I submitted my presentation proposal for ATA55

I have just submitted my presentation proposal for the 55th ATA Conference. If the ATA accepts my proposal, I'll give an advanced-level presentation on Xbench for Translation Management and Translation QA.

...and since Corinne McKay had the idea for a badge, and French/Hungarian>English translator Carolyn Yohn created one and made it available, I'll also proudly display it

What I've been doing instead of blogging

This year I've been blogging a lot less than in the past few years. Part of the reason was blogging fatigue, but mostly because I've been working on a special project for the Italian Language Division of the ATA: our new revamped website.

I started out thinking it would be a quick job of selecting a nice template and adding some updated content, and I ended up by hand-coding or tweaking all the pages and creating some special graphics for the site (such as the banner image of the home page).

In addition to that the ILD Twitter account is now active: @ATA_ILD, and of course, Tradurre (the ILD's blog) has been active for years.

Early-bird deadline for the ATA Conference

Friday, September 20 is the last day you can register for the ATA Conference at the discounted early-bird rate.

In their reminder e-mail, the ATA give ten good reasons to attend the ATA annual Conference:

1. MORE THAN 200 SEMINARS, SESSIONS, AND EVENTS
   Practical education from translators, interpreters, and company owners
2. FACE-TO-FACE NETWORKING
   More than 1,800 attendees to meet at this year's Annual Conference
3. TOOL TUTORIALS
   Three days of translation tool workshops and presentations
4. LATEST SOFTWARE, BOOKS, TECHNOLOGY
   Meet vendors and try a little hands-on experience in the Exhibit Hall
5. MOBILE "APPING." NEW THIS YEAR!
   Program, handouts, and more from smart phone, tablet, or laptop
6. ATA DIVISION EVENTS
   Some of the best one-on-one information networking
7. ASSOCIATION MEETINGS
   Find out more about ATA's goals and how you can be part of them
8. TIME TO HAVE FUN
   Things to do, places to go, and fun to be had
9. THE GREAT DEBATE
   Tweet, email, or post your comments online in debate of T&I issues
10. IDEAS, MOTIVATION, AND ENTHUSIASM
    Learn from others, be inspired, and remember what makes your career so great
    
    Review the complete ATA Annual Conference Program now. 

But in addition to that, this year is particularly special for the Italian Language Division: we have more sessions than ever before, and two very special guest speakers: Italian best selling author Beppe Severgnini, and his English translator, Giles Watson.

You can see more details about the Italian Language Divsion events in the ILD's new website.

See you in San Diego!

Can translators ignore theory?

Being informed about translation theory is knowing what others have said and thought about translation: its purposes, how to judge whether a translation is accurate, successful, or well written. How to translate to achieve specific goals, what responsibilities translators have, and whether they are primarily responsible to the author, the original text, the reader, or the customer who commissioned a specific translation.

To be sure, without knowing or being aware of translation theory one can still translate. But translators who learned translation from teachers who reject theory out of hand and only emphasize learning by simply translating, are still following a translation theory of sorts. A theory, however, they are not aware of, and that they cannot, therefore, examine critically and tap for specific occasions or assignments.

Downplaying the importance of theory, while teaching translation through a series of commandments, as Mark Freehill seemingly does (from what could be seen in his presentation at the recent 52nd ATA Conference), is contradictory: his students will learn a confusing mishmash where on the one hand they are told that there are many different ways to translate a text (true, of course, as far as that goes), but on the other hand are taught absolute “commandments of interpretation” and “deadly sins of translation”.

Take the “deadly sin” of his that was most hotly debated during his presentation:

Never, never, never give in the temptation to improve the original. If the original is vague or clumsy or just plain wrong, then a good translation will faithfully reflect the flaws. After all, that was how the original author wrote it.

Stated in such stark terms, this is nonsense. Freehill referred, in his examples, to legal translations, saying that the reader of the translation has a right to know where the original went wrong. Fine (maybe) if the reader commissioned the translation precisely so as to find its weak points, perhaps to challenge them in court. But what if the customer is, instead, a foreign attorney who had his brief translated to file it in a US Court? Should a conscientious translator merrily translate the text “as is”, errors, warts and all, or should he point out to his customer unclear and wordy passages, suggesting suitable improvements? What about a translator commissioned to translated a hastily (and therefore badly) written press release. Shouldn’t he do his utmost to make the translated press release as smoothly flowing, well written and informative as possible in the target language?

During Freehill’s presentation Chris Durban remarked that by teaching his students never to improve on the original, he was condemning them to the bottom of the market. I agree. By limiting the choices available to his students, Mr. Freehill is depriving them of vital tools necessary to succeed in translation.

