It’s still only July and like many of you, by this stage of the year the extent of my forward planning goes about as far as fantasising about my much-needed summer holiday next week. Life post-holiday is quite low down on my priority list right now, but there have been a couple of events which have caught my eye recently. I’m pleased to report that I’ve managed to muster the energy to reach for my pen to mark them in my diary now, as I’m sure the dates will have crept up before we know it:

The first, on 25th September, is the Chartered Institute of Linguists Members’ Day in Bloomsbury, London. The programme consists of a series of seminars with titles including ‘Translators or Consultant Linguists?’ and ‘Training Translators and Interpreters in the Next Ten Years’, and will finish off with a lecture by my favourite linguist, Professor David Crystal OBE HonFCIL.

The second is a webinar entitled ‘Specialising in legal translation’ by Ricardo Martinez of City University, a good one for those of us who specialise in legal translation. The webinar itself is run by eCPD Webinars. After ITI’s first webinar yesterday morning, in collaboration with eCPD Webinars, it seems that this training format is something translators and interpreters want to see more of, and I hope it will continue to grow.

The third is Portsmouth University’s 10th annual translation conference; this time entitled ‘Translating Multimodalities’. I attended this conference for the first time last year, after intending to go for years, and was not disappointed. As a translator ‘at the coal face’ I rarely get a chance to discuss the slightly more theoretical aspects of translation or explore other areas of work with languages, and this conference allows me to do that without offering up too many abstract theories.  Take a look for yourself here: http://www.port.ac.uk/departments/academic/slas/conferences/translationconference/

Image courtesy of wordwealthy.com

Earlier this week I enjoyed reading a post called ‘The Most Overused Buzzwords and Marketing Speak in Press Releases’ over at Adam Sherk’s blog (discovered courtesy of @Betti_Moser). Reading the post, it really struck me that high ‘bleurgh’ factor buzzwords like synergy, and dynamic tend to rear their ugly heads in languages other than English, too.

When I translate French press releases into English, for example, I can usually see straight away that the ‘bleurgh’ factor could be reduced by about 70%. The tone of French press releases is often a lot more gushing and flowery than you’d normally see in English, so that’s one challenge. But the individual words themselves present a second, delicious challenge.

Synergie and dynamique are of course words with French origin, but do they really mean anything in either language, or are they just linguistic padding? I suspect that in both languages they are used in marketing texts to give the reader a warm fuzzy feeling about the product or service being sold. In fact, here’s an aside thought: how true would it be to say that use of these words in English marketing texts is to some extent a result of unimaginative translationease creeping into English? We’re all guilty of letting these words slip in, they’re part of our collective marketing vocabulary, and to a large extent we expect to see them. But we could probably all use them a little more sparingly (and I include myself in ‘we’!) and focus instead on packing in the information-bearing words.

I’m all in favour of warm fuzzy feelings as a marketing technique, but let’s not forget that in the highly competitive, fast-paced world we live in, consumers and customers are looking for the FACTS, presented in a digestible, appealing way. My personal view is that as a wordsmith (whether you’re translator, copywriter or writer), your mission if you choose to accept it is to use words to craft something that is a pleasure to read while conveying information in an unambiguous way.

Playing with words in this way is an art, and it takes time to perfect it. For help with copywriting, and writing in general, I highly recommend ‘Write to Sell: The Ultimate Guide To Great Copywriting’ by Andy Maslen.

So which foreign language marketing buzzwords irk you the most? For me, it has to be synergie. Bleurgh!

Inverness castle. Image courtesy of http://www.sys-tec.ch/

Last Friday I set off for weekend far, far away from home up in Inverness with other foodie translators. This was my first event since becoming Food & Drink Network Coordinator, and I was really looking forward to meeting other members of the network, and to catching up with Scotnet members, who never fail to put on a good bash.

The event certainly lived up to expectations. On the programme were Karen Stokes (founder and first ever coordinator of the ITI Food & Drink Network), Lulu Norman and Norma Tait, all true experts in this field and each with fascinating real-life examples. Karen ran a practical session addressing and finding solutions to the challenges of working with menus and culture-specific dishes (‘Cullen Skink’, anyone?), while Lulu gave a fascinating insight into her co-translation of a Lebanese cookery book from French into English, and Norma, an expert in the field of whisky, rounded off the day with the brilliantly-named talk ‘My experience – distilled’.

