chronicle · translations of 21 operas, operettas, and choral works, many of which have been...

In this issue:ATA Annual Conference Recap

Promoting Translation in Public Education

Web 2.0: What’s Out There for You?

CHRONICLETheJanuary 2008

Volume XXXVIINumber 1

A Publication of the

American Translators Association

As a benefit of ATA membership, members can join any or all of ATA’s 15 divisions. Divisions—or professional-interest groups—play an important role in the Association. By providing specialty-specific information and networking, divisions allow members to focus on meeting the practical needs of their business. To join a division online, simply login using your ATA User Name and Password in the Members Only sectionof ATA’s website (www.atanet.org/membersonly). To learn more, visit the links here.

Join an ATA Division Today!

Chinese Language Divisionwww.ata-divisions.org/CLD

French Language Divisionwww.ata-divisions.org/FLD

German Language Divisionwww.ata-divisions.org/GLD

Interpreters Divisionwww.ata-divisions.org/ID

Italian Language Divisionwww.ata-divisions.org/ILD

Japanese Language Divisionwww.ata-divisions.org/JLD

Korean Language Divisionwww.ata-divisions.org/KLD

Language Technology Divisionwww.ata-divisions.org/LTD

Literary Divisionwww.ata-divisions.org/LD

Medical Divisionwww.ata-divisions.org/MD

Nordic Divisionwww.ata-divisions.org/ND

Portuguese Language Divisionwww.ata-divisions.org/PLD

Slavic Languages Divisionwww.ata-divisions.org/SLD

Spanish Language Divisionwww.ata-divisions.org/SPD

Translation Company Divisionwww.ata-divisions.org/TCD

3

Contents January 2008

January 2008Volume XXXVII

Number 1

A Publication of the


12 Promoting Translation in Public EducationBy Kirk AndersonIn 2007, ATA’s pro bono project ventured into new territory.

2007 Honors and Awards Recipients

School Outreach Contest Winner Draws Attention of FloridaGovernor, Local Media: 2008 Contest Now OpenBy Lillian ClementiEntering ATA’s 2008 School Outreach Contest could win you free registration to ATA’s Annual Conference in Orlando—andincreased recognition for your business.

LogiTerm Part II By Naomi J. Sutcliffe de MoraesIf I could have only one translation tool, it would be LogiTerm.

When Opera Parodies Opera By Ronnie Apter and Mark HermanHow a translation can be written to retain the parodic references.

From Blogs to Wikis: What Web 2.0 Can Add to the Translator’s Tool KitBy Yves AvérousNow that the once derided dreams of the Internet bubble are becoming a reality thanks to wide adoption of broadband andimplementation of database-driven networks, what are the visionaries dreaming of next?

2008 Honors and Awards

2007 ATA Annual Conference: Looking Back

American Translators Association225 Reinekers Lane, Suite 590 • Alexandria VA 22314Tel: (703) 683-6100 • Fax: (703) 683-6122E-mail: [email protected] • Website: www.atanet.org

18

22

1216

Columns and Departments6789

41

Our AuthorsFrom the PresidentFrom the TreasurerFrom the Executive DirectorNew ATA-Certified Members and Active Membership Review

Certification Exam InformationGeekSpeakBusiness SmartsSuccess by AssociationMember NewsDictionary Review

Humor and TranslationThe Translation InquirerUpcoming EventsDirectory of Language Services

55565860

30

35

30

414243444546

35

4852

The ATA Chronicle ■ January 20084

The ATA Chronicle (ISSN 1078-6457) is publishedmonthly, except bi-monthly in November/December,

by the American Translators Association, 225Reinekers Lane, Suite 590, Alexandria, VA 22314.Periodicals postage paid at Alexandria, Virginia, and

additional mailing offices. POSTMASTER: Sendaddress changes to The ATA Chronicle,

225 Reinekers Lane, Suite 590, Alexandria, VA 22314.

The American Translators Association (ATA) wasestablished in 1959 as a not-for-profit professional

society to foster and support the professionaldevelopment of translators and interpreters and to

promote the translation and interpreting professions.The subscription rate for a member is $43 (includedin the dues payment). The U.S. subscription rate for

a non-member is $65. Subscribers in Canada andMexico add $25; all other non-U.S. subscribers add

$45. Single copies are available for $7 per issue.

Reprint Permission:Requests for permission to reprint articles should be sent

to the editor of The ATA Chronicle at [email protected].

Send updates to:The ATA Chronicle

225 Reinekers Lane Suite 590

Alexandria, VA 22314Fax (703) 683-6122

[email protected]

Moving? Find an error with your address?

EditorJeff Sanfacon

[email protected]

ProofreaderSandra Burns Thomson

DesignEllen Banker

Amy Peloff

AdvertisingMatt Hicks

McNeill Group Inc.

[email protected]

(215) 321-9662 ext. 19

Fax: (215) 321-9636

Executive DirectorWalter Bacak

[email protected]

Membership and General Information

Maggie Rowe

[email protected]

website: www.atanet.org

AdvertisingDirectory

acrossSystemswww.across.net

Japan Pacific Publications, Inc.www.japanpacific.com

Monterey Institute ofInternational Studieshttp://translate.miis.edu/ndp

National Security Agencywww.nsa.gov/careers

SDL Internationalwww.translationzone.com

5

47

15

63

64

The ATA Chronicle enthusiastically encourages

members and non-members to submit articles of

interest. For Submission Guidelines, log onto

www.atanet.org/chronicle. The ATA Chronicle

is published 11 times per year, with a combined

November/December issue. Submission deadlines are two months

prior to publication date.

We Want You!


Our Authors January 2008

Kirk Anderson is a freelance translator based in Surfside, Florida.He is ATA-certified (French→ English and Spanish↔ English). Aformer ATA Board member and past chair of ATA’s Public RelationsCommittee, he served as the coordinator of ATA’s 2007 pro bonoproject. Contact: [email protected].

Ronnie Apter, a professor of English atCentral Michigan University, is a pub-lished poet and translator of poetry,and the author of Digging for theTreasure: Translation After Pound(1984), the Bilingual Edition (Bookand CD) of the Love Songs of Bernartde Ventadorn in Occitan and English:

Sugar and Salt (1999), and the chapter on Ezra Pound inTranslation—Theory and Practice: A Historical Reader (2006). In collaboration with Mark Herman, she has written English translations of 21 operas, operettas, and choral works, many ofwhich have been performed throughout the U.S., Canada, andEngland. Contact: [email protected].

Yves M. Avérous is the vice-president of the Northern CaliforniaTranslators Association (NCTA), and is in charge of the association’spublications. A French native, he has been a professional translatorfor over 20 years. His major focus is software localization. He cre-ated his first blog in 2004, and has been using Rich Site Summaryfeeds since 2005. He developed the sites http://translorial.com(to house the archives of Translorial, the NCTA newsletter);http://ata.insf.net (a Wiki site for attendees to ATA’s 2007 AnnualConference in San Francisco); and http://transmug.com (a Macuser group blog for translators). Contact: [email protected].

Lillian Clementi is a member of ATA’sPublic Relations Committee and apartner in LinguaLegal, a translationconsultancy based in Arlington,Virginia. She translates from Frenchand German into English, specializingin law and commerce. Contact: li l l [email protected].

Mark Herman, a frequent collaboratorwith Ronnie Apter, is a literary trans-lator, technical translator, chemicalengineer, playwright, lyricist, musician,and actor. Contact:[email protected].

Naomi J. Sutcliffe de Moraes is an ATA-certifiedPortuguese→ English freelance translator based in São Paulo,Brazil. She has a Ph.D. in linguistics from the University of São Paulo. Before becoming a linguist, she earned a B.S. inmechanical engineering and an M.S. in physics from the University of California, Los Angeles. She specializes in legal, medical, and engineering translations. Contact: [email protected].

It’s Time To Renew!If you have not renewed your membership, now is the time!From membership in any or all of ATA’s 15 divisions to discounted business services,ATA gives you the strategic edge that benefits your bottom line.

Renew online at:www.atanet.org/MembersOnly

Or call:703.683.6100

Thank you for your past support and for renewing for 2008.

7The ATA Chronicle ■ January 2008

Who We Are, Who We Are Not

[email protected]

From the President Jiri Stejskal

Last month you read aboutthe changes in our administration andabout ATA’s core objectives. Let usnow review who we are as an organi-zation and what we stand for. ATA is anot-for-profit membership corpora-tion, organized and existing under thelaws of the State of New York, whereit was established in 1959. The501(c)(6) tax exempt status wasgranted by the Internal RevenueService in 1963. One of the maincharacteristics of a 501(c)(6) organi-zation is that it must be an associationof persons having some commonbusiness interest, and its purpose mustbe to promote this common businessinterest. This ties in nicely with ATA’score objectives as described in ourbylaws.

In 1991, ATA Headquarters movedfrom New York to Virginia, which isits current location and the placewhere we file taxes, namely Form990, a tax return for organizationsexempt from income tax. Today, wehave 11 paid staff members at ATAHeadquarters, headed by ExecutiveDirector Walter Bacak. The ATABoard, consisting of 13 volunteermembers (9 directors and 4 officers),sets the policies and makes strategicdecisions about the future of theAssociation, while the staff focuseson management and administration.

We are by far the largest associationin the U.S. serving the needs of transla-tors and interpreters. We are anAmerican organization with an interna-tional orientation, with members in 80countries. Our primary goal is to pro-mote the profession and our commonbusiness interests. Membership in theAssociation should be viewed as anopportunity to participate in the promo-tion of the profession and of our inter-ests, rather than as a purchase of certain

services and benefits provided inexchange for membership dues (askyourself what $145 would buy youelsewhere—half an hour of anattorney’s time?). Your membershipmeans that you are a part of a largecommunity of translators and inter-preters that creates synergies andopportunities for you to participateactively in the shaping of our industry,and to develop your skills as a trans-lator or an interpreter.

Speaking of skills, let’s also look at

who we are not. We are not an associa-tion of professional translators andinterpreters. Paying membership duesdoes not make anyone a professional.This is a conundrum that ATA’s PublicRelations Committee is facing whenaddressing the media, because while wewant to present ATA as the “go to”place, we cannot claim that all ATA members are professionals. OurAssociation welcomes students andnew entrants to the profession who ben-efit from the experience of those whoare professionals. If you consider your-self a professional, show it by gettingand maintaining certification or pursueactive membership status through theactive membership review process if nocertification is currently offered for yourlanguage combination(s), and help

others to become professionals.We are not a political organization.

While 501(c)(6) organizations mayengage in limited political activitiesthat inform, educate, and promotetheir interests, ATA should not take apolitical stance and must remain non-partisan. It is often not possible to stayout of politics when humanitarianissues involving our profession areconcerned. In such instances we needto ask ourselves how such issuesrelate to the core objectives of the

Association and whether they concernour common business interests, andact accordingly. Neither ATA’s Boardnor individual members are immuneto errors of judgment, and ultimatelyit is up to the voting members todetermine through their collectivewisdom whether a given action, reso-lution, or position is appropriate.

Without a doubt, ATA is an impor-tant organization that contributes toour profession in a great variety ofways as a major player in the U.S. andaround the world. Be an activemember so that you can exercise yourvoting power and make your own con-tribution to our profession.

Membership in the Association should be viewed as anopportunity to participate in the promotion of theprofession and of our interests, rather than as a

purchase of certain services and benefits provided inexchange for membership dues.


Treasurer’s Report from ATA’s 48th Annual Conference

[email protected]

From the Treasurer Peter Krawutschke

Revenue (in thousands)

*Overhead was redistributed across program services.

The ATA Chronicle $550,923

Conference $502,064

Certification $443,473

Divisions $253,734

Publications $87,259

Membership $1,597,450

Conference $591,800

Certification $227,298The ATA Chronicle $138,000

Divisions $94,830

Professional Development$59,000

Before I present my report,allow me to express my appreciationto all of you who once again entrustedme with our association’s finances byre-electing me for a second term asyour treasurer.

As I am writing this, a representa-tive of the CPA firm of LarsonAllen isat ATA Headquarters in Virginia initi-ating this year’s audit of our books.New auditing guidelines and stan-dards for associations bring the costfor this audit to over $12,000 plusexpenses. I will report to you on thisaudit as soon as it is completed.

The 2006-2007 budget would haveshown a loss had it not been for theexcellent performance of our invest-ments. The 2007-2008 budget projects asurplus of only $8,435. This is a smallamount considering an operating budgetof $2,789,978. Since I anticipate a

reduction in our investment income, the2007–2008 budget will demand consid-erable attention by Headquarters staff,the Board, and the treasurer in order tocontrol expenditures.

The charts below give specificinformation in reference to a numberof income and expense categories. Forthis 2007–2008 budget summary, wehave included overhead expenses asthey pertain to certain program serv-ices. The Board and I would appre-ciate your opinion in reference to twobudgetary questions:

1. How much should The ATAChronicle be worth to you andto ATA? You will notice that itwill cost us $412,923 in the2007–2008 budget (i.e., approx-imately $40 per member).

2. How much of the certificationprogram costs should be distrib-uted over the membership atlarge? At the present time, eachone of the over 10,400 ATAmembers pays approximately$21 for the program.

In my report last year, I posed thesame questions and received only afew comments. Please get involved inthis discussion by sending your com-ments and suggestions to ATAHeadquarters. Please assist me to domy job of guiding our resources aseffectively as possible.

As I did last year, I wish to thankour staff (Executive Director WalterBacak and Accounting Manager KirkLawson) for their sound financialmanagement of our resources.

Expenses (in thousands)*

Publications $30,000

Other Operating/Program Revenues

$51,600

General & Administrative $412,411

Membership Services $229,837

Professional Development $93,867

Public Relations $75,000

Board Meetings $62,700

Volunteers & Governance $50,645

Officers & Directors $10,480

Committees $9,150

Total Operating Revenues $2,789,978 Total Operating Expenses $2,781,543

Budget Summary FY 2007-08


Why You Should Renew Your ATA Membership

[email protected]

From the Executive Director Walter Bacak, CAE

As we welcome the New Year,I encourage you to please renew yourmembership in the American Trans-lators Association if you have notalready done so. ATA is closing out abig year, with record conferenceattendance (1,825) and with a record10,438 members. 2008 should be justas promising and here is why.

But first, what is important to youin deciding to renew? The resultsfrom past ATA membership surveyshave shown that the top reasons forbeing an ATA member are for the net-working opportunities, the fact thatATA is a key source for informationon translation and interpreting, andfor professional development. Thiscompares with an article I recentlyread reviewing The Decision to Join,published by the American Society ofAssociation Executives.

The findings from this publicationshow that the reason individuals join(renew their membership) has to do withtheir level of involvement in the organi-zation. For example, those who do notserve in any volunteer roles—which arethe vast majority of members—join forthe knowledge and information that theassociation provides. Whereas, thosemembers who serve in volunteer posi-tions within the same organization main-tain their membership for the networkingopportunities.

For the non-volunteers, professionaldevelopment was the second highestreason for joining and networking oppor-tunities was third. For the volunteers,informational resources placed secondand professional development third.

For those for whom ATA is a keysource for information on translationand interpreting, here is why youshould renew. Looking beyond the con-tent of our award-winning magazine,The ATA Chronicle, and the information-packed website, ATA has recently

released two noteworthy publications:The Patent Translator’s Handbook andthe Fourth Edition of the Translationand Interpreting Compensation Study.

The Patent Translator’s Handbookfeatures contributions from some ofthe most esteemed patent translators inthe business. The Compensation Studyis based on one of the broadest, if notthe broadest, survey of translators andinterpreters. (Be sure to check out theFebruary issue of The ATA Chroniclefor an executive summary of theresults.) For more information on thesetwo publications, please go towww.atanet.org/publications/index.php.

As I touched on last month, you willalso be receiving a new e-newsletterfrom ATA featuring summaries of trans-lation- and interpreting-related articlesfrom the general media as well as spe-cialized publications. Watch your e-mailbox for more on this new benefit.

For those who look to ATA for net-working opportunities, here is why youshould renew. The networking highlightfor the year is ATA’s Annual Conference,which will be in easily accessibleOrlando, Florida, November 5-8, 2008.To enhance your networking further,

plan to give a presentation. Otheravenues for networking are attendingthe ATA professional developmentseminars, participating on the variousdivision lists, writing articles for TheATA Chronicle, and volunteering.

And, tying the two areas together isprofessional development. In 2008,ATA will be offering six professionaldevelopment seminars in addition to theAnnual Conference. (Watch The ATAChronicle for more developments.) TheATA Chronicle also offers many prac-tical professional development articlesand columns, such as Business Smarts.To ease the access to the information,many of the seminar handouts are pub-lished separately after the seminar ifyou are unable to attend, and many ofthe sessions from ATA’s AnnualConference are available on DVD-ROM. Check out ATA’s website formore information on all the benefits ofATA membership.

Thanks for being a member in2007. As you can see, a lot is plannedfor 2008, so please be a part of ATAand renew your membership today.

ATA’s Governance and Communications Committee, in aneffort to enhance communications among members and trans-parency of the organization, developed the concept of one-pagedocuments to explain various aspects of the Association. Theseone-pagers will be published in The ATA Chronicle and onlineas they are created. The first ATAgram was distributed at the2007 Annual Conference (see page 10).

Introducing ATAgrams

Participate in the life of your Association!

Listen to your colleagues—at the conference, in The ATA Chronicle, on mailing lists and in Division newsletters.Be informed about your languages, specialties, profession, and Association.

Talk to other members and to the Board: the Directors and Officers volunteer their time and energy to helpmake ATA better for everyone, and they need to hear from you.

Vote for the Directors and Officers you think will make ATA what you want it to be.

Share your knowledge and expertise with other members by writing an article for an ATA publication or giving a conference presentation.

Help build your profession and your Association by serving on a Committee and participating in Division and Chapter activities.

Learn from your fellow members and from the experience you gain as an active participant in ATA and in your profession.

Grow as a translator and interpreter, as a member of a vital and demanding profession, and as a human being.

225 Reinekers Lane, Suite 590Alexandria, VA 22314

Phone: (703) 683-6100Fax: (703) 683-6122Email: [email protected]

The American Translators Association is a not-for-profit membership organization with the primary goals ofencouraging the professional development of translators and interpreters and promoting the translationand interpreting professions. It is governed by its Bylaws, which define the scope and nature of its activi-

ties, and an elected Board of Directors, which conducts the business of the group. ATA is incorporated as a501(c)(6) association in the State of New York.