---

For an interesting discussion between a translation theorist and a professional translator, see Can Theory Help Translators? A Dialogue Between the Ivory Tower and the Wordface, by Andrew Chesterman and Emma Wagner (St. Jerome, 2002)

“The Voice of Interpreters and Translators”

When the new ATA tagline (“The Voice of Interpreters and Translators”) was unveiled during the annual meeting of all voting members, I wrote in my notebook “consider me underwhelmed”.

According to the ATA October 2011 newsbrief, the tagline

would help both clients and the public understand what interpreters and translators do [...] In just six words, it sends the message that linguists are all about communication, about giving "voice" to information, ideas, and culture.

If that is the purpose of the tagline, it does not succeed: worded as it is, it says instead that the ATA speaks for translators and interpreters, but it gives to the public no information about what translators and interpreters actually do.

Open post on “Blogging 101”

As promised during the presentation, here is a post for questions and answers about our blogging presentation, or for other questions about blogging for translators.

Please feel free to ask any question by adding a comment to this post.

---

You can download the most up to date version of our presentation from this blog (to download the presentation, select the “Blogging 101” tab above, and then follow the link to the ppt file).

If you have a blog or will start one, write to Corinne or to me: we love to see new interesting blogs o translation and related subjects.

52nd ATA Conference: 3rd (and final) day

This was the third day of the conference, and I was a bit nervous, as I had two different presentations to give, one in the morning, and the other in the afternoon.
The first presentation I attended was How to Read a Prospectus, presented by Francesca Marchei and Barbara Arrighetti: another excellent presentation from the Italian Language Division – technical, but very useful for English into Italian and Italian into English financial translators. The two presenters focused mainly on certain terminological niceties about different types of investment funds, and on changes to Italian law aimed at providing investors with information in an easier to understand format… that, however, may throw unexpected hurdles in the translator’s path.
The second presentation I attended in the morning was Out, Damned Theory, by Mark Freehill. I’ll have more to say about this frustrating presentation later. Its aim, seemingly, was to show how no theory is necessary in teaching or learning translation, or in translating. This, of course, is itself a theory of translation of sorts. (And it did include the “ten commandments of translation”: Freehill condemns theory, but has no problem with prescribing what should or should not be done.) But, as I said, I’ll criticize this presentation later.
After Freehill’s presentation, it was time for Corinne’s and my presentation on blogging for translators. I believe the presentation went well; we had a good audience, and I think they found our material interesting. As soon as I’m back in Denver, I’ll post here the most up-to-date version of our presentation (meanwhile, you can still download the old one). I’ll also add an open post to answer any question from people who did not have time to ask them at the end of the presentation.
After the lunch break, it was time for my second presentation of the day: a detailed introduction to Xbench. Again, there was a good audience, and the presentation went well. It was only marred by a flaky microphone: the people in the room probably heard me well enough, but I’m afraid the session’s recording was not of good quality.
The last session of the day was Corinne McKay’s, Judy Jenner’s and Chris Durban’s Smart Business Panel – good advice for all translators, but especially for those who feel insecure marketing their services.
A good presentation, all in all. Nina and I will remain in Boston for a couple of days more, to sightsee and visit at least some of this city’s many attractions.

52nd ATA Conference: 2nd day

I skipped the plenary session to put some finishing touches to my presentations – and was also late for the first presentation I had selected for today (Corinne’s and Eve’s session on how to work successfully with a translation partner). Nina had arrived before me, and told me the session had been very good and well presented. Nina than stayed for a second presentation on a similar subject (cooperation between translators in virtual workgroups), this time by Friederike Butler and Jeana Clark – again, a very informative session.

The second session I attended was Overview of Editing Basics for the Translation Professions, by Literary Division’s Distinguished Speaker Greer Lleud. Lleud has many years of professional experience in the publishing in various capacities, and provided clear explanations of the various types of editing professionals and what they do: what distinguishes line editing, for example, from copy editing. Although the content mostly concerned editing in the publishing world, it was also useful for translators and translation editors.

In the afternoon I went to two Italian session: Translating Style, by Tim Parks, and Class  Action (Italian Style), by Barbara Arrighetti. Both very interesting presentations – in particular Parks’, as he provided several examples of good (and bad) work from English into Italian and from Italian into English, from translations of Henry Green, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Elsa Morante and Niccolò Ammaniti, proving how style in translation may get all the more difficult precisely in apparently simple passages.

Barbara Arrighetti presentation on the differences between common law class actions and recently introduced apparently similar actions under civil law was technical, but very clearly explained, and certainly useful to all Italian legal translators.

All in all, another interesting day at the conference.

52nd ATA Conference: 1st Day

We arrived in Boston on Wednesday, escaping the first winter storm in Denver (just two days earlier it was still shirtsleeves weather). Yesterday was our first day at the conference, with two interesting presentations.