Here are my main takeaways from the day:

• Remember you are selling a product, and think about who you are selling it to – is it the chef or the diner? How tasty a dish sounds is very important, and advanced creative skills are often called for. Take ‘gizzards’, for example. Yum, huh? There is a constant balance to be found between the ‘acceptability’ factor and losing the poetry of the original writing.
• Consumers, particularly higher-end consumers, are usually pretty attuned to foreign words, which can be kept in the translation. Think ‘coulis’ and ‘béarnaise’. Karen’s advice was that if they sell it in Sainsbury’s under a foreign name, that’s a good yardstick. Indeed, sometimes using another European language, particularly French, can act as a ‘bridge’.
• The words we use to describe food can changes between generations. Take ‘muffins’ for example, which I would now tend to use to describe a small, cupcake-like cake rather than a breakfast muffin or ‘English muffin‘ (which I would probably call a ‘breakfast muffin’). Think about who the end user of the document will be and be guided by that.
• Remember that in recipe measurements you may be catering for two ‘Englishes’. Always check with the customer if they’d like conversions, and whether any measurements might even need to be adjusted to suit the type of products available in different countries. Lebanese flour is not necessarily the same as the flour we get in the UK, and other countries may have different techniques for ingredients as common place as garlic, for example. Did you know that in France they tend to remove the green core of a garlic clove before using it?
• Recipe styles can differ between countries. Recipes in the UK have a very discursive and descriptive style, preferring adjectives such as ‘chopped’ or ‘diced’, while many French recipes adopt a fairly technical style.Go for an hourly, rather than a per-word rate, if you can: food being such a clear indicator of cultural difference, translating in this field can be a real labour of love. But don’t let that mean you are short changing yourself!
• As always, some terms just cannot be translated into one word in another culture and the simplest approach is to explain the concept, particularly in an interpreting situation. Norma gave the excellent example of ‘mash tun’. The Portuguese term she once heard used to describe the ‘mash’ (mistura) doesn’t quite capture it, does it?

Yesterday the New Statesman ran an article which explores some of the possible reasons. I’m tempted to conclude that politicians in the UK  have simply not yet taken the internet seriously enough as medium (remember Cameron’s ‘too many tweets make a twit’ comment?). However, the major parties do seem to all have Twitter profiles, and the Conservatives even have their ‘WebCameron’, so it’s not as if they have completely ignored the medium’s potential.  

However, I think one of the problems is they still don’t quite fully understand it or know how to exploit its full potential. The internet is certainly a powerful vehicle which can quickly speed out of control, but instead of attempting to take the wheel, the parties seem to tend to just let it do its own thing. So we see the supporters, such as Grace Fletcher-Hackwood, starting their own Twitter campaigns and the politicians just piggybacking on that once the campaign gains in popularity.

Perhaps the politicians just don’t believe that using the internet to garner support will make a difference. But, from the voting public’s point of view, aside from door-to-door visits, reaching out via the internet (e.g. using something like Twitter) must surely be the most direct and democratic way of communicating, right? It offers politicians a direct line of communication with the public. If they’re worried that communicating with voters via social media may come across as cheesy or cynical, is this really more of a concern than the fact that TV and the press can never offer a truly neutral medium for a political message? There is always an editorial agenda of some kind, and while this is of course also true of much the internet (particularly blogs), it at least offers a more interactive, diverse medium. What politics needs, surely, is a two-way conversation with the electorate, not just one-way electioneering.

I imagine the real reason politicians have not made more use of Twitter, for example, is that they believe it is used only by the country’s chattering classes, liberals and progressives, who have probably already made up their minds about who to vote for. But this assumption really underestimates the far-reaching power of social media. Using the search hash-tag for my local town, I’ve certainly seen a number of undecided voters who have not yet engaged with any party and are looking for information.

I would argue that the internet really can help to change the course of an election, or at least help inform people about their options. Sites such as Votematch and 38Degrees help to provide the public with the facts and make an informed decision, an antidote to the irresponsible journalism and scaremongering often peddled by the press from both ends of political spectrum.

