INTERPRETING MACHINES
(BESIDES US)
The first NCTA meeting of 2008 took place on February 9 and featured—in addition to our election results and news of ongoing projects—longtime NCTA member Hany Farag’s presentation on new developments in machine translation.
BY SARAH LLEWELLYN
NCTA Secretary Stafford Hemmer, standing in for the absent Vice President Yves Avérous, began the meeting with a series of announcements, including details of upcoming NCTA workshops, a call for volunteers to present future NCTA workshops and also to contribute to Translorial, and a reminder about the monthly happy hours that take place the last Monday of every month in San Francisco and Oakland.
Alison Dent announced the results of the recent (uncontested) election, and welcomed each of the new board members, who will begin two-year terms effective immediately. Dagmar Dolatschko will take over from Song White as treasurer; Paula Dieli will take over Naomi Baer’s position as membership director; Norma Kaminsky will be responsible for continuing education in place of the outgoing Mateo Rutherford; and Diane Montgomery will take on a new role of director of marketing. Stafford Hemmer will continue in his capacity as secretary. Stafford thanked each of the departing members of the board for their valuable and often inspirational contributions during their tenure.
The Interpreter Machine
The meeting’s featured presentation was given by long-time NCTA member and former board member Hany Farag. Hany works in the fields of language and technology and is a translator and state-certified Arabic interpreter, as well as a technologist specialized in automation and control systems.
Hany’s presentation focused on recent efforts in the development of an automated, real-time speech-to-speech translation device—an “interpreter machine”— under the auspices of DARPA, the U.S. government’s Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency. While machine translation in various guises has been around for some 50 years, the development of such a system was hastened by an urgent need for Arabic-language interpreters in Iraq after the 2003 U.S. invasion of that country.
Iraq: Facts and Challenges
One of the challenges facing the ground forces in Iraq was how to rebuild a nation of 20 million people, while having virtually no knowledge of the native language, Arabic. The number of interpreters needed— more than 5,000, based on U.S. troop deployments—was an unrealistic target, particularly given that in the whole of California there were, at most, 500 Arabic-language interpreters. And using local interpreters posed a variety of problems, not least of which was the reliability of their information for intelligence purposes. In response, DARPA instigated a project entitled Global Autonomous Language Exploitation (GALE) to develop an interpreter machine that could communicate spontaneously in real time in tactical—that is, war or battle—situations.
Competing to Succeed
Three teams of researchers were hired to develop systems: IBM, The Stanford Research Institute (SRI) and Bolt Beranek & Newman (BBN). Each year, their progress would be evaluated, and the worst-performing team could be eliminated—or, the program could be shut down entirely. At any time, up to 200 people have been working around the clock on this initiative: the largest language project in existence.
Due to the fact that the only existing, related technology was machine translation for text, the interpreter machine had to be developed using a series of building blocks. The first was ASR (Automatic Speech Recognition). Machine translation was the second component, involving the creation of a corpora, or body, of words in context to improve the translation. The third building block involved text-to-speech synthesis (TTS), which was already of exceptionally good quality.
By late 2006, two machines were ready for deployment in Iraq: IBM’s MASTOR and SRI’s IRAQCOMM, each using a different technology, and each having an accuracy level for text estimated to be around 75%. R&D is still in progress, with the goal of reaching 95% accuracy—comparable to a human interpreter—by 2010.
Hany concluded his presentation by suggesting that no one can stop the progress of technology, and that we need to embrace innovation by understanding it and contributing to it if we can. Researchers, after all, are not practicing interpreters!
After a brief Q&A session, NCTA presented Hany with a box of Valentine’s Day Joseph Schmidt chocolates, to thank him for his presentation.
NEXT UP
Translating Poetry: A Primer
SATURDAY MAY 17, 1-4 PM
MECHANICS’ INSTITUTE LIBRARY,
57 POST STREET, SAN FRANCISCO
University of Florida-Gainesville professor of poetry Sidney Wade will present a hands-on workshop in the art of literary translation, designed both for those who are new to the field and interested, as well as those more experienced with the undertaking. There will be an introduction to the most basic elements of the craft, as well as some of the more exasperating issues. Procedures, questions, and conflicts will all be discussed. This workshop will entertain the following sorts of questions: Who is best qualified to translate poetry? How does one start? Why choose one language over another? What is a literal trot? How does a literal trot get translated into a fine poem in English?