The first one was by Tim Parks, the Distinguished Speaker for the Italian Language Division. In addition to being a well-known writer, Parks is a translator and teacher of translation. In his first presentation, Retranslation of Classics for an Authentic reading Experience, he spoke of the challenges of translating such a well-known and politically loaded book as Macchiavelli's The Prince. The presentation was excellent, with several interesting examples from older translations as well as Parks' own recent one - and also from translation from Macchiavelli's Italian into modern Italian.

Parks will have another presentation this afternoon, Style in Translation (speaking, this time, on the translation of modern Italian authors).

The second interesting presentation of the first day was by Tuomoas Kostiainen, on Working with Non-Trados Studio Clients/Translators, i.e. which workflows are available for translators who work in Trados Studio, but have to deliver translations to customers who are not working with Studio as yet.

The ATA conference is fast approaching

There are several sessions that look interesting at this year’s ATA Conference. The Italian division, in particular, will be very active, with two presentations on literary translation by special guest Tim Parks and a couple of interesting sessions on English to Italian legal translation.

You can find a list of all the scheduled sessions from the Conference’s preliminary program.

I’ll have a very busy Saturday at the conference, with two presentations within just a few hours:

• Blogging 101 (presented with Corinne McKay), Saturday 11:30 AM (session IC-10)
• Xbench: A Free Tool for Terminology and Quality Assurance, Saturday 2:30 PM (session LT-9)

If you are interested, older versions of both presentations are available from this blog (see the tabs above). I won’t post the most up to date version until after the conference.

---

If you are going to the 52nd ATA Conference (Boston, October 26-30), but are unsure what to do (because it’s the first time for you), Jill Sommer has just posted a very useful QA session.

See you in Boston!

2011 Conference | Colorado Translators Association

We'll be in Boulder this weekend for the first ever Colorado Translators Association mid-year conference. Corinne and the organizing committee have done a great job of promoting the conference and selecting interesting presentation (maybe I shouldn't say so, since one of them is our own presentation on Trados 2007 v. 2009).

The conference will be complemented on Sunday by ATA certification exams, and by two Trados training sessions.

After the conference, I'll post the slides from our presentation here in About Translation.

ATA Conference in Denver: insider tips from the Colorado Translators Association

If you are going to Denver for the 51st ATA Conference, check out the suggestions offered by the Colorado Translators Association about things to do in Denver, where to eat, where to go shopping, and so on.

Back from long absence

Sorry for the long absence: It's been a hectic period. A long on-site QA project (in Palo Alto); developing, teaching and grading the last few classes of the localization course at Denver University's University College, and, above all, the last-minute work for the Art Students League of Denver's Summer Art Market.


The Summer Art Market went well, considering the economic downturn: I sold several pieces, met other artists and old friends, and felt re energized and encouraged to devote more time to painting.


I also have plans for more writing: at least a few long articles, both for About Translation and possibly for some print media.

Speaking of which: the next ATA Chronicle contains a piece chosen from this blog (Translation tests v. translation samples).

ATA Conference in Seattle

In some ways, it was a better conference than usual: an interesting city, good fish restaurant, some interesting presentations, and the chance to meet again with old friends.

The hotel was not the best, given the number of people that came this year: the elevators were always overcrowded and took forever, and many of the conference rooms were way too small.

As usual, the presentations were a mixed bag: most had either too narrow a focus to be of interest for most people, or were slanted too much towards beginners... for example the presentation on using word macros was, in my opinion, way too basic, as was the one on XML.

Other presentations were much better. Of those that I attended the best was definitely the presentation and seminar on legal translation from Italian into English. Also very interesting and topical was the presentation on "Neutral Spanish" (and why such thing does not exist and is totally unnecessary).

Our own presentation was fairly well received; I did not present very well - I was nervous, and it showed, but Franco did much better in his part of the presentation (as well as in his presentation with Microsoft on MT).

Probably the best part was meeting again with Masaki, our partner that now works at Microsoft: we went twice with him at an excellent fish restaurant: especially the first evening we had an excellent time, the four of us remaining at our table for ours, talking about translation, Microsoft, and the "good old times" at J.D. Edwards.

Our presentation at the ATA

We gave our presentation ("Translation Quality measurement in Practice") at the 46th ATA Conference, in Seattle.
You can download a pdf version of the presentation from our web site devoted to translation quality: TranslationQuality.com.

ATA conference coming... with our presentation

Our presentation, "Translation Quality Measurement in Practice", will be on Saturday morning, at 8:30.
We have quite a few new things to present after a one year absence, including our practical experience implementing TQI at Lionbridge.
Anybody who is interested in translation quality is cordially invited to our presentation.

See you in Seattle.