Board of Directors and OfficersThe elected Board of nine directors and four officers is responsible for managing the Association and guiding its develop-ment. Each director serves a three-year term; each officer a two-year term. Board members are unsalaried and receiveno compensation for their services.

Policies and ProceduresThe Board is also responsible for defining policies and procedures to ensure that ATA governance is ethical, transparent,and in accordance with the laws of the State of New York and the United States of America.

CommitteesThe Bylaws establish a number of Standing Committees to oversee and administer many of ATA's activities and pro-grams. Ad Hoc Committees are appointed, as needed, to address specific, current issues that affect the organization asa whole or individual members as a group. As a volunteer-driven organization, member participation at the committeelevel is the strength behind many of the Association’s activities.

Voting MembersElections for the ATA Board of Directors are conducted annually. Voting members may cast their ballots by mail, byproxy, or in person at the Annual Meeting of All Voting Members. The ATA Bylaws can also be amended by a two-thirdsmajority of voting members.

Headquarters StaffThe ATA Staff are management professionals who provide administrative and organizational support for everything ATAdoes, and ensure continuity through changes in volunteer leadership.

How ATA Works

At a Glance

Governance

More services, more benefits, more reasons to be an ATA member.The ATA Chronicle ■ January 200810


ATA’s pro bono project,which is undertaken in conjunctionwith ATA’s Annual Conference, high-lights the critical role that translatorsand interpreters play in our society, andoften gives volunteers an opportunity to

make a difference. In 2007, ATA’s probono project ventured into new terri-tory. For the first time, ATA partneredwith its local chapter, in this case theNorthern California Translators Association (NCTA), to develop and

implement a pro bono project that com-bines several innovations:

• Never before has a pro bono benefi-ciary been an organization specifi-cally devoted to translation, in thiscase the San Francisco-based Centerfor the Art of Translation (CAT);

• Never before has ATA had the oppor-tunity to combine its school outreachwork with its pro bono project;

• Never before has the pro bono projectbeen grounds for the presentation ofan award: CAT was the recipient ofATA’s first Award for OutstandingAchievement in Promoting Trans-lation in Public Education; and

• Never before has the pro bonoproject kept on giving: this onewill continue through the rest ofthe 2007-2008 school year.

So what is all the fuss about?Founded by ATA member OliviaSears, CAT’s many activities includethe publication of the respected lit-erary annual Two Lines: A Journal ofTranslation—now in its 14th year ofpublication—which features Englishtranslations from dozens of lan-guages, in genres extending farbeyond traditional literature. On

The Center for the Art of Translation (CAT) was the recipient of ATA’s first Award for Outstanding Achievement inPromoting Translation in Public Education. CAT founder Olivia Sears accepted the award on behalf of the Center.

Promoting Translation in

Public EducationBy Kirk Anderson


November 1, CAT launched its mostrecent series: New World/New Words:Recent Writing from Latin America.

One of CAT’s most innovative ini-tiatives is its Poetry Inside Out (PIO)program, which brings literary transla-tors into Bay Area elementary andmiddle school classrooms to teach theart of translation. Through a series ofactivities, culminating in anthologiesof student work and public poetryrecitals, the PIO program seeks todemonstrate the benefits of bilin-gualism, encourage language learning,

and promote reading and translationskills. Although the current programworks predominantly with bilingualLatino children, a pilot program inChinese is being developed.

On October 31, 2007, two intrepidATA volunteers, Inés Swaney andTony Beckwith, visited a PIO class-room in San Francisco. We had beenforewarned to recruit engaging,charismatic presenters because thekids were capable of “eating unwaryvisitors alive.” The visit was aresounding success. The kids listened

in rapt attention to Inés and Tony’sanecdotes about their experience asprofessional translators and inter-preters, and—I think this says it all—the session ended with the kids askingfor Inés and Tony’s autographs. Tonyand Inés walked away inspired by thestudents and confident that they hadplanted some seeds that may one daybear fruit in the form of the next gen-eration of our colleagues.

For the first time, ATA’s pro bonoproject will extend beyond the confer-ence. Over the rest of the school ➡

ATA member Tony Beckwith, along with Inés Swaney (not shown), talked to students about the profession as part of the San Francisco-based Center for the Art of Translation’sPoetry Inside Out program, which brings literary translators into Bay Area elementary and middle school classrooms to teach the art of translation. Photo courtesy of Olivia Sears, Center for the Art of Translation

14

year, members of ATA’s local chapter,the Northern California TranslatorsAssociation (NCTA), will visit otherPIO classrooms to discuss our profes-sions with the students. CAT is alsoconsidering bringing professionaltranslators and interpreters into theclassrooms as a permanent compo-nent of their program. (If you are aBay Area translator or interpreterinterested in getting involved, pleasecontact NCTA for more information.)Inés and Tony would also be pleasedto talk to anyone interested in learningmore about their experience in theclassroom.

As mentioned earlier, ATA pre-sented CAT with the first ATA Awardfor Outstanding Achievement inPromoting Translation in Public

Education. The PIO program echoesATA’s primary purpose: to promotethe recognition of the translation andinterpreting professions. By recog-nizing and supporting such a program,ATA not only encourages the expan-sion and replication of their effortsand similar efforts to raise awarenessof translation and interpreting, butalso plays an active role in the cas-cading impact such efforts will haveon future generations of language pro-fessionals and their clients.

On behalf of ATA, I would like tothank CAT and their PIO program forthe great work they are doing; theNCTA in general, and TuomasKostiainen, Yves Avérous, NaomiBaer, Alison Dent, and Jacki Noh inparticular for their support of this

project; the ATA Board andHeadquarters staff for their assistancein making this project a reality; andespecially Inés Swaney and TonyBeckwith, for going where no transla-tors have gone before.

Get Involved!If you are interested in offering

your services for a pro bono project inconjunction with ATA’s 49th AnnualConference in Orlando, Florida(November 5-8, 2008), please contactATA Executive Director Walter Bacakat [email protected] or 703-683-6100 (ext. 3006).


Promoting Translation in Public Education Continued

Suggested links for more information:

Center for the Art of Translationwww.catranslation.org

American Translators Associationwww.atanet.org/pressroom/pro_bono_project_next.php

Northern California Translators Associationwww.ncta.org

Poetry Inside Outwww.catranslation.org/education.html

Two Lines: A Journal of Translationwww.catranslation.org/Translation/issues.html


Are youconnected?

Many of ATA’s announcements and specialoffers are now sent to members by e-mail. E-mail you will receive from ATA includes:

• Information about seminars, confer-ences, and regional group meetings

• Association and division news updates • Membership renewal reminders• Notices of certification exams,

division newsletters

Don’t miss out! Keep your ATA contact infor-mation current. You can make updates onlineat www.atanet.org/MembersOnly, or you cansend your information to [email protected] withyour ATA membership number in the subjectline.

ATA does not sell or rent the e-mail addressesof its members.


2007 Honors and Awards Recipients

American Foundation for Translation and Interpretation

JTG Scholarship in Scientific and TechnicalTranslation or Interpretation

The $2,500 JTG Scholarship in Scientific and Technical Translation orInterpretation was awarded to Cheryl McKay, a student in the TranslationStudies MA program at Kent State University. Ms. McKay, who specializesin Spanish→English translation, plans to enter the fields of marketing, com-munication, and business development after graduation.

Other applications for this award were received from New York University,the University of Minnesota, Brigham Young University, Western OregonUniversity, the University of North Carolina-Charlotte, Hobart and WilliamSmith College, and Rutgers University.

Founded in 1995 by ATA Past President Muriel Jérôme-O’Keeffe, JTG Inc.is a language consultancy that supports homeland security, intelligence, andglobal business with cross-cultural communications. JTG Inc. has under-written the AFTI scholarship since 2001. Visit: www.jtg-inc.com.

48th Annual Conference


San Francisco, California | October 31– November 3, 2007

S. Edmund Berger Prize for Excellence inScientific and Technical Translation

The S. Edmund Berger Prize for Excellence in Scientific andTechnical Translation, made possible by an endowment from the chil-dren of Dr. S. Edmund Berger, was awarded to Suzanne Gagliardi. An ATA-certified translator (French and German→English),Ms. Gagliardi specializes in scientific and technical translation, withan emphasis on patent translation. As one member of the award panelwrote, “her background, education, experience, and accomplishmentsshould serve as a model for anyone wishing to excel in technical andscientific translation.”

Suzanne Gagliardi

Cheryl McKay


ATA Student Translation AwardAlexis Crowell, a student at the College of Wooster in

Wooster, Ohio, is the recipient of the ATA StudentTranslation Award, in the amount of $1,000, for her transla-tion project from Russian into English of The Obstacle:Selected Works of Daniil Ivanovich Kharms. Daniil Kharms,a writer in the Soviet Union from the mid-1920s to the early1940s, was particularly noted as a master of absurdism andof the short story. Ms. Crowell spent her junior year abroadin St. Petersburg, Russia, where she took classes and learneda great deal about Daniil Kharms, who was a native of St.Petersburg. She continued her research on Daniil Kharmsupon her return to the College of Wooster.

Other applications for this award were received from theCollege of Wooster, the University of Texas at Austin, KentState University, the University of California-Los Angeles,and Barnard College, Columbia University.

Ungar German Translation Award Philip Boehm is the recipient of the Ungar German

Translation Award for his translation of A Woman inBerlin.

First published in 1954, A Woman in Berlin waswritten by an anonymous journalist, who was 34 at thetime she started this eight-week diary in April 1945,when the Russians were invading Berlin and the city’smostly female population was heading to its cellars towait out the bombing. Anyone who was able looted aban-doned buildings for food of any kind. Soon the Russianswere everywhere, and drunken Russian soldiers rapedwomen indiscriminately. After being raped herself, theauthor decided to “find a single wolf to keep away thepack.” Thanks to a small series of Russian officers, shewas better fed and better protected at night. Her storyillustrates the horror war brings to the lives of womenwhen the battles are waged near a home front (rather thana traditional battlefield). Nearly half a century ago, whenher diary was first published in German, it challenged thepostwar silence and all it concealed: guilt, lies, defen-siveness, and denial.

Mr. Boehm has translated numerous authors fromPolish and German, including Franz Kafka, Ingeborg Bachmann, Stefan Chwin, and Wilhelm Genazino. His translationshave received several awards, most recently the Schlegel-Tieck prize from the U.K. Society of Authors. He also works as astage director and playwright, and has produced original plays, including Mixtitlan, Soul of a Clone, and Alma en venta/Soulon Sale.

The Ungar German Translation Award is bestowed biennially in odd-numbered years for a distinguished literary translation from German into English that has been published in the U.S.

Alexis Crowell and Peter Krawutschke

Philip Boehm

See page 48 for the 2008 Honors and Awards entry guidelines.

ATA member Alina Mugfordof Bradenton, Florida, took the prizein the Association’s third SchoolOutreach Contest. Working through apress release service offered by herlocal chamber of commerce, she usedher award to promote the professionand her own business, drawing atten-tion from Florida Governor CharlieCrist and local media.

“Between, between and drink a chair.”

To break the ice and show that trans-lation is more than word substitution,Alina welcomed Spanish IV students atBradenton’s Manatee High School witha puzzling, “Between, between anddrink a chair.” After some blank facesand giggling, a student translated hergreeting as Entre, entre y tome una silla(Come in and take a seat).

Using a laptop and a projector,Alina highlighted the roles of thetranslator, interpreter, proofreader, andeditor in various work settings, usingInternet resources she found on ATA’sSchool Outreach webpage (www.a t ane t . o rg / a t a_schoo l / s choo l_outreach_materials.php). She thenintroduced the students to ATA’s web-site, explained ATA’s mission, and con-cluded her presentation with an onlinevisit to the list of translation and inter-preting programs offered by ATA insti-tutional members (www.atanet.org/careers/T_I_programs.php). She alsoleft a copy of Park’s Guide to Trans-lating and Interpreting Programs in

North America with Manatee’sSpanish teacher, Diane Fisher.

“Mrs. Fisher said that she couldonly give me 25 minutes to do thepresentation,” Alina said, “but she andthe students liked it so much that sheasked me to come next year and speakfor a whole hour. I enjoyed makingthe presentation and am looking for-ward to doing it again next year.”

A World of OpportunityAlthough she is a relative new-

comer to the translation profession,Alina has many years of experiencewith translation and interpreting in thebusiness world. After holding a variety


By Lillian Clementi

It is important that Florida schools accommodateforeign language programs. Your commitment toadvancing foreign language has helped to shape

the future of education. Congratulations! — Florida Governor Charlie Crist

School Outreach Contest WinnerDraws Attention of Florida

Governor, Local Media:

2008 Contest Now Open

Alina Mugford


of managerial positions in sales, mar-keting, and public relations in multina-tional companies, she recentlylaunched her own business, TheTranslation Link LLC, providingtranslation, cross-cultural consulting,and other language-related services tobusinesses and organizations that wantto cater to Spanish-speaking clients.One of her first major projects was thetranslation of the Manatee Chamber ofCommerce website into Spanish.

And she is no stranger to the class-room. For several years Alina taughtadvertising management, public rela-tions management, and publicspeaking as an assistant professor atthe Universidad Metropolitana inVenezuela, and more recently she hastaught Spanish and English as a

Second Language at high schools inthe Bradenton area, both as a volun-teer and as a staff member.

Alina joined ATA in 2007 and iscurrently seeking certification forEnglish→Spanish translation. She isalso cultivating English↔Spanishinterpreting skills, with a focus onbusiness and medicine. “Translatorsand interpreters have the world infront of them to pursue their careersand serve their communities,” saysMugford. “The human side of the pro-fession is extremely important to me.”

Congratulations from the GovernorAlina was quick to put her adver-

tising and public relations expertise towork. As soon as she heard that shehad won the School Outreach Contest,

she and a friend drafted a pressrelease and uploaded it to the websiteof the Manatee Chamber ofCommerce. Through the Chamber’smedia service, Alina scored four men-tions in three different publicationsduring September 2007, including theonline and print editions of theBradenton Herald.

In late October, Florida GovernorCharlie Crist wrote to congratulate heron winning the contest. “It is impor-tant that Florida schools accommodateforeign language programs to meet theneeds of our diverse culture,” hewrote. “Your steadfast commitment toadvancing foreign language in schoolshas helped to shape the future of edu-cation. Congratulations and bestwishes on all your future endeavors!”

School Outreach organizers arecurrently exploring ways to helpfuture contest winners replicateAlina’s successful public relations ini-tiative. Possibilities include creating akit containing a model press releaseand tips on using the award to promotethe winner’s business in his or herlocal media and business community.

“I Saw You on TV”School outreach can raise your

professional profile even if you do notwin the contest. Well-known ATAconference speaker Jonathan Hine hasbecome a local celebrity in andaround Charlottesville, Virginia, aftermaking a 40-minute presentation tohigh school students in November2006. Charlottesville’s public accesstelevision channel filmed the presen-tation and has aired it regularly eversince, says Hine. “Not a week goes bythat someone does not accost me with‘I saw you on TV the other day.’” Theprogram proved so popular that it hasbeen copied to DVD and made avail-able to all middle school and highschool guidance counselors in ➡


Charlottesville and the surroundingcounties.

Enter the 2008 Contest and WinFree Conference Registration

ATA is now accepting entries forthe 2008 School Outreach Contest.The prize is free registration to ATA’s49th Annual Conference at WaltDisney World in Orlando, Florida,November 5-8, 2008.

The deadline for submissions isJuly 21, 2008, and the winner will becontacted no later than August 18,2008. Here’s how to enter:

1. Visit the School Outreach home-page at www.atanet.org/ata_school/index.php and click on PresentationResource Materials.

2. Pick the age level you like the bestand click on it.

3. Download a presentation and deliverit at your local school or university.

4. Get someone to take a picture ofyou in the classroom. For tips ongetting an effective photo, see“Three Steps to a Winning Shot.”

5. Send your picture via e-mail toATA’s Public Relations Committeeat [email protected] using the subjectline “School Outreach Contest,” ormail your entry to 225 ReinekersLane, Suite 590, Alexandria, VA22314. Please include your nameand contact information, the date,the school’s name and location,and a brief description of the class.

You may submit multiple entries, andany member of ATA or of any ATA-affil-iated organization is eligible to enter. For

more information, contact LillianClementi at [email protected].

And Even if You Don’t Win......you can still earn ATA continuing

education (CE) points for the timeyou spend in the classroom. Eachhour of school outreach presentationtime earns two points, subject to amaximum of six points in each three-year reporting period. Two or more

school outreach presentations of lessthan 60 minutes may be combined toreach the one-hour mark, and noadvance approval is required. Visitwww.atanet.org/ata_school/ce_points_form.php to get additional informa-tion on CE points for school outreachand to download a CE form designedspecifically to document CE points forschool outreach.

School Outreach Contest Winner DrawsAttention of Florida Governor, Local Media:2008 Contest Now Open Continued Three Steps to a Winning Shot

Make sure the photo shows clearly that you are talking abouttranslation and/or interpreting. This could include wordsbehind you on a whiteboard, chalkboard, or flip chart; aninteresting prop; or classroom decorations such as flags, for-eign-language vocabulary, or maps. Visual impact willimprove the quality of your photograph and make your pres-entation more interesting and engaging. Avoid shots ofPowerPoint presentations, which usually appear as blankscreens in photographs.

Include yourself and one or more students in the photo if youcan. If the school’s confidentiality policy prohibits showingchildren’s faces in the photo, try a shot that shows them fromthe back. Ask the teacher or school photographer to take thephotograph for you, or ask if the school newspaper or year-book is interested in photographing your presentation. Youcan also invite a colleague, family member, or friend to comealong and take pictures.

Aim for a photo that is clear enough for effective reproduc-tion in The ATA Chronicle and promotional materials.Ideally it should be visually pleasing as well, although we arewilling to do some cropping and enhancing if the content isgood. For a few basics on photography and composition, visitwww.wildthingsphoto.com/tips/tip0206.htm.

The ideal photograph would combine all three elements to createa picture that captures the fun of translation and interpreting,your passion for the profession, and the interest and engagementof your audience. For examples, visit www.atanet.org/ata_school/photo_gallery.php, where a variety of successful schooloutreach photographs are on display.

1.

2.

3.

Full Conference DVD-ROM $149* for ATA Members / $179* for Nonmembers

(*Plus $7.50 U.S. / $15 International Shipping & Handling)

To order your DVD-ROM, visitwww.atanet.org/conf/2007/dvdrom.htm.