Sidney Wade is the guest poetry editor of TWO LINES: World Writing in Translation for 2008. She is currently a professor at the University of Florida in Gainesville, where she teaches poetry and translation workshops. She translates Turkish poetry and wrote Istanbul’dan/From Istanbul. She is a recent president of the Associated Writers and Writing Programs and the author of four other collections of poetry: Stroke, Celestial Bodies, Empty Sleeves, and Green.
Upcoming: ATA Certification Exam workshop, August 23rd.
PARADOXICALLY INVISIBLE:
THE LITERARY TRANSLATOR’S PROVIDENCE
It is one of the oldest dilemmas in literary translation: if it is the translator’s mission to remain invisible, how does one recognize—and value—the translator’s work?
By Anne Milano Appel
“Good humor is a paradox,” writes humor aficionado Mel Helitzer. “The unexpected juxtaposition of the reasonable next to the unreasonable.” The literary translator must indeed be equipped with good humor to be able to hover in that paradoxical and perpetual state between visibility and invisibility. If I needed yet another reminder of this chronic condition (which I don’t!), it came in the form of a recent article by Umberto Eco in the Italian weekly L’espresso (“Cappelli alti di forma”, Sept. 28, 2007)i. In it the well-known semiotician, philosopher, medievalist, and writer (perhaps best known for his ambitious novel The Name of the Rose) makes a statement whose obviousness on the surface may seem equivalent to “aria fritta” (fried air), as the Italians say when they mean “so what else is new?” Something that is “fritta e rifritta” (fried and refried) is an old story, old news. As Eco puts it (I’m translating of course):
“The translator’s job is therefore difficult and paradoxical, since he should do all he can to make himself invisible, … and yet he would (justly) like this invisibility to be rewarded with a certain visibility. Yet the translator’s success lies precisely in achieving invisibility… ii”
Now I have two reactions to this statement. The first is the duh-uh factor: so the translator’s job is difficult and paradoxical. Tell me about it. The second, and more serious, issue has to do with the use of the word “rewarded” (premiati). As I see it, the “certain visibility” sought by the translator should not be considered a “reward,” but something he rightfully deserves for his success at being “invisible.” Eco himself uses the word “justly” in describing the translator’s desire for visibility. Indeed, it seems to me that a distinction should be maintained between the invisibility of the translator’s hand in the work he produces – something that is decidedly desirable – and the fair, just and merited attribution of the work that is rightly due him. There is a vast difference between striving for invisibility in the act of translation (not letting your hand show through) and being treated as invisible when it comes to having your name identified with the work you’ve produced. Unfortunately, the “invisibility” that is most associated with the translator is all too often not his skill in hiding his hand, but rather the lack of attribution. For example, some publications, here and abroad, regularly neglect to include the translator’s name when referring to a book, and many publishing houses refuse to put the translator’s name on the cover. As a colleague recently put it: this type of recognition should not be considered a “reward” but, given the circumstances, it often ends up being regarded as such. And therein lies the intriguing paradox: if the translator is invisible (“good,” in Eco’s world), who then is able to notice him, and presumably accord him some form of visibility?