On a lighter note, it seems I’m not the only one trying to draw comparisons with the 2008 US elections  – The Sun has published a picture of David Cameron on its front page edited to look like one of Obama’s famous election images.  Alarmingly, they seem to be piggybacking on support for a US President in what is a completely and utterly different election, in completely and utterly different circumstances. At least, if Obama happens to see it (possibly via Twitter), it’d probably make him chuckle, given his previous meeting with Cameron. Oh dear, I think I’ve just been decidedly un-neutral

Alex runs Translator Tips, where you can download a free marketing ebooklet, or buy Alex’s ebook How to Earn $80,000+ Per Year as a Freelance Translator (the headline is designed to get your attention – admit it, it worked, didn’t it).

I’m really glad Alex decided to make a comeback.  I’m not sure whether he intends to update his ezine format by continuing to publish his content on his blog, but I certainly hope so.

I hope that this case study will help any future translators out there to get an idea of what it’s like being a professional translator and the sort of skills the job requires.  The edition also included case studies of other language professionals, one of which is on the same page as mine – you can download it out here: Real World article Feb 2010

Image courtesy of ehow.com

Hello blog, it’s been a while! The main reason for my woeful silence is that I recently moved home and office, and have been focusing on the practicalities of setting up and running my business from a new location.  I know, I know, excuses, excuses!

I thought I’d share with you some tips for ensuring a home office move goes as smoothly as possible while juggling translation deadlines, so that you can get up and running again in no time.

1)      Planning ahead early: this might sound obvious, but when you know you’re moving make a list of all the companies and services you will need to notify. I’m a big list-maker, and found that a making a quick list on a Google docs spreadsheet which I could tick off was the best way of keeping the information somewhere I could not lose it. This will save a lot of headache. Don’t forget to let your clients know your new office address and update your website, as well.

2)      Stay easily contactable by phone: my clients needed to know that I would be unavailable for a couple of days while I was getting my new home office unpacked and set up, but I wasn’t sure if I would have a landline immediately. I had already planned ways of making sure they knew how to get in touch with me via my Smartphone (which of course did not change), but I also have a subscription to an online number through Skype which allowed them to continue to call me on a landline number which I could provide them with well in advance of the move, making the transition easier.

3)      Don’t even try to live without broadband: I really take broadband internet access for granted now, and the thought of trying to get anything done without it sends shivers down my spine. If you can’t get your broadband set up in your new office immediately (or as soon as you plan to be back at work), you will need to have a Plan B. My Plan B was a pay-as-you-go mobile broadband stick which I had purchased a while ago as a back-up. Remember the benefits of having your own domain email address not linked to your ISP as well (rather than @btinternet.com, @aol.com etc.), so that you can be reached from any computer connected to the internet.

4)      Contingency planning: it’s a fact, things can go missing or get broken in moves, so make sure that if the worst happens (and by worst I mean something untoward happening to your trusty main office computer, and/or the room you were planning to use as an office being less suitable than you initially thought), you won’t be reduced to a quivering wreck because you have that Plan B ready and waiting. For me this means having a back-up laptop (or 2) available for me to work on anywhere. Again, in this scenario, the mobile broadband stick and online landline number will come in handy.

5)      Pack strategically: I didn’t actually pack my office until the night before the removal men arrived, because I need to be working on a job right up until then, although I did pack some books I was sure I wouldn’t need the weekend before the move. When I did do the final pack, I made sure that everything I would need first the other end was at the top of the boxes, and clearly marked to avoid those situations involving crazed rummaging through boxes, packing paper and cardboard flying in all directions.

6)      Focus above all on getting organised: moving home and office at the same time can be a recipe for frazzled nerves, so if it all leaves you feeling beleaguered, then just take your time to move past that by getting yourself organised – get any admin you’ve let slip in order, locate those dictionaries buried at the bottom of the last unpacked box and generally help yourself to feel at home and in control of your new office.  Hey, you could even indulge in an office spa day.

By following my own advice, happily the transition to working from a new location was as smooth as I could have hoped, with all the messy stuff out the way within a couple of hours so that I could get back to my translation work.