Attention ATA-Certified Members: This DVD-ROM is approved for Continuing EducationPoints. Earn one point for each hour viewed, up to a maximum of 10 points!

Did you miss the ATA Annual Conference?BUY THE DVD!

ATA’s primary goal is to foster and support the professional development of translators and interpreters. In order to reach more professionals in more successful ways, ATA is creating an electronic library of advanced education that will have increased availability and easier accessibility.


48th Annual ConferenceHyatt Regency San Francisco, California October 31-November 3, 2007

DVD-ROM of Conference Sessions

Sessions of the 48th Annual Conference have been audiotaped and integrated with supporting slides, documents, and other information to create a multimedia DVD-ROM that will serve as a valuable educational tool.

Note: Not all presentations were recorded due to speaker consent, audio problems, or program changes. DVD-ROMs are Windows compatible and will play in your computer DVD drive only, not in your audio or home DVD player.



Please note that the reviewer is not affil-iated in any way with the products beingdiscussed. This review does not repre-sent an endorsement of the product byATA. All opinions are solely those of theauthor.

In the November/Decemberissue I described what LogiTerm does,its search interface, and how it storesand searches terminology files. Forthose who did not read Part I of myreview of this tool, I will just summarizethese points here.

LogiTerm indexes terminology files,aligns translations and reference files,and allows you to search these filesfrom a single interface, as shown inFigure 1 on page 23. The results shownhere are for a fuzzy search on “chlor*”in the terminology database. Double-clicking on a cell will copy its contentsto the clipboard. (See theNovember/December issue for moreinformation on how LogiTerm storesdata and searches for information.)

Bitext FilesCreating and searching terminology

files was addressed in Part 1 of thisreview. The second type of file that canbe indexed and searched is whatLogiTerm calls a bitext, which is a filecontaining an original text aligned withits translation. LogiTerm stores bitextsin HTML (HyperText MarkupLanguage), in a two-column format. Itsalignment tool is extremely accurate,and I rarely have a problem with theresulting bitext alignment. The advan-tage of searching bitexts rather than atranslation memory is that you get morethan just a random segment—you canclick on the segment and see the entireparagraph, or even the entire document.LogiTerm is not the only corpus-basedtool. You can find a general discussionof this type of tool and others in thearticle “Taking the Plunge” in the Juneand July 2007 issues.

Bitext Generation: LogiTerm’s auto-matic alignment feature is excellent, asit uses an algorithm that takes into

LogiTerm Part II By Naomi J. Sutcliffe de Moraes


account more than just punctuation. Itcan align up to 25 pairs of files at atime. LogiTerm does not currentlyinclude a manual alignment tool,though I have never needed one. Bitextfiles are stored in HTML format sothey can be edited with MS Word or anHTML editor. The only time it did notalign two files correctly, I realized Ihad left an entire page out of one doc-ument when converting it from paper.If you are interested specifically inautomatic alignment, see Terminotix’sAlignFactory tool. It has a manual editorand has no restriction on the number offiles. Note that LogiTerm can index—and align—MS Word, WordPerfect,HTML, Excel, PowerPoint, and PDFfiles (when not created from an image).

These files do not need to be convertedbefore indexing. Having such a reliablebitext generator led me to search on theBrazilian and Portuguese governmentwebsites for official translations oflaws, and I was able to align them andadd them to my bitext collection.

Translation Memory Conversion:LogiTerm can import data created intranslation environment tools such asSDLX, SDL Trados, and Déjà Vu X(DVX) if it is first exported to theTrados or TM/2 formats by thesetools. This feature was very conven-ient for me because I have years ofdata stored in translation environmenttools, and I was able to import it in twosteps. LogiTerm can also export

aligned files into the Trados or TM/2format for subsequent import by othertools, and its automatic alignment toolis much faster than the manual align-ment tool provided with most transla-tion environment tools.

Editing Visualization Tool: If you aresent a translation to edit, with thesource text in one file and the transla-tion in another, you might considerusing the bitext generation feature tocreate an aligned file, since reviewingan aligned file makes it easier to spoterrors. This two-column format is oneof the reasons so many translators liketranslation environment tools likeacross, DVX, and SDLX. (See thearticle “Taking the Plunge” in the

Figure 1: LogiTerm search interface showing fuzzy search results

➡


June and July issues for a more com-plete description of translation envi-ronment tools.)

Search Results Table: Figure 2 showsthe result of a bitext search for carci-noma in English. The order of theresult grid columns can be configured,and does not indicate the order inwhich the file was translated. I use acode in the filename to tell me whichlanguage is the source language. Thesearch results table shows only theoriginal text and its translation, butclicking on the bar on the left opens anunformatted copy of the entire alignedfile, providing more context for thesegment. You can also search for con-tent in a second field.

LogiTerm also provides a way foryou to create terminology recordsfrom the bitext search results table orfrom a bitext file open in MS Word,

which is useful when reviewing trans-lations done by others that are alignedas reference files. The name of thebitext file from which the term wasextracted is automatically inserted inthe terminology record.

As with terminology files, alignedtranslations do not need to be inLogiTerm’s native format to beindexed. You can throw a file in anyformat into a folder containing bitextsand tell LogiTerm to index it. Whensearch results are shown, the two lan-

guage columns will be blank, but thepath and filename will be displayed.Clicking on the bar to the left will openthe original file at the point where thesearch word appears, showing the orig-inal and the translation.

Comparison with Translation MemoryTools: Searching the translation memo-ries of translation memory tools issomewhat complicated if you are nottranslating in the tool (either becausethe source text is not in electronic

Figure 2: Bitext search results

LogiTerm’s automatic alignment feature is excellent, asit uses an algorithm that takes into account more than

just punctuation.


format, or because the client requestedthat a specific tool be used and you nor-mally use a different tool). DVX’s TMlookup interface is shown in Figure 3. Irarely used it even before I purchasedLogiTerm, although I have had DVXfor years. Its search mechanism allowsyou to use SQL (a structured query lan-guage designed for the retrieval andmanagement of data in relational data-base management systems) commandsto perform complicated searches.However, despite having studied SQL afew years ago, I never remember the

commands and only perform simplesearches. First, in DVX, the left columnshows the segments found based on mysearch on carcinoma, but the word (car-cinoma) is not highlighted in any way.Second, the right column shows thetranslation for only the selected cell onthe left. So, you must click-click-click-click to see the different translations oneby one, rather than just scrolling as inLogiTerm. The data in the bottomwindow would provide some contextinformation (client, project, filename) ifit had not been lost somewhere along

the way. Another advantage ofLogiTerm is that you can put as much oras little information as you want in thefilename to indicate external informa-tion.

SDL Trados’ TM lookup interface isshown in Figure 4. It allows only simplesearches, and shows only date/timeinformation and the name of the userwho added the segment to the TM if thesegment was created from within SDLTrados (rather than imported, as thesetwo entries were.). The name of the fileor project is not shown. The interfacedoes allow you to scroll—rather thanclick—through the segments.

In summary, the main differencesbetween LogiTerm’s bitext search andthe two translation environment toolsSDL Trados and DVX are:

1. LogiTerm’s automatic alignmenttool is extremely efficient. I haveused it to align hundreds of fileswith no errors and no manual interaction.

2. LogiTerm allows you to use specialsearch functions (described in theNovember/December 2007 issue),such as searching for quotes, wildcards, or for one word in the sourcetext and another word in the targettext (only segments matching ➡

Figure 3: Déjà Vu X TM search results

Figure 4: SDL Trados TM search results


LogiTerm Part II Continued

both criteria are shown, and bothwords are highlighted).

3. LogiTerm displays the results frommost appropriate to least appro-priate, which is similar to Google.Highest priority is given to theexact sequence of words in thesearch field, then for the searchwords, but in any order, and thenfor any of the words in any order.

4. LogiTerm shows the results in atwo-column format that you canscroll through quickly.

Reference FilesLogiTerm can index reference files

in many formats, including PDF files(see the section on bitext generationearlier in this review). There is nostandard format for reference files, soLogiTerm has no way of knowingwhich language is in a given file. I

usually put the language and/orcountry in the name of the file, orcreate separate folders/sub-databasesfor different languages/countries.

When I studied translation, one ofmy teachers taught me the importanceof background reading in the targetlanguage to absorb terminology, reg-ister, and word collocations.Searching reference texts usingLogiTerm allows me to speed up thisprocess, rather than having to readthrough entire reference documents.One example of how I use referencefiles is when translating patient infor-mation leaflets for drugs. Sometimes Ican find a patient information leafletin the target language online or inprint for a similar drug, or even for thesame drug manufactured by anothercompany. In these cases, the unknownoriginal text will not be exactly thesame as my original text, but thetranslation will be similar to what I

must produce, so the terminology,register, and collocations will behelpful. I search my target-languagereference texts on one or two keywords and I am taken to the file(s)with similar text. If I were to useWindow’s search tool, it would onlytell me that a certain file in thesearched folder contained the searchword. I would then have to open thefile and do another search within thefile for each occurrence.

Another example is when I trans-late diagnostic laboratory results. Thephysician is writing about a specificpatient, but I can usually find infor-mation online about the exam per-formed and how to understand theresults. I stash this away in my med-ical reference folder and can call it upby searching on the name of the exam.(See “Teaching Medical Translationinto English” in the January 2004issue for more information on how to

Figure 5: LogiTerm toolbar in MS Word

Example 1: Translated terms added in bracketsThe Parties [parte~] agree [concordar] that any dispute [controvérsia+], claim [reivindicação] or controversy arising under [nos termos de], out of, or in relation to this Agreement[contrato] shall [deverá] be submitted for adjudication and/or settlement by arbitration proceedings [autos~+] in accordance with [de acordo com] the Rules [norma~] of theAmerican Arbitration Association, and any determination thereon shall [deverá] be binding [vinculante] upon the Parties [parte~] hereto with the same force and effect as if renderedby a court of competent jurisdiction [juízo competente], and judgment [decisão+] thereon may [poderá] be entered by any Party [parte].

Example 2: Source text replaced by translated termsThe parte~ concordar that any controvérsia+, reivindicação, or controversy arising nos termos de, out of, or in relation to this contrato deverá be submitted for...

Example 3: Terms found in terminology database underlinedThe Parties agree that any dispute, claim, or controversy arising under, out of, or in relation to this Agreement shall be submitted for adjudication and/or settlement by...

Example 4: Terms found in reference bitexts or monolingual reference documentsNo judgments, liens, or security interests will be outstanding at the time of the closing against the Seller or against its business or any assets thereof, except those to be paid and dis-charged out of the purchase price at closing and approved by the Purchaser’s attorney.

Figure 6: Sample output (with standard color coding) after pretranslation of terminology


use reference texts in medical transla-tion.)

MS Word ToolbarThe MS Word toolbar (see Figure 5

on page 26) is not actually needed tosearch the LogiTerm databases or tocreate terminology files in the nativeformat. However, it does providefunctions that speed some things up.For example, you can select a word inMS Word and click on a button, which

sends the word to the LogiTermsearch screen shown in Figure 1 onpage 23. It also has shortcuts to aid inthe creation of terminology recordsand for opening favorite terminologyfiles.

Pretranslation and Other Linguistic Functions

LogiTerm performs many of thesame functions translation environ-ment tools perform, but by prepro-cessing the source text rather thandoing so interactively, segment bysegment, within the tool.

Pretranslation of Terminology: Thisfunction searches the terminology filesyou specify (only those in LogiTermformat) for all terms in a given sourcetext. The result of the search is a copyof the source file with the identified

terms marked, as shown in Figure 6 onpage 26.

In the first example in Figure 6, asentence in English has been pretrans-lated and the terms found in the spec-ified terminology files (in Portuguesein this example) have been added inbrackets next to the English. The firstterm (Parties) exists in the database inthe singular, which the program indi-cates by adding a tilde to the trans-lated term: [parte~]. Note that the

same term appears in the singular atthe end of the sentence and no tilde isadded. When the terminology data-base contains more than one transla-tion for the term, as is the case for“proceedings,” the program providesone possible translation and adds aplus sign: [autos+]. In this case, thetranslation autos is not a good choice,but the + tells me I can look the termup with the search interface to seewhat other options I have stored. Inthis example, 14 of the 17 suggestedtranslations are useful. There is a wayto tell LogiTerm about plural inflec-tions on a case-by-case basis, but it isbeyond the scope of this article.

LogiTerm allows you to indicate apriority terminology database, madeup of one or more terminology files,for pretranslation, in addition to thecore set of terminology files. This fea-

ture allows you to use terminologyfiles specific to a client or type of doc-ument for terminology pretranslation,and can be used by an agency to indi-cate the terminology that should beused when sending out a job, or in-house by the lead translator whenworking with interns.

In the second example in Figure 6,LogiTerm replaced the source termwith the translation. This kind of sub-stitution could be useful when thesource and target languages have sim-ilar grammatical structures, and/orwhen the translator translates manysimilar documents and has well-defined terminology.

In the third example in Figure 6,LogiTerm simply indicated that amatch was found in the database. Forthe first two examples, I toldLogiTerm to look only at legal termi-nology, but in this example I told it tolook at all terms, and it underlined afew extra words, such as “settlement”and “by.”

In the fourth example, LogiTermlooked for terms not in the termi-nology records, but rather in thebitexts. You can configure LogiTermto look in both the terminologyrecords and bitexts at the same time,in effect combining Examples 3 and4, with blue underlining for terms andgreen underlining for bitext matches.In most translation environment tools,you must select terms and click abutton to ask the tool to perform thistype of search (called Scan in DVX,Concordance in SDL Trados, andConcordance or Fuzzy in across).

Export of Glossaries: LogiTerm’sCreate Glossary function can exportyour terminology records into otherformats, such as an XML file, tab-delimited text file, or a two-columnformat (just source and target terms) inRTF (Rich Text Format), with fil- ➡

LogiTerm provides a way for you to create terminologyrecords from the bitext search results table or from a

bitext file open in MS Word, which is useful whenreviewing translations done by others that are

aligned as reference files.


tering by domain. This feature allowsme to export all my terms into one filethat is compatible with my translationenvironment tools, so I can update myterminology files in only one place.

Batch Search for Entire Segments inBitexts: A function called LogiTranscan search your bitexts for matches orpartial matches of your source text andprior translations stored as bitexts. Thisfeature is similar to what translationenvironment tools do, but LogiTermpreprocesses the source file and marksthe text that has already been translated.As with the pretranslation of termi-nology, you can configure the programto mark the text with highlighting, oryou can have it insert the translation foryou. You can also run the output(marked-up) file from this functionthrough the terminology pretranslationfunction, and the highlighted areas willbe ignored during processing. It canalso indicate which of the bitext files inyour database are most similar to thenew source text.

Term Extraction: This function onlyworks if French or English is thesource language. It scans the selectedtext or texts for “terms” and outputs afile showing the terms and their fre-quency, including collocations, ifrequested. It can also search for theterms in specified terminology filesand underline them if they are found.It only works for French and English

because it is programmed with spe-cific language information—such ashow these two languages form plu-rals—that aid the identification ofterms. LogiTerm is a Canadian tooland French/English is presently itsprincipal market.

External Search Function: Thisfunction only works for French,English, and Spanish. The ExternalSearch Function currently connectsonly to the Termium database (onlineor on CD), which only contains termsin French, English, and Spanish.Termium is the Canadian govern-ment’s linguistic database, and isavailable through a subscription.LogiTerm simply provides a conven-ient interface to it. According toTerminotix, the next upgrade willallow the user to search other termi-nology sites as well. Unfortunately,this will not be user-configurable.

MiscellaneousI have been impressed by

Terminotix’s pre- and post-sales sup-port. I have never had any problemswith the program, but sometimes havefound it hard to figure out how tosearch in a certain way, or how to con-vert files from a specific format. Theyhave held my hand through suchperiods (mainly before and shortlyafter I purchased the program), eventhough they had every right to tell mesimply to read the manual.

I think that this tool is probablybest for specialist translators whomust maintain a good deal of termino-logical data. It is also ideal for trans-lators who deal principally withprinted or scanned source texts thatcannot easily be fed into a translationenvironment tool. My most importanttip is to make sure you set up a systemfor naming your files so you will beable to tell at a glance how reliable asource is, which languages a file con-tains, what country the text is from,and similar information.

The Professional version ofLogiTerm has other features that I havenot mentioned here due to space limita-tions. LogiTermWebPlus also has fea-tures not included in LogiTermProfessional. The company (Terminotix)says that LogiTerm is compatible withWindows Vista and MS Word 2007, butI have not tested it. Please see the com-pany website for details.

If I could have only one translationtool, it would be LogiTerm.

References:LogiTerm Professional Edition v. 3.1www.terminotix.comPrice: 450 Canadian dollars (approximately US$ 450)

Termiumwww.termiumplus.gc.ca

LogiTerm Part II Continued

Stay tuned to www.ata-spd.org for more information! To learn aboutadvertising, exhibit, and sponsorship opportunities, please contact

Milly Suazo-Martinez at [email protected].

ATA Spanish Language Division 5th Mid-Year Conference March 28–30, 2008

Doubletree HotelPhiladelphia, Pennsylvania


Announcing the ATA Job Bank!Find the perfect job. Make the perfect hire.

Check out this new, easy-to-use online service designed to helpconnect translators, interpreters, and project managers to newemployment opportunities.

Employers and Recruiters:• Post job announcements for free.• Target the best qualified candidates.• Track applications online.

Job Seekers: • Search by keywords, languages, and more.• Apply with e-mail applications.• Create job alerts to receive new listings.

Online now at www.atanet.org/jobbank!

Online Now!

Reserve your

SpotToday

Increase your company’s

visibility by placing an

ad in The ATA Chronicle.

Contact:

Matt Hicks at McNeill Group Inc.

[email protected]

215.321.9662 ext. 19.

Attention Advertisers:

Conference sessions will cover various aspects ofjudiciary interpreting and translation, including:skills-building; ethics; tape transcription; researchskills; reference works; special legal projects; courtinterpreting in other countries; specialized termi-nology; lexicography; legislation; advocacy; tech-nology; and interpreting in other settings (e.g.,medical visits, international tribunals).

For more information, please go to http://najit.org.