Erasing the tracks
Invisibility in the text is certainly something to strive for. One way to see if a translator has “erased” his own tracks is to check his body of works. If the translations are of works by different authors yet they all display (betray? traduttore, traditore…) the same hand, chances are the “voice” you’re hearing is the translator’s and not the author’s. This cookie cutter approach lies at the far end of the spectrum from invisibility and transparency. Malcolm Jones, writing about two new English translations of Tolstoy’s War and Peace, mentions Constance Garnett’s approach as what may be considered an example of cookie cutting:
“Garnett was a woman in a hurry—she translated some 70 Russian books into English—but what she gained in speed, she lost in subtlety. Her version of “War and Peace” isn’t bad, but it’s not exactly Tolstoy either. It has a sort of one-size-fits-all quality”. (Malcolm Jones, “Lost in Translations”, Newsweek, Oct. 15, 2007)iii
Invisibility in rendering the author’s text is prized and justly so. Wyatt Mason, for example, reviewing Margaret Jull Costa’s translation of Javier Marías’ Your Face Tomorrow: Dance and Dream, notes that Marías’ style is “faithfully rendered by Margaret Jull Costa, his principal English translator, who achieves a rare feat: presence and near invisibility.” (Wyatt Mason, “Interpreter of Malefactors”, The New York Times, August 27, 2006)iv More recently, Kathryn Harrison’s review of a new work by Mario Vargas Llosa praised translator Edith Grossman as having produced “the fluid artistry readers have come to expect from her renditions of Latin American fiction.” (Kathryn Harrison, “Dangerous Obsession,” The New York Times Book Review, October 14, 2007)v The reviewer goes on to speak of “a remaking rather than a recycling”, and though she is referring to Vargas Llosa’s recreation of Emma Bovary’s story, the words could readily be applied to the translator’s craft as well:
“The genius of ‘Madame Bovary,’ as Vargas Llosa describes it in ‘The Perpetual Orgy,’ is the ‘descriptive frenzy … the narrator uses to destroy reality and recreate it as a different reality.’ In other words, Flaubert was a master of realism not because he reproduced the world around him, but because he used language to create an alternate existence, a distillate whose emotional gravity transcends that of life itself.”vi
The writer creates an alternate existence, much like that created by the literary translator. Just as A is to B (the real world is to the author), so C is to D (the author’s text is to the translator). By engaging in a form of rewriting or re-creation of the original text (while remaining invisible) the translator gives the writer a voice in another language. It has been said that the act of translation allows the translator to have a love affair with the author’s words. Indeed, there is a sensual component to the process, since words appeal to the senses and have a voluptuous quality. On one level it is all about seduction and attraction. It is paradoxical then that the translator should vanish after weeks and months of living in close, intimate contact with the author, attempting to render the subtle meanderings of his mind… after the “I” has become “we” and distinctions have blurred.
Part accomplice
The invisibility of the translator in the text stands in distinct contrast to the invisibility that is all too often represented by the denial of due recognition for the work he has produced – a recognition that is not only fair but merited. In his article in L’espresso Eco also writes: “For years one of the battles translators have waged has been that of having their name on the title page (not as co-author but at least as an essential intermediary)…”vii This “not as co-author” is interesting and telling. Certainly many authors (and many translators) would agree with Eco. Others, on the other hand, are more generous and more acknowledging. For Claudio Magris, for example, the translator is a co-author. In Ilide Carmignani’s interview of Magris which I translated for Absinthe: New European Writing (March 2007), the writer states: “unquestionably, both when one translates and when one is translated, there is a strong sense that the translator is truly a co-author, part accomplice, part rival, part lover…”.viii
Accomplice, rival, lover… heady stuff. Definitely at the other extreme from the prosaic intermediary, middleman or go-between. There is perhaps a second paradox to be noted here. Without the translator, the author would be invisible! José Saramago, the Portuguese novelist and winner of the 1998 Nobel Prize for literature, once stated that writers create national literatures with their language, but world literature is written by translators.ix French filmmaker Robert Bresson,x whose films were characterized by a profound intensity, wrote that his aim was to “Make visible what … might perhaps never have been seen.” And Swiss artist Paul Klee: “Art does not reproduce the visible; rather, it makes visible [sic]”.xi The translator too “makes visible” the author. Another way to think about how the translator brings visibility to the author while remaining in the shadows is to imagine the act of translation as a mask. The mask as an age-old form of disguise and masquerade is worn over the face to conceal an individual’s identity and, by its own features, create a new persona. In this metaphor, when the wearer (translator) is attired in the mask (engaged in the act of translation), there is a loss of his previous identity and the birthing of a new one (the author’s new voice). And so we have the Masquerade of Translation.