Portsmouth Spinnaker Tower, courtesy of virtualtourist.com

Last month I spent a Saturday down in Portsmouth at the university’s Ninth Translation Conference, entitled ‘The Translator as Writer’. It’s incredible that I’ve never made it to the event before now, as I’ve always noticed the high calibre of speakers every year (a combination of practitioners and academics), and I’m pleased to say that having finally made it this year, the event lived up to my expectations.

It seemed to me that the event had a very similar theme to other translation conferences I’ve attended in the past 12 months: the translator beginning to take a more strategic and proactive role in the text (aka the product) production process and to bring other skills they offer to table in their role as intermediaries between cultures and as professional writers.

Here are some of my takeaways from the event:

Jody Byrne’s plenary lecture on technical translation:

* The traditional distinctions between the work of translators and writers are rapidly fading

* Technical translators have traditionally not been viewed as needing or possessing excellent writing skills in the same way as translators of more ‘creative’ types of text have been, but this is changing

* Customer expectations of technical translators are changing: technical expertise is often needed as well, with the translator assuming a greater role in the overall usability of a document.

Practical workshop by Fiona Harris on localising and editing press releases for the EU:

* EU press releases translated into English often need to be extensively edited and localised to ensure they are relevant to the everyday life of the people in the target country

* In the case of the UK, the press releases need to appeal to a British audience. For example, they are often adapted for a Eurosceptic press, in order to get the best coverage.

Luc van Doorslaer’s lecture on translation and journalism:

* Globalisation tends to emerase /emquestions of translation in the news media

* Fast communication needs do not pay attention to translation and will rather tend to make it invisible.

* Through this reduction in multilingual diversity, the world is often falsely conceived as being monolingual.

* National image-building in the media: do the media express or create cultural proximity? Reconstruction of a constructed reality?

Neil Bartlett’s inspirational keynote address on ‘Inspiration’:

* How can a translator facilitate the ‘breathing’ of a sentence?

Denise Merkle’s lecture on translating and expert writing in translator training:

* There are misconceptions among some translation students about what translation actually involves

* Many translation students have poor reading and writing skills, and tend to read less in general (I am still not convinced of this myself – is this measurable?)

* How do we define quality?:  a lot of LSPs focus mainly on their quality procedures in their promotional material. For example many make a lot of their Quality Assurance (QA) procedures and turnaround times, competitive rates etc., rather than selling the quality of the writing they are offering.

On the last point, I have since wondered how much of this was a sign of the times, where businesses in just about every line of work seem to be placing great emphasis on procedural aspects such as safety and reliability, sometimes over and above their actual product offering. I’m curious about why this might be. Do we live in such a complaint-fearing world that we feel we must set out these types of parameters to armour us against any risk of grievance? Are we not confident enough to place a bigger emphasis on selling the quality of the product we are offering, and to be able to defend it?

I’ve written a replica of that case study for my blog:

Job title:

Freelance Translator

Languages:

French, Spanish and Portuguese (into English)

Company/location:

My cosy home office in London!

Background:

I translate from French, Spanish and Portuguese into English (my mother tongue). I started off by doing a BA in French and Spanish at Cardiff University, then went on to do an MA in Translation and Linguistics (Spanish and Portuguese) at Westminster University in London.

After my studies I managed to get a job as an in-house translator, and this gave me the opportunity to really hone my language skills. However, after a few years I decided that freelancing was for me and so I launched a new career beyond cubicle life.

A typical day for me:

I’ll usually be at my desk quite early in the morning, since my commute only involves a short walk to my desk! I often start my day in the same way as most other people, by checking my emails. There may be urgent requests from clients that I need to respond to. I will also typically do some reading of industry-specific newsletters and foreign press or listen to podcasts in my source languages. When I start working on a translation project, I will need to consult with the client for any background references and will need to carry out my own research into the subject matter and terminology. The finished product will then need to be thoroughly edited and proofread before delivery to the client.

Working from home, I get to manage my own workload, but I generally try to work a standard 8 hour day, although I sometimes need to work evenings and weekends to complete urgent or large jobs.

What’s the best thing about your job?

Without a doubt, being my own boss!

So you want to be a professional translator?