National Association of Judiciary Interpreters and Translators29th Annual ConferenceMay 16-18, 2008Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania


All works of art, includingoperas, are created in the context of aweb of conventions. A work may fullyconform to or partially defy the con-ventions of its day, but it cannotescape being measured against them.And this can be fuel for comedy,which may choose to parody the con-ventions either implicitly or explicitly.In such a case, the translator needs tobe aware of the conventions and makesure that the parody survives in thetranslation. Meanwhile, the operatranslator is working to solve theusual problems: preserving meanings,diction levels, syllable counts, stresspatterns, word burdens, aural clo-sures; perhaps also trying to re-createrapid-fire, cleverly rhyming patter. Ofcourse, the result must be singable,and, above all, funny.

These are the problems faced bytranslators making a performableEnglish translation of L’occasione fa illadro ossia Il cambio della valigia / AThief by Chance or Baggage Astray bythe Italian composer GiocchinoRossini (1792-1868). This 80-minute,one-act opera was first performed inVenice in 1812. Its libretto is by LuigiPrividali, adapted from the French Leprétendu par hasard, ou l’occasion faitle larron (1810) by the prolific EugèneScribe (1791-1861). The criticalorchestral score for this work was pub-lished by the Fondazione RossiniPesaro in 19941; the companion piano-

By Ronnie Apter andMark Herman

Parodies

OperaWhen Opera


vocal score, published in 2007 byRicordi, includes our translation,which is copyright 2007 by CASARICORDI-BMG Ricordi S.p.A.2 Allexcerpts from L’occasione fa il ladroincluded here are taken from these twoscores and are used with permission.

Five late 18th- and early 19th-centuryEuropean operatic conventions are glee-fully employed to the point of parody inL’occasione fa il ladro: identityswitching, falling in love with a portrait,falling in love at first sight, overly com-plex plots, and the cowardly, schemingnature of servants. Another conventionof both opera and the society of its time,the arranged marriage, is used to moti-vate dramatic action.

It is easy to retain the parodyinherent in this work simply by trans-lating fairly literally. The point is thatbeing aware of the conventions is neces-sary in order to appreciate the libretto.For instance, to those who know theconventions, the plot is not silly, butsatire: an important distinction. In otherwords, knowledge informs the tone of atranslation in a way that is hard to pindown, or to demonstrate by individualexamples. Knowledge helped theauthors to enjoy the opera and to enjoytranslating it—and, we hope, to conveythat enjoyment to performers and audiences.

Some of L’occasione’s parody ofcomplex plots is evident even in a plotsummary, which we will recount hereto help readers follow a discussion ofan opera they have probably neverheard of.

The StoryOn a dark and stormy night, our

hero, the baritone Don Parmenione, is

at a country inn enjoying his dinnerwhile his servant, Martino, cringes infear of the lightning. Our other hero,the tenor Count Alberto, together withhis bit-part servant, comes in to escapethe rain. Alberto is going to Naples foran arranged marriage to a woman hehas never met. When Alberto leaves,his servant mistakenly takesParmenione’s bag instead of Alberto’s.

Parmenione and Martino gothrough Alberto’s bag, finding money,papers, clothes, and a portrait of a girlthey assume to be Alberto’s fiancée.Parmenione—of course!—falls inlove with the portrait and rushes off,Martino in tow, intending to imper-sonate Alberto and steal his fiancée.

Meanwhile—of course there is a“meanwhile”—in Naples, ourheroine, Berenice, is awaiting thearrival of her fiancé, whom she hasnever met. Berenice is a countess wholives with her uncle Don Eusebio andErnestina, our other heroine.Ernestina, Berenice’s companion, foran as yet an unknown reason, is—ofcourse—posing as a servant. Berenicewould like to assess her fiancéwithout his knowledge, and so per-suades Ernestina to switch identitieswith her.

Enter Parmenione, wearingAlberto’s clothes, and Martino, forAlberto is—of course—the fiancé.Parmenione meets Ernestina and againfalls in love at once, not caring that shelooks nothing like the portrait.Ernestina thinks he is a bit bizarre, butvery nice, and hauls him off to meetDon Eusebio, Berenice’s uncle.

Enter Alberto, received byBerenice in disguise. (Remember,Countess Berenice is now pretending

to be Ernestina pretending to be a ser-vant, while Ernestina is pretending tobe Berenice.) Alberto and Bereniceimmediately take to each other, andAlberto, too, is brought to meet UncleEusebio. When the couples andEusebio are assembled, bothParmenione and Alberto claim to beAlberto, and both believe Alberto isengaged to Ernestina. The five venttheir confusion in a quintet.

The second half of the opera isdevoted to unraveling the confusion.Berenice is determined to set thingsright. She rather likes Alberto, butdetests Parmenione. She sets herselfto trap Parmenione in an inconsis-tency, which is no difficult task, andreveals her identity.

Now Parmenione and Alberto areconfused. The question switches from“Who is the real Alberto?” to “Who isthe real Berenice?” Parmenione andAlberto make a pact. If servant-clothed Berenice is the countess,Parmenione will give Alberto back hisidentity. If she is indeed a servant,Parmenione will continue as Alberto.This sounds like a good solution, but,since this is comedy and parody, theremust be more confusion. Berenicesays that if Alberto does not tell herthe truth at once, she will havenothing more of him in any persona.

Needless to say, after a little moremaneuvering, everyone’s true identity isrevealed and all is forgiven. Through itall, the chief concern of Martino—remember him, Parmenione’s servant?—has been to find something to eat.

But wait! Why is Ernestina in dis-guise? And whose is the portraitParmenione first fell in love with? Afew lines of recitative explain all.Ernestina is in hiding to escape a “vileseducer” who never appears in theopera. The girl in the portrait isAlberto’s sister, who never appears inthe opera. And, lest the plot

A work may fully conform to or partially defy theconventions of its day, but it cannot escape being

measured against them.

➡


not be complicated enough, the co-incidences not piled high enough,Parmenione is a friend of Ernestina’sbrother (who never appears in theopera), who has been sent to Naplesfor the specific purpose of finding outwhat had happened to Ernestina.

In tried and true comedic conven-tion, a double wedding is planned.

Switched Identities Obviously prominent in the plot of

L’occasione fa il ladro are switchedidentities, a staple of 19th-century fic-tion in general and operas in particular.L’occasione librettist Prividali wasprobably specifically making fun ofMozart’s Così fan tutte, which was firstperformed in 1790. In Così, two men,disguised as “Albanian” strangers, wooand win each other’s fiancées.3 At theturn of the stuffy 19th century, somefound this plot scandalous.

L’occasione makes fun of Così byupping the ante. Not only do the menswitch identities, but also the women.“Behold,” L’occasione implies, “I am notscandalous because my lovers, albeitunknowingly, are correctly paired off.”

Falling in Love with a Portrait L’occasione fa il ladro turns to yet

another Mozart opera to parody the plotdevice of a hero who falls in love witha portrait. In Mozart’s Die Zauberflöte /The Magic Flute, first performed in1791,4 Tamino falls in love withPamina’s picture. He sings an impas-sioned aria about it, beginning:

Dies Bildnis is bezaubernd schön,wie noch kein Auge je gesehn. Ich fühl’ es, wie dies Götterbild mein Herz mit neuer Regung füllt.

[This picture is enchantingly beautiful,more than any eye has yet seen. I feel how this godly image

fills my heart with new emotion/agitation.]

This boy is definitely in love!

Here is our performable Englishtranslation:

I gaze in wonder at a face whose beauty art cannot portray. This portrait transports me to aworld apart! A strange emotion fills my heart!5

Tamino, the hero, rushes off torescue Pamina, the heroine. Thoughthe situation turns out to be not quiteas he thought, he does get the girl inthe end. And while Die Zauberflöte isa comedy, his love for Pamina is sup-posed to be accepted by the audienceas deep and real.

L’occasione proceeds differently,and much less seriously. Parmenione,unlike Tamino and despite our appel-lation in the plot summary, is not ahero. He does not seek to rescue a girl,but to steal her from another man bymeans of deception. The girl whoseportrait has charmed him is not theheroine of the opera. Indeed, the girlin the portrait never even appears inthe opera. And Parmenione promptlyfalls for the first other girl he sees onhis way to his supposed beloved.

The aria Parmenione sings istotally different in mood from that ofTamino. Tamino is impassioned andconfused. Parmenione is impassionedand scheming:

D’arrogarmi un nome finto veramente il passo è ardito, sì, sì; e può mettermi in procinto di mangiare il pan pentito, sì, sì; ma se l’oro all’ altro io rendo,se rinunzio a ogn’ altro effetto,l’interesse non offendo,non pregiudico l’onor.

Ma poi questo bel visetto fa scusabile ogni error.

[To claim a false name for myself,truly the step is bold, yes, yes; and it could place me on the point of eating penitential bread, yes, yes; but if I repay the gold to the other man,if I renounce everything else,I do not offend his interests,I do not prejudice his honor. And of course this beautiful face excuses every error.]

In our performable translation,Parmenione sings:

I will take another’s name for I am bold enough to do it. Oh, yes. I will play a dangerous game though truth to tell I well may rueit. Oh, yes. Yet if I return his money,it is little that he loses. It is not as if his honor were sub-jected to assault. And besides her face excuses every failing, every fault.

Overly Complex Plots The twists and turns in the story of

L’occasione parody a long line ofoverly complex opera plots, and thecreators of L’occasione were obviouslyaware of what they were doing, as twopassages of meta-drama make clear.(In meta-drama, characters step out-side the dramatic action to comment onthe work in which they are appearing.)

In the middle of the opera, all themain characters sing a quintet, whichends with the lyrics:

Di tanto equivoco,di tal disordine nel cupo, orrible,confuso vortice,urta, precipita,

When Opera Parodies Opera Continued


s’avvolge, rotola,perduto il cerebro per aria va:ma si dissimuli,che senza strepito già tutto in seguito si scoprirà.

[Because of such misunderstanding,of such disorder in a dark, horrible,confused whirlpool,he knocks about, plunges headlong,embroils himself, spins; brain lost, through the air he goes:but he is deceived,because without any hubbub,of course all later on will be laid bare.]

Since modern audiences often expe-rience instances of meta-drama, we feltthat we had to exaggerate somewhat orPrividali’s “Without any hubbub, ofcourse all later on will be laid bare”might not be noticed. Therefore, weadded the word “masquerade”:

Oh how confusedly implausibilities of great perplexity resist analyses! Insane complexities increase relentlessly in whirling vortices of growing force! But soon reality will end the masquerade and everything will be made clear of course.

Another passage of meta-dramaoccurs near the end of the opera.Though all, or almost all, has beenexplained, Eusebio sings, “Iosbalordito resto”: “I remain bewil-dered.” Just before Eusebio sings,Ernestina and Parmenione sing theirown conclusions. The three phrases,

as we have translated them, are: “Ohwhat a happy moment!” “Oh what astroke of fortune!” “Oh what com-plete confusion!” Though explana-tions have been given, the characters,and perhaps also the audience, remainthoroughly confused.

And not only the audience!Richard Osborne, who wrote the entryon L’occasione in the GroveDictionary of Opera, incorrectlystates that the portrait in Alberto’sluggage is of Berenice.6 This is theportrait with which Parmenione firstfalls in love. Since it is a major plotpoint that neither Alberto norParmenione have any idea whatBerenice looks like prior to theirarrival in Naples, Osborne’s error con-verts L’occasione from a complex andsomewhat confusing opera into onethat makes no sense whatsoever: “Ohwhat complete confusion!”

Cowardly Scheming ServantsAll of the parody discussed so far

has pertained to plot. However, oneconvention parodied by L’occasionepertains to character. The schemingand/or cowardly servant dates back tothe classic comic drama of the ancientGreeks and Romans. Once again,L’occasione fa il ladro indicates it ismaking fun of the conventions per se,as opposed to merely conforming tothem, by having the performers almoststep out of character to comment.When he is being grilled about theidentity of his master, Martino says:

La verità! Ma come mai, signore,pretenderla si può da un servitore?

[The truth! But how, sir, can that beasked of a servant?]

Martino conforms with a vengeanceto all stage conventions regarding ser-vants. His cowardice is prodigious. He is

in almost constant fear of death, bylightning, by beating, even by starvation.He schemes to obtain food for himselfand more money for Parmenione: whenhe and Parmenione discover that thesuitcases have been switched, Martino’seye is on Alberto’s fat wallet. However,his scheme is crushed under the weightof Parmenione’s scheme. Stealing themoney, says Parmenione, would beunforgivable, dishonorable. Stealing thefiancée, however...and off they go.

However, as convention decrees,Martino is also hilariously clever.While refusing to reveal his master’sidentity, he slips in a devastatingword-picture of Parmenione, which,he has, of course, told everyone is alie. Or is it? His aria begins:

Il mio padrone è un uomo,ognun che il vede il sa:rassembra un galantuomo,e forse lo sarà. Vecchio non è né giovine,né brutto, né avvenente,non è villan, né principe,né ricco, né indigente,insomma è un di quegli esseri comuni in società.

[My master is a man,anyone who sees him knows this:he seems to be a gentleman,and perhaps he will be. He is not old nor young,nor ugly, nor handsome,not a peasant, nor a prince,not a rich man, not a pauper,in sum he is one of those who may be common in society.]

Our singable version goes:

My master is a man, sir, as anyonecan see,indeed a man of honor, if looks andtruth agree,indeed a man of honor, if ➡


looks and truth agree. Neither a youth nor elderly, andneither plain nor handsome,and neither sunk in poverty, norrich enough for ransom. He’s not a prince, nor a pauper. In essence, he’s a common type inour society,a very common type in our society,as common as can be in our society.

Falling in Love at First Sight andArranged Marriages

The convention of falling in love atfirst sight is obviously parodied inL’occasione fa il ladro: Parmenionedoes it twice, once with a portrait andonce with Ernestina. Upon meetingErnestina, he bubbles over with joy:

Quel gentil, quel vago, vago, vago,vago, vago oggetto,che a voi sposo, che a voi sposo,che a voi sposo il ciel destina,tutto foco s’avvicina, tutto focos’avvicina alla cara, alla cara, alla cara suametà.

[What an amiable, what acharming, charming, charming,charming, charming object,he whom to you as husband, he whomto you as husband heaven destines,all passion he is nearing, all pas-sion he is nearing to his dear, to his dear, to his dear[better] half.]

We had to capture this efferves-cence in our translation:

Oh you amiable, amiable, amiablecreature! Heaven sends me, heaven sends mehere to you to share your future. I approach you full of ardor, Iapproach you full of ardor:

you’re my better, you’re my better,you’re my better half to be.

Ernestina, in her turn, begins to fall inlove with Parmenione. She does sobecause of what she mistakenly believesis Parmenione’s reaction to another oper-atic (and societal) convention with whichthe opera is playing: the arranged mar-riage. Alberto’s and Berenice’s marriagewas arranged without their ever havingmet. Because of the switched identities,Parmenione and Ernestina each wronglybelieve the other to be a party to thatarranged marriage. Ernestina does nottake Parmenione’s protestations of love asgenuine. Instead, she assumes thatParmenione is saying, “Though you haveto marry me, I intend to woo you and tryto ensure that our marriage will be ahappy one.” Ernestina takes this as a greatcourtesy and kindness, and this motivatesher attraction to Parmenione. She says:

Io m’inchino con rispetto allavostra gran bontà,con rispetto alla vostra civiltà.

[I bow my head with respect atyour great goodness,with respect at your civility.]

and, aside,

È bizzarro, ma grazioso.

[He is eccentric, but gracious.]

Her appreciation of Parmenione’seccentricity bodes well for their rela-tionship. Therefore, the ending of theopera is indeed happy for these two,and, apparently, for Alberto andBerenice also.

And also for Rossini. His operaparodying operas was one of his firstbig successes, the harbinger of manymore successful operas to come.

Notes 1. Rossini, Giocchino, composer.

L’occasione fa il ladro. Libretto byLuigi Prividali. Operatic farce in oneact. Orchestral score. Critical editionunder the editorial direction of theRossini Foundation of Pesaro.Edited by Giovanni Carli Ballola,Patricia Brauner, and Philip Gossett(Pesaro: Fondazione Rossini, 1994),Distributed by Ricordi.

2. Rossini, Giocchino, composer.L’occasione fa il ladro. Libretto byLuigi Prividali. Piano-vocal scorebased on the critical edition of theorchestral score. English transla-tion by Mark Herman and RonnieApter (Milan: Ricordi, 2007).

3. Mozart, Wolfgang Amadeus, com-poser. Così fan tutte. Libretto byLorenzo da Ponte. Opera in twoacts (Kassel: Bärenreiter, 1970).

4. Mozart, Wolfgang Amadeus, com-poser. Die Zauberflöte. Libretto byEmanuel Schikaneder. Opera in twoacts. Edited by Gernot Gruber andAlfred Orel (Kassel: Bärenreiter,1970).

5. Mozart, Wolfgang Amadeus, com-poser. Die Zauberflöte. Libretto byEmanuel Schikaneder. Piano-vocalscore. English translation by MarkHerman and Ronnie Apter (1982).

6. Osborne, Richard. “L’occasione fail ladro.” In The New GroveDictionary of Opera, III: 644.Stanley Sadie, ed. Four volumes(London: Macmillan Press Limitedand New York: Grove’sDictionaries of Music Inc., 1992).

When Opera Parodies Opera Continued


If you believe all the hype,you would think that there is a brandnew Internet out there: a “2.0” versionof the good ol’ thing. The truth is, thisinfamous Web 2.0 we hear so muchabout is not a revolution. It is a naturalevolution, the glorious promise of theturn of the century progressivelycoming to fruition in both expectedand unexpected forms. As in theInternet bubble days, many of the newcompanies at the heart of the currenttrend will eventually perish or be pur-chased, while some may redefine thelandscape yet again, as Google didonly a few years ago.

Looking back on this youngInternet history, I cannot help butreminisce about the Minitel. Longbefore the Internet had reached a largeaudience, French phone subscriberswere offered little terminals to replacetheir phone books. The Minitel let the

French enter the cyber highway indroves before anybody else, with aneconomic model where the user wasbearing all the cost by paying forsophisticated services by the minute.

Even with that first online experi-ence under my belt, I still could nothave imagined, unlike some techno-ratis of the 1990s, that the Web wouldbecome a platform. Among the firstvisionaries, Bill Gates perceived thethreat to his PC-based empire, and

geared Microsoft up to catch up, andsquash, Netscape, which had analmost complete hold on the browsermarket in the early days. When basicWeb content was displayed in poorlylaid out pages at 28kbps, it did notlook like this medium would soon bechallenging the snappy ASCII(American Standard Code forInformation Interchange) services ofthe Minitel (do you remember thosegraphics made of monospace ➡

From Blogs to Wikis: What Web 2.0 Can Add to the Translator’s Tool Kit

As in the Internet bubble days, many of the newcompanies at the heart of the current trend will

eventually perish or be purchased, while some mayredefine the landscape yet again.