If there is indeed a second paradox to be found in the literary translator’s craft, the words of physicist Edward Teller come to mind: “Two paradoxes are better than one; they may even suggest a solution.” Solutions, anyone?
i. Umberto Eco, “Cappelli alti di forma”, in the column La Bustina di Minerva, L’espresso, Sept. 28, 2007, online at http://espresso.repubblica.it/dettaglio/Cappelli-alti-di-forma/1796108).
ii. Ibid.: “Dura e paradossale fatica è dunque quella del traduttore, il quale dovrebbe fare il massimo per rendersi invisibile… eppure vorrebbe (giustamente) che questa invisibilità fosse premiata con una certa visibilità. Eppure il successo del traduttore è proprio il raggiungimento dell’invisibilità…”
iii. Malcolm Jones, “Lost in Translations”, Newsweek, Oct. 15, 2007.
iv. “Interpreter of Malefactors”, Review by Wyatt Mason, The New York Times, August 27, 2006.
v. “Dangerous Obsession”, The Bad Girl by Mario Vargas Llosa, Review by Kathryn Harrison, The New York Times Book Review, October 14, 2007.
vi. Ibid.
vii. Eco, op. cit.: “Una delle battaglie dei traduttori è stata da anni quella per avere il nome sul frontespizio (non come co-autore ma almeno come mediatore fondamentale)…”
viii. “Part Accomplice, Part Rival: the Translator is a True Co-Author: An interview with Claudio Magris”, Anne Milano Appel, translator. Absinthe: New European Writing, Dwayne Hayes, ed., March 2007. (Translation of an interview by Ilide Carmignani that originally appeared in Comunicare. Letterature .Lingue, Il Mulino, Bologna, n. 6, 2006, pp. 221-226.)
ix. Saramago reportedly made the statement in May 2003 during a speech to attendees at the Fourth Latin American Conference on Translation and Interpretation in Buenos Aires.
x. Bresson felt a deep feeling of responsibility to his audience, and thought that it was not the aim of his filmmaking to impress the viewers with his brilliance or the brilliance of his performers, but to make them share something of his own vision. Cited at: http://64.233.169.104/search?q=cache:VsZLusd8erkJ:www.wsws.org/articles/2000/jan2000/bres-j20.shtml+Robert+Bresson+make+visible&hl=en&ct=clnk&cd=6&gl=us
xi. “L’art ne reproduit pas le visible ; il rend visible…
THE LEGAL T&I WORKSHOP
Our March workshop offered a crowd of enthusiastic NCTA members a hands-on approach to legal translating and interpreting.
BY ANGELA ZAWADSKI
As a practicing interpreter and workshop provider, I was looking forward to attending the Legal Translation and Interpretation workshops to be taught by Corinne Cline, an instructor with the Sonoma State University Certificate Program. Before the event, all participants received via email the workshop handouts, which included the National Association of Judicial Interpreters and Translators (NAJIT) Code of Ethics and Professional Responsibilities, information about consecutive and simultaneous interpreting practices, and useful legal terms and phrases that interpreters and translators often encounter in English <>Spanish legal texts. Attendees were asked to bring a cassette tape recorder, as sample practice tapes were to be provided.
The morning session, which covered legal interpreting, began with a video created for judges and attorneys about working with interpreters in court. The video showed examples of interpreted hearings with both qualified and unqualified interpreters at work. Some important issues covered included the need to use the first person at all times (except in certain very specific circumstances), problems encountered when there are overlapping conversations, the need for a judge’s intervention to avoid confusion, examples of an interpreter correcting his or her mistakes on the record, and the difference between certified and qualified interpreters.
Clarifying the role
In an important scene and one of the best examples I have ever seen of what is expected of a court- certified interpreter, a judge establishes an interpreter’s credentials, asking questions regarding the interpreter’s education, fluency in source and target languages, specialized training, and other pertinent issues. The video also addresses the importance of the interpreter as “clarifier” when he or she is faced with unfamiliar slang and the serious problems arising from changes of meaning when the interpreter edits, omits, or adds material on the record.
Ms. Cline underscored the importance of the code of ethics with a capital E and reminded us that note-taking is part and parcel of our professional duty. I believe in the need to take notes as well, even when we feel confident that our memory will not fail us. The presenter also provided information about topics such as full-time employment, fees paid by the courts, and training opportunities. Afterward, we broke up into small groups and practiced “shadowing” (same-language simultaneous exercises) as well as target-language interpretation. Before the lunch break, the participants had a chance to ask more questions regarding the certification exam, compensation, and the use of monolingual and bilingual dictionaries. Ms. Cline also provided us with an extensive list of print and online resources.