You’ll need excellent writing skills in your mother tongue and of course fluency in the languages you translate from. You’ll also need to acquire sound knowledge of one or two specialist fields, for example medicine, law, IT, engineering or physics. I work mainly in the fields of law and marketing, so I need to maintain my knowledge in these areas through ongoing training.

You’ll also need to bear in mind that if you’re freelance, you’re effectively running your own mini-business, so take some time to check out what that entails.

*Psst! If you’re tempted by translation but would like to have a taster before committing, I notice that London Metropolitan University are hosting a Taster Day for Linguists as Mediators, through the UK National Network for Translation.

Attendees of the event who are new to my blog may be interested in reading a little more about how I got into translation, as just one example of how a freelance translator begins their career. Well, if you’re wondering, read on…

For me, translating freelance was something I’d aimed for since starting my MA in Translation and Linguistics at Westminster University over six years ago. Completing the course 9 months later, I realised that freelancing lark would require planning, careful consideration and funds (not to mention paying off various bills and loans). So, quite early on I started looking for in-house translation jobs in London, eventually accepting a job as a full-time in-house translator in the public sector. My plan was to stay in this job for about a year, save up and then launch my freelance translation business.

I remember that I was fairly overly confident about my abilities as a translator at that stage, despite not having much real-world experience of it. Embarrassing to think about it now! A year passed quickly and I realised that I still had a long way to go before I felt ready to go it alone, both in terms of my translation skills and my ability to run a business. I still felt that I was much more suited to freelancing than to cubicle life in a rather uninspiring air-conditioned office, but the value of what I was learning was too great to just ditch it so quickly. I decided to set myself a target of at least 3 years in the job, and then to go for it freelance.

So, apart from translating diligently, squirrelling away my pennies, making my escape plan and daydreaming about a fantasy life as a freelance translator, what else was I doing during those years? Well, because I was serious about becoming freelance, and felt that if I put my mind to it and got support from the right people I could really make a go of it, I spent a lot of my evenings online researching how others were doing it, what sort of hardware/software/ancillary skills I might need for my business etc. Like many translators, I did regular voluntary translations in my spare time in order to hone my translation skills. I joined several ITI groups, and started reading the e-group threads after work. I attended steadily more ITI and CIOL events (networking is a long-term activity so I thought it best to get started on that ASAP), and I started a blog. I had been reading other translation blogs, and realised that I was gaining so much from reading about the experiences of other translators that I wanted to contribute something of my own. This led to more networking and becoming part of a dialogue with other translators in order to share our experiences.

Eventually, I felt the time was right to finally go freelance. If anything, though, I felt even more terrified at the prospect of freelancing at that point than I did when I graduated years before, when I was blissfully ignorant about what it involved! But I was still determined to do it, and resolute that in-house translation was not for me at that point in my life. I needed something to make me take the plunge, but I also needed a security blanket. So, I hatched another plan. I started attending a TESOL course for 3 hours each evening after work to qualify to teach English as a foreign language – a sort of back-up plan just in case freelancing didn’t work out, or if it took a lot longer than expected to get going. I also sat the ITI exam to become a qualified member (MITI).

Happily, I passed both the TESOL course and the ITI exam and no longer had any excuses to put off going freelance. The next thing I needed was the ITI’s Professional Support Group course, as after years in the public sector I was still seriously lacking any business skills. So, one week after leaving my in-house job for good I started the PSG course and was at my new desk in my home office. I got a short-term part-time teaching job in central London to help pay the bills, and also some locum teaching and private tuition in Business English. By October 2008 (6 months after going freelance), I was finding it too difficult to fit all this in with what was by then a full-time translation workload and felt secure enough to stop the teaching altogether.

I think it’s fair to say that each freelance translator will have taken a slightly different route, and the length of time it takes to get to the point where you’re earning a decent full-time income with regular, valued customers will vary considerably (depending on your language combinations, experience, marketing material, and often just sheer good luck). However, hearing how other people did it and how long it took them is one of the best ways of getting a realistic picture of what to aim for. I started my career in-house, and I’m not suggesting that’s what everyone ’should’ do. However, I do think that however you do it, careful planning is one of the best routes to a successful, sustainable freelance career. Running your own business is very fulfilling but can be scary, and so ultimately, the crucial qualities are determination and the ability to be brave when it’s needed!

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