By Yves Avérous


characters?), such as checking thelatest news, viewing movie schedules,and ordering train tickets. This was1995, when the first surfers were stilldreaming of the largest library onEarth, safe from mercantilism. Ah,those were the days!

Web 2.0: How Users are Now alsoActors and Doers

Times have changed and the Webhas grown to the point of making anyBBS (bulletin board system) terminallook like a relic of an ancient past. In

just a decade, even as HTML(HyperText Markup Language) hasremained the basic language of ourwebpages, a whole new range ofcoding languages has developed tohelp serve up instantly customizeddata assembled from multiple vastdatabases all around the world, and topresent it in the most elegant andpractical ways. Thanks to these newtechnologies, not only do we getquick answers to our questionsthrough a whole series of new serv-ices that are also quickly becomingnew institutions, we can also helpcontribute to those answers. Volunteercontributors to forums, or better yet,Wikis—and notably, Wikipedia—haveblurred the lines between publishersand mere readers. Web surfers arenow actors and doers, creating a“wisdom of the crowds” for the ben-efit of all. Welcome to the universe of

Web 2.0. It should be noted that thisgallery of goodies was not built in oneday, but rests on an assortment ofcommunication blocks. Let’s reviewthem quickly.

From E-mail to Wiki: The Tools ofInformation on the Internet

From the get-go, one application onthe Internet was the no-brainer “killerapplication”: e-mail. Bulletin boardshad been around for a while(remember The WELL?), but e-mailproved to be as simple as physical

mail, but faster. All would have stayedperfectly lovely had it not been forspam. Who knows, message systemsfrom some of the newfangled Web 2.0services may well dethrone e-mailsome day, so stay tuned. Before we getthere, however, let’s explore the variedsolutions offered at this point.

1. E-mail and Chat: Personal inVarious Sizes: From the sweet note tothe formal letter, e-mail covers a largearray of uses and has found a verywidespread adhesion, which has beenfacilitated by software applicationscombining all the functions that helpusers manage their day-to-day duties,such as calendars, address books, andmore. While e-mail is more often a“one-to-one” or “one-to-few” commu-nication medium, it can extend itsreach ad nauseam when combinedwith the mail merge function, trans-

forming this most useful tool into anuisance to the point of threatening thevery medium.

Today, the amount of bandwidthclogged by random messages tryingto hook unsuspicious recipients isphenomenal. Web 2.0 may bring asolution by offering safe messaginginside the gated communities ofonline social networking. This isironic, considering that most of usstrayed away long ago from suchcommunities as Compuserve andAOL as soon as the Web developed itsmuscles. Could this be a kick back tothe future?

Personal e-mail, widened at timesto the size of a selected chat room,adds to the quality of immediacy, andis especially optimal when it is brief.Its cell phone cousin, SMS (shortmessage service), can even pushbrevity to the extremes.

2. Mailing Lists, the Boon ofPersonalized Marketing and GroupCommunications: With the mailinglist, the “one-to-many” medium hasfound a civilized way to express itself.The mailing list is particularly usefulfor organizations, notably commer-cial, that are trying to reach reliablepotential members or customerswithout spamming. A mailing list notonly requires a voluntary subscrip-tion, but when it belongs to a “group,”the users have the ability to managehow they collect the list’s messages.

3. Forums, Pioneer Messaging at theForefront of Social Networking: Theforums and the Web-based mailinglists of online groups offer a “many-to-many” type of content of short tomoderate length. Forums are particu-larly useful for support groups wheremembers’ questions, answers, state-ments, and reactions create a knowl-edge base, effectively generating a

From Blogs to Wikis: What Web 2.0 Can Add to the Translator’s Tool Kit Continued

Times have changed and the Web has grown to thepoint of making any BBS terminal look like a relic of

an ancient past.


history that can be searched over time.The three classic communication

media discussed above, which arethemselves extrapolations of the earlyBBSs and chat rooms, provide a back-bone for developing Web 2.0 cre-ations. Social networking andcollaborative sites often bring manyof these modes under the same inter-face to adapt users’ communicationneeds to their circumstances. Forexample, were you to share a draftproposition made on Google Docswith colleagues, you could choose toinvite them by e-mail, or chat directlywith them from the document pagesite you create.

Blog: One Person’s Word to the World

Early enthusiasts made blogs verypopular, but most people underesti-mate their usefulness. A blog is awebsite where entries are written inchronological order and commonlydisplayed in reverse chronologicalorder. Many blogs provide commen-tary or news on a particular subject;others function as more personalonline diaries. A typical blog com-bines text, images, and links to otherblogs, webpages, and other mediarelated to its topic. The ability forreaders to leave comments in an inter-active format is an important part ofmany blogs.

Blogs provide a way to add onenew article after another, and to indexentries for easy access and fast searchresults. Contrary to popular belief,blogs do not have to be used to rantand rave in front of the entire Web. Infact, very respectable companies,from Apple to General Motors, useblogs for support or marketing.

As an example, the NorthernCalifornia Translators Association(NCTA), an ATA chapter, uses theblog infrastructure to store the articles

published in its journal, Translorial.The blog version of NCTA’s publica-tion includes a large number of pastarticles, as well as the current crop(the latter are password-protected tokeep the new material exclusive to thegroup’s members). Blogs such aswww.translorial.com progressivelybuild rich sources of information fortranslators and interpreters, and it maybe useful to include these sites in yourbookmarks for further research, orbetter yet, add them to a feed reader of

your choice to have content sent toyou automatically. Professional blogsoften include a “blog roll,” which is alist of kindred places on the Web thatyou may want to visit.

Another interesting fact aboutblogs is their popularity with searchengines. If you maintain a specializedblog where you regularly post newcontent, chances are the varioussearch engines will give your blog ahigh rating. The reason is that blogsare easy to populate. Activity bringsvisitors, and activity and visitors com-bined give your blog a higher rankingon the search engines. It is as simpleas that. To illustrate this point, if yousearch for “Wordfast and Office onthe Mac” on Google, at the time ofwriting this article, the blog I maintainfor TransMUG, a Mac user group fortranslators, comes up first out ofnearly 1.2 million results.

If you have useful professional

information or advice to share, butyour content is not so formal anddetailed that you feel the need to addit to Wikipedia, use a blog! The worldwill thank you—silently most of thetime, but sometimes in the form ofcomments at the end of your articles.

Wiki is “Many-to-All,” Moderate to Long

A Wiki is a type of computer soft-ware that allows users to create, edit,and link webpages easily. Wikis are

often used to create collaborative web-sites and to power community websites,and are increasingly being installed bybusinesses to provide affordable andeffective Intranets or for knowledgemanagement. Wikis now enableemployees to contribute knowledge tothe company Intranets, which can thenbe accessed at any time by newcomersto a department or by people from otherbranches of the company interactingwith that department.

Wikis tend to be more formal thanblogs. Blogs are linear, so you postone article after the next, and theyopen in different pages that are gener-ated on demand. Wikis, on the otherhand, grow as the content grows. Ascontributors add new sections, littleby little, pages to those sectionsenrich all the branches of the site.

Wikis are finally growing in popu-larity, mostly thanks to software that isgetting somewhat easier to deal ➡

Web surfers are now actors and doers, altogethercreating a “wisdom of the crowds” for the

benefit of all.


with. You will not find the ease of useof Wordpress.com or Blogger yet(described below) in the Wiki solutionsavailable at this point, but an organiza-tion may invite you to participate intheir own Wiki, as NCTA did with theirmembers during ATA’s conference inSan Francisco. In the case of NCTA’sWiki site, www.ata07.insf.net, the ideawas to collect experiences of localtranslators and interpreters in the BayArea to share with ATA conferenceattendees. This effort demonstrated tounfamiliar users mostly accustomed toWikipedia that a Wiki does not alwayshave to be formal.

Customizable Portals: ThePrecursors of Web 2.0

A portal is a site that functions as apoint of access to information on theInternet. A pioneer in this domain, MyYahoo! is the first site to offer easy,flexible, and complex customization.Not long after the site had beenstriking agreements to provide con-tent from big media firms, it startedopening its modules to RSS (reallysimple syndication) feeds, allowingusers to bring anyone they could findalong the side of the informationsuperhighway to the party. Similarly,social networking sites today, such asFacebook, are also opening up byadding third party “applications” thata user can elect to run on their per-sonal pages.

Creating a BlogUnless you enjoy creating your own

websites and are familiar with, or notintimidated by, tools such asDreamweaver, Nvu (free), iWeb, andRapidweaver on the Mac, you maywant to consider a hosted “turnkey”solution for your blog. The followingservices allow you to hit the road withyour stories immediately after creatingan account and entering a few settings.

Bloggerwww.blogger.com

A startup acquired by Google,Blogger is one of the first web-basedblog applications, along withTypePad, to make blogging easy andfun. Getting started is as simple asopening yet another online account(or using your Gmail log in, in thisparticular case). With a straightfor-ward interface and a free hosting solu-tion, Blogger’s Blogspot gets yougoing in a flash.

Wordpress/TypePadWordpress.orgTypePad.com

For the supporters of the opensource movement, Wordpress is thechampion. You can either install theirPHP (personal home page) extensionsfrom Wordpress.org on your server(most hosts offer the module right intheir website hosting package), or useWordpress.com, the Wordpress com-munity’s free hosting offering. Opensource in this case means more tem-plates and better styles for your blog(s).As an example, TransMUG.com ishosted by Wordpress.com, whileTranslorial.com uses the Wordpressextensions (providing more freedomwith customization) on a private Webserver. If you prefer a corporateprovider with great customer support,the good people of Six Apart(www.sixapart.com) also have both ahosted (TypePad.com) and an installedsolution (Movable Type).

Microsoft Live Writerwindowslivewriter.spaces.live.com

If you prefer to keep your writingon your computer and sync it withyour blog, local applications exist thatconnect with the blog extensions togive you untethered control. Whileblogs made with applications likeBlogger and Wordpress are generally

completed directly online, local appli-cations, like Microsoft Live Writer onthe PC or MarsEdit on the Mac, estab-lish a seamless connection that allowsyou to control multiple sites from onesingle interface.

Reading BlogsIf you have a tendency to succumb

to addiction, using a feed reader maybe hazardous to your health, and maysiphon off your precious free time.Still, if you would like to cut down onthe time you spend every daychecking multiple websites for thelatest news relevant to you (or packmore of those in the same space), youmay save yourself a lot of time andeffort with a feed reader (also callednews reader).

Some of those reader applicationsreside by themselves, like NetNewsWire or FeedDemon on your machine,or inside your Web browser or your mailapplication. A search for RSS on share-ware aggregator websites likeDownload.com or MacUpdate.com willyield a long list of applications fromwhich to choose. User ratings and thenumber of downloads are good predic-tors of which solution to pick. In themeantime, let’s review those you canuse right from your browser withouthaving to install anything, while bene-fiting from extra bells and whistlesnot included in standard browsers ortheir plug-ins.

Google Readerwww.reader.google.com

My favorite one among all theweb-based readers is the GoogleReader. It has enough speed and fea-tures to satisfy your basic needs,including folders to organize yourfeeds and the ability to highlight (witha star) the articles you want to readlater, keep or use for a project, orshare. Google Reader keeps with the



less is more philosophy, offering alimited but essential—and working—set of features.

My Yahoo!My.yahoo.com

The original feed reader is holdingstrong in the current competitive envi-ronment. Second to Google inattracting new members, it is still the50-million-user gorilla of newsreaders. Its advantage is the ability tobring feeds to the level of classicsources of information. A drawback isits tendency to mix a fast and flexiblemedium in a heavy portal layout. Theredesigned interface, still in beta atthe time this article went to press,catches up with the times and makescustomization a breeze.

MyMSN/Livewww.live.com/?add

The sheer weight of the Microsoftempire always guarantees large num-bers of subscribers, but the service isfar from being on par with the compe-

tition. It is shocking to compare theirsite to any of the contenders on thispage and Newsgator.

Bloglineswww.bloglines.com

An Ask.com property that wasamong the first to add bells and whis-tles to their pages, Bloglines tries todo a lot around the concept of theblog. In my mind, this dilutes theinterest of offering feed management.Your feeds, your RSS destinations,are the sources of information youcare about. Bloglines offers you manydigressions that I find distracting. Theservice fits the expectation of a largeaudience, though.

NetVibeswww.netvibes.com

A newer kid on the block, Netvibes isgrowing fast on the very premise of Web2.0. It offers a sophisticated customizedcommand center of your Internet life,gathering the information you want anddisplaying it in one window.

Newsgatorwww.newsgator.com

Displaying the most elegant inter-face of the bunch, and mimicking thefeatures of the stand-alone applica-tions for Mac and PC offered by itsparent company, the Newsgator Webreader offers the most functionalities,but you will have to pay for theluxury, and, frankly, Google Readeroffers most of it for free. Still, it isworth a try.

Collaborative Tools

Google ApplicationsWhile Microsoft did a pretty good

job of sizing up the threat comingfrom Netscape, they did not reallymeasure the potential impact of asmall site with one empty field andone search button: Google. Google isthe platform. Little by little, it isassembling one piece of a vast puzzle after another. Some of these pieces remind us of traditionalsolutions, like Google Docs ➡

Suggested links for more information:

Apple iWeb http://www.apple.com/dotmac/iweb.html

RSS Explainedwww.ata-divisions.org/LTD/?p=65

RSS and BloggingAvérous, Yves. RSS and Blogging: Maturing Technologies to Gather and Produce Information (presentation at 2006 ATA Annual Conference)http://tinyurl.com/2sq8va

Microsoft LiveWriter Reviewhttp://paulstamatiou.com/2006/08/14/review-windows-live-writer-beta/

Blog HelpWordpress.com: http://codex.wordpress.org/Main_Page

Blog Tutorialhttp://www.blogbasics.com


(docs.google.com) emulating Micro-soft Office, while others, like GoogleMaps, with its recent customizationoptions and application programminginterfaces (APIs), which allow devel-opers to branch their services on themaps, are completely new. Developedaround Writely, the online wordprocessor they acquired, the office suiteoffered online by Google is a great col-laborative tool. I use Google Docs regu-larly, notably for NCTA’s journal,Translorial, and the tool is fantastic forsharing the documents that carry infor-mation the team needs to access andupdate. Using it as your word processor,though, can be tedious when your con-nection is not very fast, and its inter-Office compatibility is still limited.

ThinkFreewww.thinkfree.com

They call themselves “The bestonline office on Earth.” This collabo-rative site offers the most sophisti-cated interface that any Web-basedproductivity suite is able to offer atthis time. If it were not for the jugger-naut reach of Google Apps, ThinkFreemight well be THE online produc-tivity solution people are using. Thereason ThinkFree may have missedthe mark is that it might be trying todo too much too soon with a heavyand sophisticated Java interface.Depending on your configuration,ThinkFree is not that responsive, andyou may encounter a lot of graphicerrors in the interface.

Buzzwordwww.buzzword.com

Another startup gobbled up by abig group, Buzzword is one of thelatest entries in the online wordprocessor field. Flash-based, the siteoffers a stunning interface and thesmoothest interaction, history, andcomments. It recently added a word

count function that may make it thebest tool around—experience will tell.And this is only the beginning of whatit has to offer. Buzzword was acquiredrecently by, not surprisingly, Adobe.

MySpace and Facebookwww.myspace.comwww.facebook.com

What if you were to throw every-thing but the kitchen sink at your web-site? This is pretty much what MySpace and Facebook are attempting todo, and the big players are alreadyshaking in their boots. Not to be lefthanging, Rupert Murdoch, of theNews Corporation media empire(Fox, etc.), snatched MySpace earlyon, while Microsoft recently paid$240 million to lock in a seat at theFacebook table, which is now esti-mated to be worth $15 billion.

Facebook brings the concept ofMySpace, which has been embracedby teenagers, to the adult crowd(albeit mostly a still young crowd).The participatory site allows you tokeep in touch with your friends andsocial contacts. In the meantime, awell-established service like LinkedIn(www.linkedin.com), with a strong-hold on the professional networkingworld, is not playing dead, butFacebook has the potential to invadethat territory eventually, too. OnFacebook, your own personalizedhomepage lets you know what allyour friends are up to, from theserious “Yves is writing an article” tothe inane “John invites you to becomea Zombie.” It also brings togetheryour “networks” (your university, forexample) and groups, and keeps youinformed of important events andwhat the group is sharing or reading.(Why not an ATA division, or chapter,as a Facebook group or network.) Addto all this the ability to search out con-tacts and send messages, choose the

people who can contact you in aspammer-free space and access allyour feeds, and you obtain a servicethat could very well help our commu-nity rebuild the old CompuserveFLEFO translator community cher-ished by our seasoned colleagues, butthis time with spanking new 21st cen-tury attributes.

And Then?When considering the latest Web 2.0

services, one could dream of a commu-nity not unlike ProZ, but a communitythat relies on the latest advances to betruly interactive and modern. Thisvision can become a reality if we workfor it. In the meantime, Web 2.0 isalready preparing version 3. Now thatthe once-derided dreams of the Internetbubble are becoming a reality thanks tothe wide adoption of broadband and theimplementation of database-driven net-works, what are our visionariesdreaming of next? In a recent edition ofthe San Francisco public radio stationmorning show, Forum (www.kqed.org/epArchive/R710180900)—a podcastyou can subscribe to in your feed readerfrom the link www.kqed.org/.pod/forum)—one participant was describinga Web that will remember where yourquest for information has brought you,gauge your level of understanding of theissue you are researching, and help youreach your goals based on that sharpevaluation. This presents a perspectivewhere scary becomes scarier, andexciting exhilarating.


Visit www.atanet.org

today!