Translation basics
Because the presenter for the afternoon session was unable to attend, Ms. Cline also covered the topic of legal translation. Since this is not her area of expertise, she focused mainly on sight translation, both as an interpreting skill and as a preamble for good translation. Ms. Cline discussed ways to prepare to become a competent translator and interpreter, using both material from her own experiences and resources from the Monterey Institute for International Studies. Most of the workshop attendees were experienced translators, but it was nonetheless refreshing to review term-research techniques.
The workshop ended with a lively Q&A session. Participants discussed strategies for sight translating repetitive English terms and approaching translation when there are no good target-language equivalents. Overall, novice interpreters felt that the workshop had been very helpful, while experienced interpreters were grateful to have had an opportunity to review the legal process and to go over specialized terminology. There is a continuing need for certified interpreters in federal and state courts, and the positive feedback confirmed that this type of workshop is extremely useful for aspiring interpreters.
LIT & LUNCH
In a sparkling presentation, the distinguished literary translator Edith Grossman shared her insights at CAT’s “Lit & Lunch” series in San Francisco.
BY ALISON ANDERSON
In her introduction, Olivia Sears, president of the Center for the Art of Translation (CAT), told us that Ms. Grossman had not set out to become a literary translator; her dreams were more along the lines of “a sculptor, or (the blues singer) Bessie Smith.” But in recent years she has been aptly referred to as the “Glenn Gould of translation”—a reference to the famed Canadian virtuoso pianist. Earlier this year she was invited to give a series of lectures at Yale on the art, entitled, “Why Translation Matters.” A longtime resident of New York, Ms. Grossman told us she had been a student at Berkeley and was glad to be back in the Bay Area, although she missed her 24-hour jazz station.
The first part of the literary lunch was devoted to readings from books Edith Grossman has recently translated. The first, from Manuscript of Ashes, was by Spanish author Alberto Muñoz Molina, to be published by Harcourt this summer. Very evocative and atmospheric, set in part during the Spanish Civil War, it was a perfect introduction to Ms. Grossman’s skill as a translator. She then read a more humorous excerpt from Mario Vargas Llosa’s The Bad Girl, published recently by Farrar Straus and Giroux, and this in turn showed her wonderful versatility and ability to take on different styles.
Formalities
For translators, perhaps the most enthralling part of the presentation was the Q&A. Ms. Grossman displayed a wry, self-deprecating humor as she elaborated on a number of issues familiar to literary translators. Asked first about her relationship with publishers—and the certain clout which she can command as the translator of Cervantes, Gabriel García Márquez, and Carlos Fuentes, to name but a few—she pointed to the Vargas Llosa book and said that the publishers had agreed to display her name in large type and provide a short bio on the back flap. But when the book was published, her name was “too small, and there was no bio. The publishers apologized deeply,” she sighed, mock-wistfully. Does she have a lawyer for the negotiation of contracts? At the beginning of her translating career she had “made the mistake of swimming in shark-infested waters” and quickly learned her lesson: she now has an attorney to guide her through the “make-believe language” of publishers’ contracts.
Could she recommend a particular title to help novice translators in their career? “Guide for the Perplexed?” she quipped, and went on to elaborate that she is not an adherent of translation theory, nor does she feel that any one book can provide the guidelines better offered by the “school of servitude.” By servitude she means constant revision and editing, reading out loud, checking for accuracy—and then more revision. And, if at all possible, a cooling-off period for the manuscript to settle, before more revision.
Authors and poets
How does she pick her titles? She does not pick, but is contacted by publishers directly. In earlier years she tried recommending authors she had discovered and loved, but this, she lamented, seems to be the “kiss of death.” Now she never mentions an author to her publishers if she hopes to see him or her in English some day.
On the subject of collaboration with authors, Ms. Grossman said she finds them to be extraordinarily generous. She does not contact them until the final revision, to iron out the “ten or fifteen knotty places” remaining in the manuscript. Had it not been problematic then, translating Cervantes, since she could not question him? She laughed and said she once told García Márquez that it is easier translating Cervantes than a living author, because there is such a wealth of academic and scholarly work to refer to. But regardless of the “bodily state of the author,” she feels a huge responsibility to the writer to get it right; it is less an issue of translating actual words than of translating the author’s intention.
