.

These numbers have caused quite a stir, sparking debates on a “national language,” immigration policy, language in schools, and more. Even Presidential candidate Barack Obama has spoken his mind on the subject, stating “Instead of worrying about whether immigrants can learn English. They’ll learn English. You need to make sure your child can speak Spanish.”

Now, what do you do when millions of people in the same country aren’t speaking the same language? Translate of course. Television, magazines, and other media now provide translated versions to reach a greater audience. Businesses like McDonalds and Coca-Cola spend millions on translating and localizing their marketing efforts to reach U.S. Spanish speaking customers. The intention here is not to provoke debate, but rather to point out that translations and translators, both formal and informal, have become the new liaison in the U.S.

Welcome to the official Spanish Translation US blog. In this blog, you will find tips, advice, and all kinds of information regarding the art, the science, and the wide world of translation, as written by translators, project managers, DTP specialists, localization and globalization experts, and all those involved in this exciting industry. We invite you to learn more about the many different facets of this field and keep informed of the latest news and updates from Spanish Translation US.