ATA Certification Exam InformationUpcoming Exams

ArizonaTucsonMarch 2, 2008 Registration Deadline:February 15, 2008

CaliforniaSan DiegoMarch 15, 2008Registration Deadline:February 29, 2008

San FranciscoMarch 22, 2008Registration Deadline:March 7, 2008

San FranciscoApril 26, 2008Registration Deadline:April 11, 2008

San DiegoSeptember 6, 2008Registration Deadline:August 22, 2008

FloridaOrlandoNovember 8, 2008Registration Deadline:October 24, 2008

IndianaWest LafayetteMarch 22, 2008Registration Deadline: March 7, 2008

MichiganNoviAugust 9, 2008Registration Deadline:July 25, 2008

New JerseyNew BrunswickApril 19, 2008Registration Deadline:April 4, 2008

TexasAustinMarch 1, 2008Registration Deadline: February 15, 2008

HoustonFebruary 24, 2008Registration Deadline: February 8, 2008

WashingtonSeattleApril 26, 2008Registration Deadline:April 11, 2008

WisconsinMilwaukeeMay 3, 2008Registration Deadline: April 18, 2008

All candidates applying for ATA certification must provide proof that they meet the certification programeligibility requirements. Please direct all inquiriesregarding general certification information to ATAHeadquarters at (703) 683-6100. Registration for all certification exams should be made through ATAHeadquarters. All sittings have a maximum capacityand admission is based on the order in which registrations are received. Forms are available fromATA’s website or from Headquarters.

New Certified Members Congratulations! The following people have successfully passed ATA’s certification exam:

English into JapaneseKiyoshi KasaharaIrvine, CA

French into EnglishElisabeth LymanWales, WI

Hungarian into EnglishCatherine K. BokorPoughkeepsie, NY

Portuguese into EnglishFlavia da Rocha Spiegel LinckHiawatha, KS

Spanish into EnglishGerardo García RamisCanóvanas, Puerto Rico

Tori S. YoungIrvine, CA

Active Membership Review Congratulations! The Active Membership Review Committee is pleased to grant active or corresponding status to:

ActiveLori B. ColmanPeekskill, NY

Chinsook Kim MooreSierra Madre, CA

Hortensia I. StuderTucson, AZ

CorrespondingPaul AntalBoulder, CO


I have been carrying the termpair “digital natives” and “digital immi-grants” around with me for a few weeks,and I finally realized why they havemade such an impression on me. Here ishow Wikipedia defines these terms:

“A digital native is a person who hasgrown up with digital technology,such as computers, the Internet,mobile phones, and MP3. A digitalimmigrant is an individual whogrew up without digital technologyand adopted it later. A digital nativemight refer to their new ‘camera’; adigital immigrant might refer totheir new ‘digital camera.’”

(Were I a digital native, I would prob-ably have referred to this quote onlyby a hyperlink or by saying “the dic-tionary,” rather than “Wikipedia.”)

Many—if not most—of us are dig-ital immigrants. After all, the reason Iwrite about technology is to “inter-pret” technology and make it palat-able for the many immigrants amongus. In a way, it is shocking to have to

identify myself as an immigrant andrealize that I will never have the sametechnology fluency as 20-year-olds orteens; however, I also think that theseterms offer some real hope.

We are all translators, and most ofus did not grow up with more thanone native language. I cannot imagineanyone who has learned a foreignlanguage to translation-level masterywho did not feel great excitement inthe process of learning that language.Remember waking up after your firstdream in the foreign language? Orwhen you felt that you could expresssomething better in the new languagethan in the language you grew upspeaking? Or when you first felt asmuch confidence talking in your newlanguage as you do in your first lan-guage? I remember those momentsvividly. The challenge is to transposethat same excitement into learningyet another “foreign language”: tech-nology. Here is the deal: We know wecan do it and be good at it, becausewe have already done it to the pointof mastery.

I recently visited Poland for a con-ference, and I was amazed at howlittle I understood—there seemed tobe so few cognates that I could clingto. I am afraid that this is how many ofus feel when we look at the tech-nology that can and should support usin our work as translators. If I had thetime, I would love to study Polish, andI am sure that I would enjoy it. As faras technology goes, the question is notwhether we have the time or not—thequestion is whether we want to con-tinue to evolve in our profession ornot. We can do it grudgingly, or wecan try to approach it as if we wereentering into the adventure of learninga new language.

Przejdêmy do rzeczy!

Digital Natives

GeekSpeak Jost [email protected]

Plan now to exhibit at ATA’s 49th Annual Conference in Orlando, Florida, November 5-8, 2008. Exhibiting at ATA’s AnnualConference offers the best opportunity to market your products and services face-to-face to more than 1,500 translators andinterpreters in one location. Translators and interpreters are consumers of computer hardware and software, technical publications and reference books, office products, and much more.

For additional information, please contact Matt Hicks, McNeill Group Inc.; [email protected]; (215) 321-9662, ext. 19; Fax: (215) 321-9636.

ATA’s 49th Annual Conference • Orlando, FloridaNovember 5–8, 2008

The GeekSpeak column has two goals: to informthe community about technological advances and atthe same time encourage the use and appreciationof technology among translation professionals. Jostalso publishes a free technical newsletter for trans-lators (www.internationalwriters.com/toolkit).


Business Smarts What is a Freelance Translation Business Worth?

There are many formulas for calculatingthe net worth of a larger business for taxpurposes or to arrive at a fair sale value.For instance, the EBITDA method looksat Earnings Before Interest, Taxes,Depreciation, or Amortization, whileother accounting procedures arrive atvaluations by considering cash flow,personnel cost, and debt. But what abouttypical freelance enterprises, which, inmost cases, are small companies run bya single person? This column looks atthe specific question of finding the valueof freelance businesses.

Dear Business Smarts,I am in the process of applying for

student aid for my college-bound sonand have to fill out financial aid forms. Inthis context, I am wondering how Iwould calculate the value of my busi-ness. I am the sole proprietor of my free-lance translation business. I do notoutsource any assignments, which meansthat all the money that comes into thecompany is earned from my translationservices. Thank you for your advice.

Valued

Dear Valued,In contrast to larger translation

businesses, which have trainedemployees, client lists, a reputablename in the industry, and other quan-tifiable assets that could be includedin a potential sale, your small com-pany is built entirely on your ownwork and skills. No one could pur-chase the business from you and

expect to continue running it withoutchanges. For further clarification onthis matter, we consulted TedWozniak, a financial translator andbusiness expert. His reply:

“The value of a professionalservice business is almost entirelydependent on the value that theindividual service provider bringsto that business. A reasonable argu-ment can be made that the indi-vidual translator IS the primarybusiness asset and, as such, cannotbe sold along with other assets.Accordingly, an earnings approachto valuation is meaningless unlessthe same individual remains withthe business. In other words, thetranslator brings value to her busi-ness, and without her, the businesshas no value beyond the relativelyminor value that is contained in thefew physical assets she owns.”

For the purpose of indicating thevalue of your business on financial aidforms, which will also ask about yourhousehold income elsewhere, it may besufficient simply to look at your equity,which is the value of your assets minusany liabilities (debt) you owe. With theexception of software, which, accordingto tax definitions, depreciates or losesits value over the course of three years,most other purchases you made for yourbusiness will depreciate over five years.This means that you would not includethe full purchase price of your com-

puter, your software, or your diction-aries in the current value of your busi-ness. Instead, you may deduct a certainpercentage of their value for every yearyou have owned them. Once you havemade this calculation, add up the depre-ciated values of your office equipment,furniture, and other items that are usedexclusively for the business: this is thevalue of your business. For most soleproprietorships, this number is unlikelyto exceed four digits. Although therehas been more and more discussionrecently in the translation communityabout the value of translation memo-ries—which can contain substantial vol-umes of translated material—no onehas yet arrived at a standardized solu-tion. So, while translation memoriesconstitute your “intellectual property,” itis not yet necessary to incorporate theminto the equation.

The information in this column was compiled by members of ATA’s Business Practices Education Committee for the benefit of ATAmembers. This column is not intended to constitute legal, financial, or other business advice. Each individual or company shouldmake its own independent business decisions and consult its own legal, financial, or other advisors as appropriate. The viewsexpressed here are not necessarily those of ATA or its Board of Directors. Send your questions about the business of translation andinterpretation to The ATA Chronicle—BPEC Q&A, 225 Reinekers Lane, Suite 590, Alexandria, VA 22314; Fax: (703) 683-6122; E-mail: [email protected]. Questions must be accompanied by a complete name and address, but will be publishedanonymously or pseudonymously upon request.

Comments?ATA members can discuss business issuesonline at the following Yahoo! group:http://finance.groups.yahoo.com/group/ata_business_practices. Youwill need to register with Yahoo! (at nocharge) if you have not already done so,and provide your full name and ATAmember number in order to join the group.


The Metroplex Interpretersand Translators Association (MITA) isa professional association serving theDallas-Fort Worth (DFW) Metroplex.MITA was established in 1993 by areainterpreters and translators to sharetheir interests and experiences, to net-work, to continue their professionaldevelopment, and to promote compe-tence and recognition of translationand interpreting as professions.

Mission • To promote recognition of quality

and professionalism in interpretingand translation.

• To provide continuing educationfor interpreters and translators.

• To serve as a resource of qualifiedlanguage professionals (inter-preters and translators).

• To offer networking opportunitiesfor its members and other profes-sionals interested in the field ofinterpreting and translation.

Benefits and Activities • The opportunity to network with

certified/accredited translators andcertified interpreters.

• A subscription to MITA’s monthlynewsletter, The MITA Reader.

• A listing in the association’s onlinemembership directory.

• Two workshops and two socialevents each year.

• The opportunity to participate in spe-cial interest groups and workshops.

WebsiteIn addition to membership information,

MITA’s website (www.dfw-mita.com)contains: event listings; contact infor-mation for the association’s officers;

an online membership directory; onlinejob listings; links to upcoming semi-nars and workshops; translator andinterpreter resource links; and archivesof The MITA Reader in PDF format.

Online Membership Directory: This searchable online directory

provides contact information anddetails about each member’s services(i.e., languages, specializations).

NewsletterThe MITA Reader is published

monthly online at www.dfw-mita.com/newsletter/index.htm.

ATA chapters, affiliates, and local groups serve translators and interpreters in specific geo-graphic areas. They provide industry information, networking opportunities, and supportservices to members at the local level and act as liaisons with the national association. Thiscolumn is designed to serve as a quick resource highlighting the valuable contributionsthese organizations are making to the Association and the profession as a whole.

• Established: 1993

• Website: www.dfw-mita.com

• Contact:Tel: (972) [email protected]

Metroplex Interpreters andTranslators Association

Quick Facts

Success by Association

Translation: Getting it Right is an ATA client education bookletavailable in print and online. ATA members can order up to 100copies at no cost. To download a PDF copy of this booklet, visitwww.atanet.org.

Translation: Getting it Right“By applying even half the tips in this guide, you will improve

your chances of getting a translation that works.”

american

translators

association

A guide to buying translations

Translation

getting it right


Send your news to Jeff Sanfacon [email protected] or American Translators Association, 225Reinekers Lane, Suite 590, Alexandria, VA 22314.Member News

• To mark its 20th anniversary, ATA’sPortuguese Language Division(PLD) presented Edna Ditarantowith the Mário Ferreira Award atATA’s 48th Annual Conference inSan Francisco. Together withPortuguese translator MárioFerreira, Edna was one of the

founders of the PLD in 1987, andserved as the division’s adminis-trator for several terms. She is cur-rently the language chair for theEnglish→Portuguese exam gradingteam within ATA’s CertificationProgram. The Mário Ferreira Awardwas established to recognize thosewho have made considerable contri-butions to Portuguese translationwithin the ATA community. It haspreviously been awarded to MuriloNery and to Clifford Landers.

• Dynamic Language Center receivedthe 2007 Northwest WashingtonFamily Business Award in the smallbusiness category from PacificLutheran University (PLU). TheSeattle-based company, founded by Maria Teresa Antezana andRicardo Antezana in 1985, wasselected from a pool of 290 nomi-

nated companies and 15 finalists.Established to recognize and honoroutstanding Northwest family busi-nesses, the Washington FamilyBusiness awards were created 14years ago by the PLU School ofBusiness Family Enterprise Institute.Award criteria include innovativebusiness strategies and practices, per-formance, family and business links,contributions to community andindustry, multi-generation familybusiness involvement, and longevity.

• Corinne McKay’s translation ofGilbert Legay’s Dictionnaire desIndiens d’Amérique du Nord hasbeen published by Barron’sEducational Series as Dictionary ofNorth American Indians and otherIndigenous Peoples.

Edna Ditaranto

Bill Grimes, a translator, abstractor, and technology enthusiast, died inCambridge, Massachusetts, November 30, 2007.

Bill grew up in South Boston, where his mother worked in a sugar factory.His first language was Lithuanian, but as he later liked to say, the only thingshe knew how to do in Lithuanian were to swear and pray.

After graduating from Harvard, where he went through the Slavic studiesprogram, Bill spent two years at the U.S. Patent Office, working on German,Russian, and Czech patents. Later, he founded W. J. Grimes and CompanyCustom Technical Translations. It was around this time that he becameactively involved with ATA, serving as a director from 1977–1980.

Always interested in technology, Bill was a pioneer in the use of the personal computer for translation. He was an early—and frequent—contributor to Compuserve’s FLEFO.

A founding member of the New England Translators Association, Bill frequently discussed technology and translation matters, and he helped point numerous “youngsters” in the right direction.

In MemoriamWilliam J. Grimes

1938–2007

—Isabel Leonard


Traducciones de contratosinglés-español español-inglés(Volume I)

Author and publisher: Liliana Bernardita Mariotto

Publication date:2006

Number of pages:264

ISBNs:987-05-0703-4978-987-05-0703-1

Contratos civiles y comerciales inglés-castellanocastellano-inglés: Formularios(Volumes I and II)

Author: Liliana Bernardita Mariotto

Publisher:Abeledo-Perrot in Buenos Aires

Publication date:1995-1996 edition

ISBNs:950-20-0846-4 (1995) 950-20-0910-X (1996)

Number of pages:252 (1995)305 (1996)

Available from: www.intransbooks.com for $65Contact the author: [email protected]

Reviewed by:Sharlee Merner Bradley

This review will compareLiliana Bernardita Mariotto’s Traduc-ciones de contratos inglés-españolespañol-inglés (Volume I) with herContratos civiles y comerciales inglés-castellano castellano-inglés: Formu-larios (Volumes I and II). A comparisonof the two editions I have of this valu-able work is a confusing process, sincethe 1995-1996 edition comes in twovolumes and is labeled as a second edi-tion. The newer edition (2006) comesin just one volume and contains nearlyall the content of the two volumes ofthe older version, but it is labeledvolume I. For review purposes, the twoeditions will be designated “the olderedition” and “the newer edition.”

It turns out that there seem to havebeen three versions of this work, thefirst dating back to 1991, which thisreviewer has not seen. Because thisreviewer’s expertise is from Spanishinto English, only this aspect will becovered in this review. The Argentinelegal terminology remains to bereviewed by a specialist in the field.

The work is not a dictionary, but thesource text and translated text of exam-ples of different kinds of contracts oneencounters in Argentina. The older edi-tion consists of one volume of Spanishlanguage contracts (with their Englishtranslations at the end) and anothervolume of English contracts (with theirSpanish translations at the end).Probably due to popular demand, thenewer edition consistently presents eachsource text on the left page and its corre-sponding translation on the oppositepage. This is a tremendous advantage tothe translator or student, who can com-pare the context of the term needed inorder to see if it is appropriate to thetranslation job at hand.

Even better is the fact that for thenewer edition, the author, a sworntranslator in Argentina, extractedmany difficult or frequently found

terms from the contracts in each lan-guage and compiled two indices,making the work much more usefuland accessible than the previous edi-tion. The two lists, one each forSpanish and English, contain around600 terms. For each term, the pagewhere the term is used is given so thatthe source term and its translation onthe opposite page may be consulted incontext. Sometimes there is a footnotewith an alternate translation or otherexplanatory information.

The English translations usually pro-vide the more modern English termsfrom the Plain English Movement(abbreviated PEM in the notes), wherethe older, antiquated, or obsolete (butstill often used) terms are often supplied.For example, the Spanish term por elpresente is translated in a contract as“hereby,” and a footnote on page 157adds the older legal English phrase “bythese presents.” In a Precompromiso decompraventa (page 154), en concepto deindemnización is translated “as liqui-dated damages.” In a Contrato de com-praventa (page 178), tendrán derechoa…indemnización alguna is translatedas “being entitled to…compensation fordamages.” The different phraseologydemonstrates the art of translating notjust the words, but the meaning andintent of the source text. In order to dothis successfully, the context is essential.

Another excellent example of pro-viding equivalent usage, not neces-sarily the same terminology, is in theboilerplate introductory text of manycontracts. In an Agreement for aBuilding Lease (page 89), “whereby itis agreed as follows” is translated asquienes acuerdan sujetarse a las sigu-ientes cláusulas.

Some of the changes in the textfrom the older to the newer editioninclude the interesting substitution ofthe term español for the previouscastellano; the addition of two new

Dictionary Review Peter [email protected]

Compiled by


English contracts (assignment oftrademark and an indemnification andhold harmless agreement); a change offont from Times to Arial (or similarthereto); and a more readable layout.The copy reviewed, however, had anumber of pages of light print, one ofwhich (page 22, which, unfortunately,is part of the index of terms) is legibleonly with difficulty.

Overall Evaluation Traducciones de contratos inglés-

español español-inglés is a remarkableimprovement over Contratos civiles ycomerciales inglés-castellano castel-lano-inglés: Formularios (Volumes Iand II), converting a good idea into ausable tool. Many terms can apply

more widely than just to Argentinecontracts. Although indexing relativelyfew terms, this volume on contractsjoins Tom West, Javier Becerro, andGuillermo Cabenellas and EleanorHoague (see publication informationbelow) on my shelf of essentialSpanish legal references.

Becerra, Javier F. Diccionario de ter-minología jurídica Mexicana,español-inglés (Mexico: EscuelaLibre de Derecho, 1999).

Cabanellas de las Cuevas, Guillermo,and Eleanor C. Hoague. Butter-worths Spanish-English LegalDictionary (Austin Texas: Butter-worth Legal Publishers, 1991).

West, Thomas L. Spanish-EnglishDictionary of Law and Business(Atlanta: Protea Publishing, 1999).

Sharlee Merner Bradley has a doctorate in Romance lexicography, and has translatedfor the United Nations. She is a freelancetranslator of French and Spanish into English,and is secretary of ATA’s Dictionary ReviewCommittee. Contact:[email protected].

Federal Bureau of Investigation/National White Collar Crime CenterThe Internet Crime Complaint Center www.ic3.gov

Security FixBrian Krebs on Computer Securityhttp:// blog.washingtonpost.com/securityfix

Scam Alert Websites


Honors and Awards | 2008

The Alexander Gode Medal

ATA invites nominations for the 2008Alicia Gordon Award for Word Artistryin Translation. This award has beenestablished in memory of Alicia Gordon,known for creating imaginative solutionsto knotty translation problems based onrigorous research. The award was estab-lished by Alicia’s sister, Dr. Jane Gordon,and award funds are administered by theAmerican Foundation for Translationand Interpretation (AFTI).