She does not believe you can be taught to be a translator, any more than you can learn to be a poet. The craft can be taught, she said, echoing Gregory Rabassa’s words, but to become a translator or a poet you either “have the impulse or you don’t.” Asked if she misses the sound of the language when working into English, she insisted on the necessity of putting the Spanish to one side after the second draft, to work solely on the English text; only when doing a final accuracy check does she return to the Spanish. She believes in maintaining the foreignness of proper names and place names, but does not subscribe to the position that a translation should “feel” foreign. “It should read like a domestic text” and provide the English-language reader with the same impact experienced by the Spanish language reader. If the text is in any way strange or eccentric, she tries to convey that oddness, too—but it must always read as smoothly as if it had been conceived in English.
Meanings
“The author and the translator are saying the same thing in two different languages,” Ms. Grossman explained. While she hears the Spanish in her mind, it comes out in English. “It’s a mistake to think you can match words.” She illustrated her point by describing a cartoon she once saw in The New Yorker: a translator sitting across from the irate author says, “Do you not be happy of me as the translator of books of you?”
In Edith Grossman’s case, there is no counting how many happy authors— and readers—she has shared her talents with.
JUST ANOTHER CERTIFICATE?
In September 2007, Princeton University launched what it hailed as “the largest, most extensive effort in the country to educate students about the important role that translation plays across academic fields and in cultural understanding.” We check it out.
By Stafford Hemmer
Officially, as News at Princeton reports, the Program in Translation and Intercultural Communication seeks to “allow students to develop skills in language use and in the understanding of cultural and disciplinary difference. Translation across languages allows access to issues of intercultural differences, and the program will encourage its students to think about the complexity of communicating across cultures, nations, and linguistic borders.”
Certificate, certified—and totally certifiable
In the blush of its novelty, Sandra Bermann, chair of Princeton’s Comparative Literature department and a member of the program’s Executive Committee, eagerly elucidates that “words like democracy or constitution mean different things in different parts of the world,” reflecting the optimism of yet another translation certificate program to arise in American academia. “Certificate” and “Certified” also mean different things in different parts of the world, too.
In order to call oneself a “translator” in a country like Germany, for example, one is required to study the discipline at a University and/or pass certification examinations administered by the state or federal government. In the USA, by contrast, no such government-sanctioned qualifying body can recognize a “certified translator” who can offer “certified translations.” It falls upon many US-based translators to educate clients about what constitutes certification, and even then, fellow translators have still had to ask each other—more than once on the NCTA list, for example—”How do I certify a translation?” A not-insignificant concern when dealing with clients who need transcripts, diplomas, immigration documents, divorce decrees translated … you get the picture.
Certainly the ATA imprimatur is a powerful endorsement, despite the deserved criticisms about the quality, nature, and prevarication of its testing practices. Still, ATA is merely a private, non-profit organization, acting on its own interests and on behalf of its members. A truly objective, government-run certifying body, administering U.S., or better yet, international, standards, is woefully absent in this country.
What about that Berkeley program?
To those of us NCTA members who graduated from the now defunct Certificate in Translation and Interpretation Studies Program offered by the University of California at Berkeley (through its Extension campus), whether as students, instructors, administrators, or conspirators, the philosophy, approach, structure—and optimism—behind the new Princeton program is hauntingly familiar. Princeton’s curriculum lends itself to ready comparison with that of Berkeley/Extension. For Princeton undergraduates already proficient in at least one foreign language, the newly christened “Program in Translation and Intercultural Communication” brings the art of translation to the plethora of disciplines represented by the 17 departments involved in the program. Berkeley’s students, who demonstrated their language proficiency upon application, benefitted from a program structured by professionals in the fields of both translation and interpretation, along with a renowned university’s staff and administration representing diverse fields of study.
Like Berkeley, Princeton offers a two-year program which began this fall with one of two core courses entitled “Thinking Translation: Language Transfer and Cultural Communication” (also called “Issues in Translation”), followed, in the succeeding semester, by the collective “Senior Seminar in Translation and Intercultural Communications.” Berkeley’s infamous first semester “Survey of Linguistics” managed to weed out just under a third of the first cohort’s initial 66 participants. The seemingly directionless second-semester course did little for student retention. This drop-out rate is unlikely to happen at Princeton, because that program is not designed for adults seeking continuing education credentials on top of their busy home and work lives, but instead for current undergraduates (mostly juniors and seniors) who are complementing their degrees in the humanities, sciences, or engineering.
