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Is A Certified Translation Necessary?

October 14, 2009 4 Comments »

Certain processes require a certified translation, meaning that the translation must be accompanied with a notarized translation certificate of authenticity and accuracy. This may include an Apostille, a signed certificate from a sworn translator, or a host of other requirements. If you are having a document translated, it

Translating Software

There is no question that the Internet has brought people from around the globe closer (virtually) than ever before, but there are still quite a few barriers to be conquered when one is looking to market  software internationally. English is the unofficial “computer language” of the 21st century, but what if yo

Facebook Translation Crowdsourcing

Social networking giant Facebook has taken a somewhat novel approach to providing its service in other languages. It is employing crowdsourcing, or community-based design, to take popular phrases from the site (tag a photo, nudge a friend) and translate Facebook into more than 65 other languages. When the Facebook applicati

How to Use Trados: First Steps

Trados can be extraordinarily useful for translating and editing your documents, but using it can be a little daunting if you don’t have much experience with it. This video will help you get started. Source: Trados Video Tutorial

How to Create Multiterm Databases with mdb, xdt and xml Files

This video tutorial in Spanish will provide you with another Multiterm functionality– creating termbases with mdb, xdt and xml files. Source: Video sobre Cómo Importar MDB XDT XML en Multiterm

Laughing at Ourselves (Translation Jokes)

September 14, 2009 2 Comments »

I found a few jokes for/about translators on a website. Maybe I’ve been at this job too long and they hit too close to home, but some of the jokes didn’t seem too funny to me. They reminded me of some hard times when I had just started out… But there were some others that […]

The Most Common Misconception about Translating

September 8, 2009 1 Comment »

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 Spa

How to Translate the Word ‘Popcorn’

September 7, 2009 1 Comment »

Regionalisms are words or phrases that give a language its local color. They are common in one area, while rare, out of place or non-existent in another area. Some English examples of these would be the “lieu vs. bathroom,” “lift vs. elevator,” “ankle biter vs. rug rat,” etc. Native speak

Translation Party

Finally a use for machine translations! The site www.translationparty.com is a simple, yet oddly addictive way to kill some time. It uses Google Translator to perform an indefinite number of back translations, typically producing something nonsensical and quite different from the original phrase. It’s kind of like the

10 Memory Tips

August 21, 2009 3 Comments »

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 […

Hate Getting Spam? Bad News..

August 19, 2009 2 Comments »

Do you ever get spam that makes absolutely no sense at all? Messages that say things like “summer slim-time muscle man science pill formulations”? Odds are that the original message was written in another language and then run through an online machine translator. Spammers worldwide have realized that they can

Feed Your Brain

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. […]

English Only Advocate Banned from England

August 11, 2009 2 Comments »

Radio shock-jock and English Only supporter Michael Savage was one of sixteen people to be barred from entering the United Kingdom. Also included on this list issued by the UK Home Office were convicted skinhead murderers,a former Klu Klux Klan Grand Wizard and several members of Hamas. What does it take to get on this [&he

A Different Type of Spanglish

August 7, 2009 7 Comments »

English is invading Spanish! This is of course something of a two-way street, but it is hard to find a Spanish-speaking country whose dialect is not now infused with Anglicisms, loan words and outright bastardizations. This happens with all languages, but the number of English words sprinkled into daily Spanish can truly be

Translating Onomatopoeias

An onomatopoeia (according to Webster’s definition) is “the naming of a thing or action by a vocal imitation of the sound associated with it.” These are used linguistically to describe sounds (boom, bang, click) and can even serve to express a thing or idea visually instead of aurally, like “zig-zag&

The Futures of Spanish and English

July 29, 2009 2 Comments »

A few years ago, the findings of a study were released that set off a bit of an uproar in the United States. The study contended that as of July 1st, 2050, the United States will have more Spanish speakers than any other country in the world. More than Mexico, more than Colombia, more than […]

The Most Translated Author of All Time

July 21, 2009 6 Comments »

It is generally accepted that the Bible is the most widely translated book of all time. But what author has had the most work translated? Some will credit the Apostle Paul, who is believed to have penned many of the books in the Christian Bible. Others, including the Guiness Book of World Records, give that […]

The Never-ending Cycle of Life

July 17, 2009 3 Comments »

“Finnegan’s Wake” is a ballad from around 1850 and is in the traditional Irish folk song style. It is most famous for being the foundation of James Joyce’s masterpiece of the same name, in which the humorous resurrection of Tim Finnegan is symbolic of the never-ending cycle of life (a typical Celtic

English First, Common Sense Second

July 8, 2009 7 Comments »

Does the United States need a national language? Should federal documents and services (driver’s license exams, election ballots, etc.) be provided solely in English, no matter what language the recipient speaks? English advocacy groups in the US, including English First, Speak English and Pro English, are once again

Translation Scandal

The UK Haringey council recently came under fire for unwarranted spending on its translation program after computer records showed that over one third of the translations it deemed necessary and spent tax money on were not read even once. With over fifty million pounds spent on translations annually, government officials be