Eligibility The award is open to ATA members

in good standing. Passages may be sub-mitted by the translators themselves orby others on their behalf. The translationthat, in the opinion of the judges,demonstrates the highest level of artistryin translation will receive the award.

Submission Guidelines 1. Translations of up to 750 words

between (to or from) English andSpanish or French in any subjectmatter field will be considered.

2. The translation and the source textmust be submitted electronically byJune 1, 2008 to [email protected].

3. Only one submission per applicantwill be accepted. Submission ofmore than one translation will resultin disqualification of the applicant.

4. The translation must have been doneby an individual (no group efforts).

5. If the translation was done as awork for hire, the party that con-tracted for the translation mustconsent in writing to its submis-sion for the award.

6. Former award recipients areexcluded from subsequent cycles.

7. The decision of the judges is final.

8. Applicants will be notified of thejudges’decision with respect to theirsubmission. Notification will be byelectronic or other means as deter-mined by the committee of judges.

9. By submitting a translation for consid-eration, the applicant expressly agreesto comply with these guidelines.

10. The award will be announced at ATA’s49th Annual Conference in Orlando,Florida (November 5-8, 2008).

Deadline: June 1, 2008 (Candidates are encouraged to submitnominations early!)

Award$250 and a certificate of recognition

Please send nominations to: Alicia Gordon Award for WordArtistry in Translation American Foundation forTranslation and Interpretation, Inc. Columbia Plaza, Suite 101 350 E Michigan Avenue Kalamazoo, MI 49007 Phone: (269) 383-6893 Fax: (269) 387-6333 E-mail: [email protected] Web: www.afti.org

The Alexander Gode Medal, ATA’smost prestigious award, is presentedto an individual or institution for out-standing service to the translation andinterpreting professions. This awardmay be given annually.

Eligibility Individuals or institutions nominated

do not have to be members of ATA;however, a history of constructive rela-tions with ATA and the language profes-sions in general is desirable. Nomineesdo not have to be U.S. citizens.

NominationsNominations are welcomed from

the past recipients of the Gode Medaland the ATA membership at large. Asufficiently detailed description of theindividual or institution’s record ofservice to the translation and/or inter-preting professions should be includedas part of the nomination. Petitions andletter campaigns are not encouraged.

Deadline: May 1, 2008

AwardGode Medal, complimentary reg-

istration to ATA’s 49th Annual

Conference in Orlando, Florida(November 5-8, 2008), transportation toand from the conference, and up to fournights’ lodging at the conference hotel.

Please send nominations of the indi-vidual or institution you consider worthyof receiving the next Gode Medal to:

American Translators Association 225 Reinekers Lane, Suite 590Alexandria VA 22314Phone: (703) 683-6100Fax: (703) 683-6122E-mail: [email protected] Web: www.atanet.org/membership/honorsandawards.php

Alicia Gordon Award for Word Artistry in Translation


➡

ATA and the American Foundationfor Translation and Interpretation(AFTI) invite nominations for theannual S. Edmund Berger Prize.

The $1,000 prize is offered to recog-nize excellence in scientific and tech-nical translation by an ATA member.

Nominations Individual translators or translation

companies wishing to nominate atranslator for this prestigious award

may obtain a nomination form fromthe AFTI website (www.afti.org) orfrom AFTI at the address listed below.

Nominations will be judged by athree-member national jury. Therecipient of the award will beannounced during ATA’s 49th AnnualConference in Orlando, Florida(November 5-8, 2008).

Deadline: September 18, 2008

Please send nominations to: American Foundation forTranslation and Interpretation, Inc. Columbia Plaza, Suite 101 350 E Michigan Avenue Kalamazoo, MI 49007 Phone: (269) 383-6893 Fax: (269) 387-6333 E-mail: [email protected] Web: www.afti.org

S. Edmund Berger Prize for Excellence in Scientific and Technical Translation

Lewis Galantière AwardThe Lewis Galantière Award is

bestowed biennially in even-num-bered years for a distinguished book-length literary translation from anylanguage, except German, intoEnglish. The Ungar GermanTranslation Award is given in odd-numbered years.

This award honors distinguishedATA founding member LewisGalantière (1894-1977). His transla-tions from French drama, fiction,poetry, and scholarship enriched cul-tural life during the middle decades ofthe 20th century, and are still beingread a quarter century after his death.

EligibilityTo be eligible for the award, the

book-length literary translation musthave been translated from any lan-guage, except German, into Englishand have been published in the U.S. in2006 or 2007.

The published translation must listthe translator’s name on the title pageand preferably on the dust jacket.Preference will be given to publishedworks that provide biographical infor-mation about the translator.

The translator does not have to bean ATA member; however, the trans-lator should have a strong connectionwith the U.S. through citizenship orpermanent residence. The nominationmust be submitted by the publisher ofthe translated work.

NominationsThe nomination must be submitted

by the publisher of the work and mustinclude the following:

• Cover letter with complete publi-cation information for the workbeing nominated, including thedate of publication.

• Brief vita of the translator,including place of residence andcontact information.

• Two copies of the nominated workwith one extra copy of the dust jacket.

• Two copies of 10 consecutivepages from the original work,keyed to the page numbers of thetranslation. Please do not staple. Ifproviding a dual-language work,copies are still required.

• Two copies of the translated pagesthat correspond to the 10 consecu-tive pages provided from the orig-inal work. Please do not staple. Ifproviding a dual-language work,copies are still required.

Deadline: May 1, 2008 Publishers are encouraged to submitnominations early.

Award$1,000, a certificate of recognition,

and up to $500 toward expenses forattending ATA’s 49th AnnualConference in Orlando, Florida(November 5-8, 2008).

Please send nominations to:American Translators Association 225 Reinekers Lane, Suite 590Alexandria VA 22314Phone: (703) 683-6100Fax: (703) 683-6122E-mail: [email protected] Web: www.atanet.org/membership/honorsandawards.php


Honors and Awards Continued

Student Translation Award

In 2008, ATA will award a grant-in-aid to a student for a literary or sci-tech translation or translation-relatedproject.

The project, which may be derivedfrom any facet of translation studies,should result in a project with post-grant applicability, such as a publica-tion, a conference presentation, orteaching materials. Computerizedmaterials are ineligible, as are disser-tations and theses. Translations mustbe from a foreign language INTOENGLISH. Previously untranslatedworks are preferred.

EligibilityThe award, to be presented at

ATA’s 49th Annual Conference inOrlando, Florida (November 5-8,2008), is open to any graduate orundergraduate student, or group ofstudents, attending an accredited col-lege or university in the U.S.Preference will be given to studentswho have been or are currentlyenrolled in translator training pro-grams. Students who have already

published translations are ineligible.No individual student may submitmore than one entry.

ApplicationApplicants must complete an entry

form (www.atanet.org/membership/honorsandawards_student_form.php)and submit a project description not toexceed 500 words. If the project is atranslation, the description mustpresent the work in its context andinclude a substantive statement of thedifficulties and innovations involved inthe project and the post-competitionform the work will take. The applica-tion must be accompanied by a state-ment of support from the facultymember who is supervising the project.This letter should demonstrate thesupervisor’s intimate familiarity withthe student’s work and include detailedassessments of the project’s signifi-cance and of the student’s growth anddevelopment in translation.

If the project involves an actualtranslation, a translation sample of notless than 400 and not more than 500

words, together with the correspon-ding source-language text, mustaccompany the application. The trans-lation sample may consist of two ormore separate passages from the samework. For poetry, the number of wordsmust total at least 300.

Deadline: April 18, 2008

Award$500, a certificate of recognition, and

up to $500 toward expenses for attendingATA’s 49th Annual Conference inOrlando, Florida (November 5-8, 2008).One or more certificates may also beawarded to runners-up.

Please send the entry form andapplication materials to:

American Foundation forTranslation and Interpretation, Inc.Columbia Plaza, Suite 101 350 E Michigan AvenueKalamazoo, MI 49007Phone: (269) 383-6893Fax: (269) 387-6333Email: [email protected]: www.afti.org

NEW Marian S. Greenfield Financial Translation Presentation Award

ATA and the American Foundationfor Translation and Interpretation (AFTI)invite nominations for the Marian S.Greenfield Financial Translation Award.

The $1,000 prize recognizes an out-standing presenter who will offer a finan-cial translation session at ATA’s AnnualConference. Conference registration feeswill be waived for the awardee.

Individuals wishing to nominate afinancial translation presenter for thisprestigious award may obtain a nomi-

nation form from the AFTI website(www.afti.org ) or from AFTI at theaddress listed below.

Nominations will be judged by athree-member national jury. Therecipient of the award will beannounced during ATA’s 49th AnnualConference in Orlando, Florida,November 5-8, 2008.

Deadline: May 1, 2008

Please send nominations to: American Foundation forTranslation and Interpretation, Inc. Columbia Plaza, Suite 101 350 E Michigan Avenue Kalamazoo, MI 49007 Phone: (269) 383-6893 Fax: (269) 387-6333 E-mail: [email protected] Web: www.afti.org


Harvie Jordan Scholarship

Purpose To promote, encourage, and sup-

port leadership and professionaldevelopment of translators and inter-preters within ATA’s SpanishLanguage Division (SPD) and tohonor Harvie Jordan’s lifetime contri-butions as a language professional.

Description of Award Paid registration to ATA’s Annual

Conference or the SPD Mid-YearConference, as desired.

Eligibility Limited to ATA Spanish Language

Division members in good standingwith two or more years of membership.

Selection Criteria 1. Demonstrated leadership skills and

career goals;

2. ATA Spanish Language Divisioninvolvement and commitment toservice;

3. Special contributions to translationand interpreting.

Please limit your response to eachof the selection criteria above to 100words or less.

Deadline: September 18, 2008

Applications Applications are available at

www.afti.org. Send your completedapplication via e-mail to the AmericanFoundation for Translation andInterpretation at: [email protected].

Applications will be numbered, de-identified, and distributed to theScholarship Selection Committee. TheSelection Committee will consist of mem-bers of ATA’s Spanish Language Division.

All selections are final. Thenumber of scholarships available willdepend on the funds available.Scholarship winners will be asked tocontribute an article to Intercambios,the SPD newsletter, reporting on theconference or a session they attended

American Foundation for Translation and Interpretation JTG Scholarship in Scientific and Technical Translation or Interpretation

Purpose This is a $2,500 non-renewable

scholarship for the 2008-2009 aca-demic year for students enrolled orplanning to enroll in a degree programin scientific and technical translationor in interpreter training.

Eligibility 1. Applicants must be graduate or under-

graduate students enrolled or planningto enroll in a program leading to adegree in scientific and technicaltranslation or in interpreting at anaccredited U.S. college or university.

2. Applicants must be full-time studentswho have completed at least one yearof college or university studies.

3. Generally, an applicant shouldpresent a minimum GPA of 3.00overall and a 3.50 in translation- andinterpreting-related courses.

4. Applicants should have at least oneyear of study remaining in their pro-gram; however, in certain circum-stances, one residual semester maybe accepted.

5. Applicants must be U.S. citizens.

Selection Criteria1. Demonstrated achievement in transla-

tion and interpreting;

2. Academic record;

3. Three letters of recommendation byfaculty or nonacademic supervisor;

4. A 300-500-word essay outlining theapplicant’s interests and goals as theyrelate to the field of translation orinterpreting.

Application Process 1. Applications may be obtained from:

American Foundation forTranslation and Interpretation, Inc. Columbia Plaza, Suite 101 350 E Michigan Avenue Kalamazoo, MI 49007 Phone: (269) 383-6893 Fax: (269) 387-6333 E-mail: [email protected] Web: www.afti.org

2. Completed applications must bereceived by AFTI by June 1, 2008.

3. A completed application consists of:a) Application cover sheet;

b) Three letters of recommenda-tion in a sealed envelope with rec-ommender’s signature over theenvelope flap; c) Essay; d) A copy of the applicant’s aca-demic record with a copy of themajor/minor or other programform, or a departmental statementof admission to the translation orinterpreting program.

Award A national award committee will

announce the name of the scholarshipaward winner by the end of August 2008.The committee’s decision is final.Disbursement of the award will occur atthe beginning of the Fall Semester, 2008.

About JTG Inc. Founded in 1995 by ATA Past

President Muriel Jérôme-O'Keeffe, JTGInc. is a language consultancy that sup-ports homeland security, intelligence,and global business with cross-culturalcommunications. JTG Inc. has under-written the AFTI scholarship since 2001.Visit: www.jtg-inc.com.

Images from the Conference



San Francisco, California | October 31– November 3, 2007

Conference photographs by Jeff Sanfacon

San Francisco Round Robin Tennis ResultsHere are the pictures and results of the ATA Round Robin Tennis Tournament.

Photo

court

esy o

f Rob

ert C

roese

Photo courtesy of Robert Croese

Thanks to everyone who participated, especially to organizer Robert Croese, whose hard workmade this year’s Round Robin Tennis event such a success. See you next year in Orlando!

Avid Players Category:

First Place Alex Alvarez and Cynthia Calder

Second PlaceMarion Rifkind and Pieter Ouwehand

Casual Players Category:

First PlaceArmin Wahl and Iris Mielonen

Second PlaceAlvaro Munoz and Bruni Johnson


A groom attends horses.Presumably, when he has time, he alsoattends a bride. How did a horse atten-dant become the bride’s beloved?

According to the Oxford EnglishDictionary (OED), “bride,” which isalso pronounced “breed” and “brood”in some British dialects, is related towords in several languages meaning“daughter-in-law.” This implies thatthe two meanings could be synony-mous in some societies; the bride inthose societies always moving into herhusband’s parents’ home. The OEDsuggests that the word may be derivedfrom a root word meaning “to cook,brew, make broth,” since that was aduty of a daughter-in-law in the prim-itive family. Significantly, the OEDdoes not suggest any etymologicalconnection with “breed” and “brood.”

What about “groom”?Around 1000 AD, the word was

“brydegome,” meaning the bride’sman, related to modern German“Bräutigam.” “Gome” [man] isrelated to “homo,” as in “homosapiens.” But, largely by the 14th cen-tury, and completely by the 15th,“gome” was gone from the language.

How did the resourceful British cope?

Well, they first made “bride” non-sexist. In the 15th and 16th centuries,“bride” referred to either partner ofthe affianced couple, female or male.But this experiment in non-sexist lan-guage was several hundred years pre-mature, and so, in the 16th century,what had once been “brydegome”became “brydegrome.”

The OED gives two possible rea-sons. The first is that “grome” wasadded to “bride” simply to distinguishthe male from the female, since“bride” could mean either. “Groom”originally meant “manchild” or “boy,”and so the “brydegrome” was the“bride-boy” as distinguished from the“bride-girl.” The resemblance of “bry-degrome” to “brydegome” wouldtherefore be coincidental.

The second possibility is that theoriginal “brydegome” survived longenough somewhere to be resurrected inan erroneous form as “brydegrome.”

There is a third possibility, notstated by the OED: “brydegrome” wasresurrected on purpose, or coinedanew, because the coiner liked theresemblance to the old word andthought the new meanings to be appro-priate. “Groom,” in addition tomeaning “boy,” also meant an “inferior

male servant,” and, by the 14th century,also specifically a servant who attendsto horses. Note, however, that it wasonly in the 17th century, after the word“bridegroom” was in widespread use,that “horse attendant” became the pri-mary meaning of “groom.”

And so the words, by their etymo-logical relationships, allow bothmembers of the happy couple to feelsuperior: the groom is the bride’s infe-rior male servant, and the bride isequivalent to the groom’s horse.

I suggest that the aisle they marchdown be called the bridal path.

Herman is a librettist and translator.Submit items for future columns via e-mail to [email protected] via snail mail to Mark Herman,1409 E Gaylord Street, Mt. Pleasant,MI 48858-3626. Discussions of thetranslation of humor and examplesthereof are preferred, but humorousanecdotes about translators, transla-tions, and mistranslations are also wel-come. Include copyright informationand permission if relevant.

Bride and Groom

[email protected] and Translation Mark Herman

Conference sessions will cover various aspects of judiciary interpreting and translation, including: skills-building; ethics; tape transcription; research skills; reference works; special legal projects; court inter-preting in other countries; specialized terminology; lexicography; legislation; advocacy; technology; andinterpreting in other settings (e.g., medical visits,international tribunals).

For more information, please go to http://najit.org.

National Association ofJudiciary Interpreters and

Translators


May 16-18, 2008Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania


ATA Airlines? Yes, ATAAirlines. Don’t laugh, it’s a reality,not fantasy. Operating under contractwith the U.S. Air Force, this cut-ratecompany, formerly known asAmerican Trans Air, has its headquar-ters in Indianapolis, Indiana, and has aWeb address that probably many lan-guage novices have typed into theircomputers while in the initial stagesof trying to find our organization:www.ata.com. As a retired militaryman, the Translation Inquirer usedtheir services twice in October—toget to and from the Far East from

Seattle—with all the bells, whistles,bennies, and perks that come withhaving served at least 20 years in themilitary and being over 60. Alongwith over 300 other passengers, I wasjammed into a DC-10 and made the10-hour westbound and eastboundflights at virtually no cost. That partof ATA Airlines was great; however,the uncertainty of being at the bottomof the priority list, and not knowingwhether I would get aboard, was notso great. But in the end, that ATAcame through for me, just as this ATAdoes for just about all of us. Right?

The Translation Inquirer John [email protected]

Cr–CroatianD–DutchE–EnglishF–FrenchG–GermanPo–Polish

Pt–PortugueseR–RussianSp–SpanishSw–SwedishUk–Ukrainian

Abbreviationsused with this column

New Queries(E-Cr 1-08/1) Marijan Boskovic won-ders about cessation of civil effects ina birth certificate that has already beentranslated once, presumably fromSpanish, since the person in questionis a female born in South America. Anadded line at the bottom mentions adivorce, and states: Divorced, cessa-tion of civil effects. [Next line:]Religious marriage by sentence No.….Of the circuit of Family Court of….What, Marijan asks, would be properCroatian for the words in bold print?

(D-E 1-08/2) The financial term(geld)telcentrale came up in a Dutchcontext indicating where money wascounted, but no English equivalentworked for this ProZ correspondent.What is it?