The rest of the program also resembles Berkeley’s program structure: in the second year, the Princeton students gradually refine their course of study first by selecting from a menu of courses in “Translation Practice”—such as “Cultures and Critical Translation”—followed by a final semester of additional, pre-approved electives that are likely to be language- and discipline-specific. And, just as with the Berkeley program, the Princeton undergrads complete the program after submitting a “Senior Thesis.” One other requirement of the Princeton program is that participants must spend between six weeks to one year abroad, whereas most of Berkeley’s enrollees had already studied abroad when they themselves were undergraduates, or lived abroad when they were being raised.
So what happened?
There are important differences between both Princeton and Berkeley that augur well for Princeton’s future. The reasons for Berkeley’s past are too complex to cover here. Princeton runs an executive committee of department members or chairs. Berkeley’s program was ultimately controlled by the Board of Regents for the University of California—making it virtually impossible for administrators to respond to important program changes or student demands, simply because they could get not get on the Regents’ quarterly meeting agenda.
The Princeton program also offers the structured environment of an undergraduate setting, with students eager to succeed, whereas the Berkeley program had to be fit in with the responsibilities of work, family, and the rest of everyday post-graduate, real-world living. It was frustrating to see so many Berkeley students who held immense potential to be so discouraged for a number of reasons—whether they had been out of college for too long, whether they had to commute three hours each way for class twice a week, or whether they were simply enraged at the administration’s inability to advocate for the changes the program needed. The program was terminated in 2002, after graduating a mere three cohorts. May Princeton enjoy a greater success.
THAT WAS THEN
Two of our earliest members look back to the very beginnings of NCTA—and before.
BY MARIA LUISA BODEN AND TONY RODER—NCTA CLASS OF 1978
Roots …
Back in the dark ages of 1978, many talented translators in Northern California toiled in isolation. There was no forum, no place to be heard, nowhere to share knowledge and resources, opportunities, encouragement, and friendship. ATA accreditation was out of reach unless you could afford traveling to the annual conference.
When I arrived in San Francisco in 1975 with my husband and a two-year old daughter who had moved nine times in her short life, I wanted to settle down and resume my freelance translation career. It looked like an uphill battle. What do you do when you don’t know anyone?
No local association meant no local seminars, no roster of colleagues, no built-in exposure to potential clients, and no standards and ethics committee … all the things we now take for granted. Networking was a slow process. There was little reaching out, you might be viewed as a competitor, and even the good translation companies were not in business to help you meet other potential clients. It was you and your typewriter!
I count myself very lucky to have stumbled almost immediately upon The Lanfranco Institute, which would later become one of NCTA’s first corporate members. This led to meeting Tom Bauman, then head of the translation department at Wells Fargo Bank, and ultimately to a good in-house job. At the ATA conference held at Stanford in 1976, Tom was the de facto representative of the Bay Area translator community, most of whose members did not know each other. The idea of starting a local association was gestated during those brief days of learning and networking together.
A colorful crowd of 60 to 70 people attended that first meeting at the Chinatown Holiday Inn on March 4, 1978 in an upbeat mood. Our motives were as varied as our circumstances. Not all the talk was positive behind the scenes. There were the altruists, the self-interested, the simply curious, and the defeatists who predicted failure. This last group was soon out of commission as of course the NCTA thrived thanks to generous and competent leadership. Among others, Hélène Riddle, Kelly Gray, Deolinda Adao, Greg Eichler, and Irene Vacchina were decisively instrumental as early Board members and language group coordinators. Steve Goldstein took on the crucial role of editor of Translorial, which glued the membership together from the start. Read about them in the first few issues now starting to be available at the website. MLB
… and branches
The Saturday March 4 entry in my 1978 appointment book reads: “2 PM-6 PM Thomas Bauman’s North. Calif. Xlator Assoc., Washington Room, Holiday Inn, Chinatown.” Thus it came to pass that I was present at the creation …
I recall a very dark green room and a modest attendance. I don’t recall what was said and vaguely recollect some of those who were present. I left thinking that it was a good idea, but not for me, only a part-time translator on occasional evenings. Which is why I did not get to sign the association’s charter. But having signed in at the meeting, I eventually received notice of upcoming meetings, one at the Hall of Flowers in Golden Gate Park, and subsequent ones on weekend afternoons in a room at the Main Library.
