Imagine that you are working professional translator and describe your day as a translator.

While-listening activities

Listen to the text “A Day in My Life as a Translator” by Roger Chriss and write out all the words and word combinations related to the translation then write your own sentence for each word.

Post-listening activities

Make a list of 5-10 questions relevant to the text and discuss them in pairs.

Pre-reading activities

Discuss as a class following questions

· What do you know about translator’s job?

· Why do we need translators?

· What is the role of the translator?

 

While-reading activities

Read an article and make a list of 5-10 questions then discuss in pairs.

The Role of the Translator

Translators are language professionals. They are applied linguists, competent writers, diplomats, and educated amateurs. Like linguists, translators have to be capable of discerning subtleties and nuances in their languages, researching terminology and colloquialisms, and handling new developments in their languages. Like writers, translators have to be accustomed to working long hours alone on a subject which interests few people and with a language that few people around them know. Like diplomats, translators have to be sensitive to the cultural and social differences which exist in their languages and be capable of addressing these issues when translating. And like educated amateurs, translators have to know the basics and some of the details about the subjects they deal with.

The above is an idealization of the translator, an image which professional translators aspire to and achieve with varying degrees of success. Not all translators need to overflow with these qualities. They must, however, have them in sufficient measure to be able to translate their material in a manner acceptable to their clients.

Somewhere in the process of translating something, the translator will come across all these issues. When I work with technical or medical documents, I have to deal with the intricacies of technical writing in Japanese and English and research new or obscure terms (and sometimes invent my own). I struggle with my English to polish and hone it so that the client sees the material as natural, without the tell-tale signs that it was translated from Japanese. I deal with the differences between Japanese and American culture, especially when I translate computer manuals. We give instructions and explanations in the U.S. very differently from how people give them in Japan.

Like any professional, translators have to stay on top of their areas of expertise. I devote a lot of my time to browsing through magazines like Byte, PC Computing, MacWeek, MacWorld, Scientific American, The Journal of the American Medical Association, and the New England Journal of Medicine as well as reading numerous books on developments in medicine and computer science.

The fundamental rule when you're not sure of a term or phrase is ask. There is an old Japanese adage which goes: to question and ask is a moment's shame, but to question and not ask is a lifetime's shame. When you have doubts or questions about a translation, call the client, ask your question, and then get the answer. If you're still not sure, make a note of it in the final translation. Clients are surprisingly tolerant of such notes and often expect them. I've even heard that clients are sometimes suspicious when they don't see these notes. After all, how much can a translator know about new surgical procedures to clear a pulmonary embolism?

Translators are one other thing: business people. Never forget this. If you are a translator, then you are in business. This means you have to take care of invoicing, accounts, equipment decisions and purchases, taxes, negotiations, and marketing. Unfortunately, it seems that the very qualities which make a good translator are those that make a poor negotiator or marketer.

How to overcome this oxymoron? One, force yourself to market, even when you don't want to. Say, I'm going to send 100 letters to agencies this week; I'm going to call my top five clients and chew the cud with them; I'm going to do my taxes before eleven thirty on April 15. You are in business, and don't forget it.

Also, it helps if you make sure to remind your clients that you are in business. Translators want to be treated as professionals, and therefore, they have to behave as professionals (much more on this in future articles).

Above all, a translator is a bridge (ugh! what a cliche!). You are standing between two people or organizations, one which created the material and the other which wants to see it. You are their solution to this most intractable problem. Remember, it's the information age, and there's lots of information out there in lots of languages and translators are the ones who bring this most precious commodity to the people who want it.

 

Post-reading activities

1. Write an essay about 180-250 words on the given theme.