(E-F 1-08/3) Sometimes even adetailed definition does not help.Process manufactured products arehigh-risk products, in that they aresusceptible to having their naturechanged as a result of probablechanges in the nature of the raw mate-rials used, and due to the manufac-turing process controls, with

production organized in batches. Theiruniformity has to be checked fre-quently. How can we get this intoFrench without having an equivalentas wordy as the above definition?

(E-Po 1-08/4) In an article on theoverall medical condition of peoplethat either do or do not drink a lot ofmilk, residual confounders, a statis-tical term, troubled a ProZer trying togo into Polish. Here is a sample:…there are differences between thesubgroups…in the various studies,but these are small, and adjustmentsare made for possible confounding indifferent combinations. Whileresidual confounding is thereforepossible…. This sounds like the dif-ferences in the figures mess up thestatistics, but what is it, and howabout the Polish?

(G-E 1-08/5) A simple-seemingverbal noun in German caused troublewhen placed in a high-tech context:Die ListAll-Funktion des Moduls wirdvor dem Setzen der IP-Adresseaufgerufen, damit in der Instanz dienotwendigen Strukturen (Adapter-Informationen, etc.) initialisiert sind.

What do we do with the InternetProvider addresses?

(G-E 1-08/6) Here is another peskyGerman abbreviation, KV. The contextis training for accreditation at a majorcorporation. The context sentencefragment speaks of Überführung von1-2 Attestlernenden in “normal” KVAusbildung prognostiziert. What is it?

(Pt-E 1-08/7) In the botanical world,what does torrão de açúcar mean?Perhaps a kind of flower, but listen tothe context: As flores produzidas naMadeira distinguem-se pela suabeleza e qualidade, méritos aos quaisé indissociável o saber fazer dos seusagricultores. Ocupando uma área decerca de 70 ha, a que corresponde umaprodução media anual de 5.000.000 deflores, as culturas mais disseminadassão a estrelícia, o antúno, o torrão deaçúcar, as orquídas (sapatinhos, cim-bídios, phalaenopsis e a cattleya) emais recentemente as próteas (génerosprótea, leucadendrum e leu-cospermum). Please help out a ProZuser who came to a dead end.

(R-E 1-08/8) As regards mechanical


devices, what is a njrfhm-eybdthcfk?A ProZ query made reference to acghfdjxybr for such.

(Sw-E 1-08/9) What on earth is våt-produktsförbränning? A context sen-tence mentions the Förhållande totalvolym våtproduktsförbränning ochden totala volymen gas & luft tillfördugnen. Please help out a ProZ habituéwho needs good English for this.

Replies to Old Queries(E-Uk 10-07/5) (windshield suctionpedestal): For this automotive term,Aleks Lukoff likes either Gilcnfdrf prhigktyyzv yf kj,jdjve crki yfghbcjcwi or Gilcnfdrf> ojpfrhigk/ænmcz yf kj,jdjve crki pfljgjvjuj/ ghbcjcrb.

(F-E 7-07/4) (les mauvaises herbesgraminées, dicotylédones et cypé-dracées déjà levées): John Kinory isnot happy about Jean Lachaud’s“broadleaf weeds” or Sandra Stubbe’s“flowering weeds” as translations fordicots (September issue, page 49).Both dicotyledones and monocotyle-dons are broadleaf, a feature that dis-tinguishes them from coniferousplants, which are not. Moreover,although conifers are normally—butnot, he believes, universally—classedthese days as non-flowering. Grassesare perfectly respectable floweringplants like other monocots, such asirises, lilies, orchids, and so on.Therefore, John proposes with thegrasses, sedges, and dicotyledonousweeds already removed.

(F-E 9-07/4) (Pompiérisme démoni-aque): Gabe Bokor says that thePompiérisme trend in art was the offi-cial “academic” art of the 19th cen-tury, and that it got its name from theshiny helmets worn by many of thesubjects in art pompier paintings.

Pompier means a firefighter. He rec-ommends diabolic pompierism ormaybe reverse academic art as theEnglish for this.

(Po-E 9-07/8) (Dali mi w ˝y∏´): PiotrGraff says this is they jabbed my vein.In other words, they gave me a shot ofheroin. For matters like this, he rec-ommends The Polish-English Dict-ionary of Slang and Colloquialismsby Maciej Widawski, published in1998 by Hippocrene Books(www.hippocrenebooks.com).

(Pt-E 10-07/8) (agua-pe in viticul-ture): Thais Simoes says it is vinhofraco, a type of wine with a lowalcohol content. The term comes fromthe Tupi language: awa’pe (awa =redondo, and pewa = chato) refers tothe round and flat shape of the leavesfrom which the wine is made. AlanClarke says that on St. Martin’s Day,November 11th, wine is an importantpart of the conviviality that honors this(allegedly) boozing saint. Agua-pe ismade by adding water to the residue ofgrapes—skins and seeds—after theyhave been stomped, and then fer-menting the concoction. This producesa weak wine.

(Sp-E 9-07/9) (calibre commercial):Carl Stoll is fairly certain that calibremeans size, and that it is equivalent tothe French calibre, which also meanssize. The term is used to describe thesize of something, such as fruits, eggs,and vegetables. When speaking offirearms, calibre means the diameterof the bullet.

(Sp-E 10-07/10) (UE): Assuming thatthis query comes from Spain, GonzaloOrdóñez has a notion that maybe theinitials UE mean that the form isasking for a standardized UniónEuropea format. Check the original

query on page 57 of the October issueto see if you think he is right.

(Sp-E 10-07/11) (condiciones de lig-aduras de los movimientos): Againfrom Gonzalo Ordóñez, the contextfor this phrase might justify equiva-lents like conditions for movementsconnections or conditions for move-ments’ relations. It is a biomechanicsmatter, by the way.

Thanks for all the contributionsthis month. Keep them coming!

This column is solely intended as a means of facilitatinga general discussion regarding terminology choices. Forfeedback regarding pressing terminology questions,please try one of these online forums: Lantra-L(www.geocities.com/athens/7110/lantra.htm),ProZ.com (www.proz.com), or Translators Café(http://translatorscafe.com).

Address your queries and responses to TheTranslation Inquirer, 112 Ardmoor Avenue, Danville,Pennsylvania 17821, or fax them to (570) 275-1477. E-mail address: [email protected]. Pleasemake your submissions by the first of each month tobe included in the next issue. Generous assistance fromPer Dohler, proofreader, is gratefully acknowledged.

ATA’s MembershipDirectory

You’ll find the most up-to-date

contact information for your

ATA colleagues online, day or

night! Search by name, location,

even by e-mail address—

just click www.atanet.org/

membersonly.


Call for Papers49th Annual Conference of the American Translators AssociationOrlando, Florida • November 5-8, 2008Hilton in the Walt Disney World Resort

Proposals are invited on topics in all areas of translation and interpreting, including the following:Financial Translation and Interpreting; Independent Contractors; Interpreting; Language ServicesProviders; Language-Specific Sessions; Language Technology; Legal Translation and Interpreting;Literary; Media; Medical Translation and Interpreting; Science and Technology; Terminology; andTraining and Pedagogy. Suggestions for additional topics are welcome.

Proposals for sessions must be submitted on the Conference Presentation Proposal Form to: ConferenceOrganizer, ATA Headquarters, 225 Reinekers Lane, Suite 590, Alexandria, VA 22314; Fax: (703) 683-6122. All proposals for sessions must be in English.

Submission deadline: March 14, 2008There’s no time like the present! Download a Conference Presentation Proposal Form atwww.atanet.org/conferencesandseminars/proposal.php.

Upcoming Events

February 5-6, 2008Israel Translators Association6th International Conference Jerusalem, Israelhttp://ita.org.il

March 7–8, 2008Institute of Germanic and Romance StudiesNordic Translation ConferenceLondon, Englandwww.awaywithwords.se/nordic.htm

May 13–17, 2008Association of Language Companies 2008 Annual Conference San Francisco, Californiawww.alcus.org

May 16–18, 2008National Association of JudiciaryInterpreters and Translators29th Annual ConferenceMay 16-18, 2008Pittsburgh, Pennsylvaniahttp://najit.org

August 4–7, 2008International Federation of Translators18th FIT World CongressShanghai, Chinawww.fit-ift.org

November 5–8, 2008American Translators Association49th Annual ConferenceOrlando, Floridawww.atanet.org

Visit the ATA Calendar Online www.atanet.org/calendar/

for a more comprehensive look at upcoming events.

Full Conference DVD-ROM $149* for ATA Members / $179* for Nonmembers

(*Plus $7.50 U.S. / $15 International Shipping & Handling)

To order your DVD-ROM, visitwww.atanet.org/conf/2007/dvdrom.htm.

Attention ATA-Certified Members: This DVD-ROM is approved for Continuing EducationPoints. Earn one point for each hour viewed, up to a maximum of 10 points!

Did you miss the ATA Annual Conference?BUY THE DVD!

ATA’s primary goal is to foster and support the professional development of translators and interpreters. In order to reach more professionals in more successful ways, ATA is creating an electronic library of advanced education that will have increased availability and easier accessibility.


48th Annual ConferenceHyatt Regency San Francisco, California October 31-November 3, 2007

DVD-ROM of Conference Sessions

Sessions of the 48th Annual Conference have been audiotaped and integrated with supporting slides, documents, and other information to create a multimedia DVD-ROM that will serve as a valuable educational tool.

Note: Not all presentations were recorded due to speaker consent, audio problems, or program changes. DVD-ROMs are Windows compatible and will play in your computer DVD drive only, not in your audio or home DVD player.


DIRECTORY OF LANGUAGE SERVICESTo place an ad contact Matt Hicks at 215-321-9662, ext. 19 or [email protected]

Transmitter/ReceiversWeekly or MonthlyLandmark Audio TechnologiesCall 888-677-4387

Interpretation Equipment Rental

ADVERTISE IN ATA& WATCH YOUR AD TRANSLATE INTO $$$

Contact Matt Hicks today for rates and information.215-321-9662 ext. 19

[email protected]

501-I So. Reino Rd., #358, Newbury Park, CA 91320Tel.: (818) 991-1277 • Fax: (805) 498-9955

Comprehensive Arabic

Solutions• Translation & Localization (Technical, medical, software & more)• Translation Memory Tools (Trados, Déjàvu) • PC & Mac DTP

E-mail: [email protected] • www.translationstogo.com

The best professionaltechnical translations,especially for Euro, Africanand Brazilian Portuguese.Quality, reliability, speed. Let ushelp you optimize your project.

www.cybertecusa.com800.769.7891

Fax [email protected]

The owner of one of the most prestigioustranslation and foreign language production agencies in the UK, based in London, provid-ing creative translation to the media industry and other blue-chip clients in Europe,the Middle East and the USA, is looking to retireand therefore pass on a fully operational andprofitable company with team of specialist staffwith a t/o of US$1.5m. Members of the ATAand ATC. Huge growth potential in the EU. Doyou want a base in Europe, then is this youropportunity? For more information contact [email protected]

Farsi, Armenian, Dari, Pashto, [email protected]

Translator

Agency for Sale

To Advertise call Matt Hicks

today at 215-321-9662,

ext. 19


American Translators Association - 2008 Membership Renewal Form

Please complete the following information (to be included in your online services and membership directory listings, if applicable).This form, along with appropriate remittance, must be received by ATA Headquarters on or before February 29, 2008.

Mr. Mrs. Ms. Dr.: First Name Middle Initial Last Name ATA Member Number

Address: Street Apt/Suite

City State/Province Zip/Postal Code Country

Telephone - Primary: Secondary:

Fax Number: International Applicants: please include Country Code ( ) and City Code ( )

Email Address (list one only):

Website Address:

Renew Online: Visit the “Members Only” section of the ATA website at www.atanet.org/membersonly to renew today!

INDIVIDUAL MEMBERSHIP

Active/Corresponding/Associate: $145 $_____

Active/Corresponding/Associate, 3 years: $385 $_____

2 Members in Same Household: $230One copy of the Chronicle per household.

$_____

Life: $75Member for 20 consecutive years and at least 60 years of age.

$_____

Student: $80Not applicable for current Active/Corresponding members. Open to

graduate and undergraduate college/university students enrolled full-

time in any program or part-time in a translation- or interpreting-

related program, including foreign language study. Limited to 4 years.

Requires current school transcript (in English) verifying student status.

Student members are not eligible to be listed online in the Directory

of Translation and Interpreting Services.

$_____

ORGANIZATIONAL MEMBERSHIP(Not eligible to take the Certification Examination.)

Institutional: $180Proof of nonprofit status is required.

$_____

Corporate: $300 $_____

COMBINED MEMBERSHIPJoint: $380Individual and Corporate Membership combined.

$_____

INTERNATIONAL POSTAGE (required for membership)

Non-U.S. Residents, except Canada and Mexico: $35(If renewing for 3 years, $95 is required for postage.)

$_____

Non-U.S. Residents, Canada and Mexico only: $15(If renewing for 3 years, $40 is required for postage.)

$_____

Do not include my information on lists rented to qualified advertisers.

Do not send me ATA broadcast announcements via email.

(Does not include payment confirmations or receipts.)

Do not list the following in the Membership Directory: Primary Telephone Fax

Secondary Telephone Email Address

DIVISION MEMBERSHIP (optional)

Renew and/or join any Division at no additional cost!

Chinese Language Division

French Language Division

German Language Division

Interpreters Division

Italian Language Division

Japanese Language Division

Korean Language Division

Language Technology Division

Literary Division

Medical Division

Nordic Division

Portuguese Language Division

Slavic Languages Division

Spanish Language Division

Translation Company Division

Note: As a member of an ATA Division, you will receive an electronic version of the

division newsletter. If you would like to receive a printed version of the newsletter,

please visit http://www.atanet.org/divisions/membership.php.

MEMBERSHIP DIRECTORY (optional)

Printed 2008 Membership Directory: $25The online Membership Directory is free to all members and is

continuously updated and available throughout the year.

Note: Corporate and Joint members will receive a complimentary copy of the printed Membership Directory.

$_____

AFTI DONATION (optional; see reverse)

American Foundation for Translation and Interpretation $_____

TOTAL PAYMENT $_____

PAYMENT: Check/Money Order: Please make payable, through a U.S. bank in U.S. funds, to American Translators Association

Credit Card: Charge my VISA MasterCard American Express Discover

Card No.: Expiration Date:

Name on Card: Signature:

The publication cost of The ATA Chronicle magazine for one year ($43) is included in membership dues. Dues are not deductible as a charitable contribution forfederal tax purposes, but may be deductible as a business expense. Membership is based on a calendar year (January-December) and is non-refundable

and non-transferable.See Reverse


AMERICAN FOUNDATION FOR TRANSLATION AND INTERPRETATION (AFTI) DONATION (optional)

You may choose to make a tax-deductible donation in any amount to AFTI. AFTI’s charitable activities consist of sponsorship anddissemination of research through grants, scholarships, commissions for the production of educational materials, and maintainingan archive of documents and artifacts in translation and interpreting.

CHAPTER REBATE (optional)

If you are a member of an ATA chapter, you may designate a chapter (choose from the menu below) to receive a dues rebate. These rebatesallow chapters to provide valuable benefits to their members. A rebate may be requested for only one chapter. Designating a chapter rebate

does not take the place of paying your chapter dues. Important: Do not deduct anything from your ATA membership dues.

Chapter (check only one):

Atlanta Association of Interpreters and Translators (AAIT)

Carolina Association of Translators and Interpreters (CATI)

Delaware Valley Translators Association (DVTA)

Michigan Translators/Interpreters Network (MiTiN)

Mid-America Chapter of ATA (MICATA)

Midwest Association of Translators and Interpreters (MATI)

National Capital Area Chapter of ATA (NCATA)

New York Circle of Translators (NYCT)

Northeast Ohio Translators Association (NOTA)

Northern California Translators Association (NCTA)

Northwest Translators and Interpreters Society (NOTIS)

Upper Midwest Translators and Interpreters Association (UMTIA)

Note: Southern California Area Translators and Interpreters Association (SCATIA) is inactive.

INDIVIDUAL MEMBERSHIP (optional)

Translation/Interpreting Employment Status: (check all that apply)

Academia Full-time private-sector employee

Government employee Full-time independent contractor

Company owner Part-time independent contractor

Areas of Specialization: (check all that apply)

Arts & Humanities Law

Business & Finance Medicine

Computers Science

Engineering Social Science

Industry & Technology Other: _______________________

Number of years you have worked in translation/interpreting: _____

In the past year, have you obtained any paid work as a result of youronline listing in the ATA services directories? Yes No

What new services or programs do you think ATA should offer?

ORGANIZATIONAL MEMBERSHIP (optional)

How can ATA better serve you and your organization?

Deadline for payment of ATA

dues is February 29, 2008.

Please return this form to ATA with your

dues payment to ensure continuation ofyour membership, a listing in the ATA

Online Membership Directory, inclusionin the Directory of Translation and

Interpreting Services (for Associate and

Active/Corresponding members), votingeligibility (for Active/Corresponding

members), and inclusion in the Directory

of Language Services Companies (for

Corporate Members).

3 Ways to Renew YourMembership:

Online in the “Members Only”

section of the ATA website at

www.atanet.org/membersonly

Fax renewal form to (703) 683-6122

Mail renewal form to

American Translators AssociationMembership Renewal

225 Reinekers Lane, Suite 590Alexandria, Virginia 22314

Thank You for Renewing!


Where Intelligence Goes to WorkIt’s about solving the toughest challenges. Taking the path never traveled. Using

your intelligence and imagination to impact the world.

NSA is looking for intelligent and imaginative people to produce foreign

intelligence information and protect U.S. information systems.

If you’re ready to give your intelligence some competition, join NSA, where the

top intelligence really matters.

Career Opportunities:

U.S. citizenship is required. NSA is an equal opportunity employer. All applicants for employment are considered withoutregard to race, color, religion, sex, national origin, age, marital status, disability, sexual orientation, or status as a parent.

For more information and to apply online, visit our Web site.

>

>

>

>

>

>

>

www.NSA .gov/CareersSECURING TOMORROW TODAY

Computer/Electrical Engineering

Computer Science

Mathematics

Foreign Language

Intelligence Analysis

Cryptanalysis

Signals Analysis

Business Management

Finance and Accounting

N AT I O N A L S E C U R I T Y AG E N C YNSA

>

>

The new way of workingfaster

easiermore powerful

www.translationzone.com

chronicle · translations of 21 operas, operettas, and choral works, many of which have been...

Documents