George Kirby, who was president after the initial period, recruited me to the board of directors. When the library room became unavailable, Edith Fried, a founding member, offered the haven of her dining room for the board meetings. My appointment books provide only vague details for the 1980s, but I well remember the realization that we were laying the building blocks of a vigorous organization. We continued Translorial, we published a directory from a rudimentary database, we hired an administrator, we defined our responsibilities, and we organized events.
These events included the formal annual General Meetings, held at the University of California Extension, and my favorites, the Post-Christmas Christmas parties with their buffets of national dishes brought by the guests. These were traditionally held at Ines Sweeney’s house in Oakland, and later at our house in Palo Alto, with truly impressive turnouts. There was also a memorable (10th or 15th?) anniversary banquet in Chinatown, attended by the ATA president; and a party with entertainment held at the Basque Cultural Center in South San Francisco.
I served on the board for about 10 years that included two terms as president, during which time we became a chapter of ATA, evolved to adopt current technologies, and saw our membership grow from about 50 to about 500.
It is a tribute to the founders that their vision bore such fine fruits. TR
SPECIALIZING:
CHALLENGES AND REWARDS
With rates under increasing pressure from globalization and other trends, many translators are turning to specialization. But the leap is not always easy.
BY QUYEN NGO
This article was inspired by recent postings from several NCTA members inquiring about transitioning into certain fields, and the respective pay rates that one might expect. In today’s general translation marketplace, with more competition and lower pay, translators are looking to focus their content expertise, and specifically in the specialized fields of medical and legal interpreting.
Many translators and interpreters are what I would call generalists. A random peek into their profiles shows the ability to work in a variety of fields, ranging from finance, engineering, and education to telecommunications, law, medicine, and science. These professionals tend to work on a few projects in each area, allowing them to (justifiably) tout the range of their capabilities.
Other translators and interpreters, however, specialize in one or two fields at the most. A specialist can be a generalist, but not vice versa: even the slightest interpreting errors in fields such as medicine and law can have grave consequences for the limited English-proficient (LEP) client. As an interpreter in these two highly specialized disciplines, I know that success requires significant dedication, study, and training. It can take anywhere from four to six years to be a proficient interpreter in either of these fields.
The best medicine
Working as a medical interpreter, I am of course well-versed in medical terminology but am also familiar with many medical procedures as well. When a doctor gives an NOP order, I know exactly what that is (no oral products). When a patient requests a DNR order, I also know that he does not want to be resuscitated in a life-threatening circumstance. It’s not reasonable to expect a translator who doesn’t have such training—a generalist—to walk into a medical interpreting setting and be able to know what these terms refer to.
Other times, the medical translator specialist will be required to work in emotional and stressful conditions such as emergencies or life-and-death situations. There was an occasion where I interpreted a religious prayer conducted by a hospital chaplain for a terminally ill patient. This event had nothing to do with medical interpreting, yet of course it was an important part of the job.
Rules of law
In the field of legal interpreting, many will find the compensation fairly good. Legal interpreting is one of the most comprehensive interpreting fields in that it requires broad knowledge of numerous other subfields. For example, family and probate law will require knowledge of financial terms. Criminal cases will require knowledge of science and medicine pertaining to forensic evidence. Civil suits involving worker’s compensation or personal injury will require knowledge of medical, vehicle, and insurance terms. Immigration, small claims, juvenile, and other specialized areas all have their own terminology. And, needless to say, courtroom interpreting can be challenging and intensive when opposing lawyers, witnesses, and judge are all talking at once.
When generalists take on the work of specialists without the proper training, few of them will be able to render acceptable translations or interpretations. Once, a medical glossary translated by a generalist provided me with incredulous comic relief. The term athlete’s foot was literally translated as “the foot of an athlete”; hives was translated as “disease of beehives”; and speed (methamphetamine) was translated as “velocity.”
The client comes first
A generalist may go into a medical or legal interpreting setting believing that he can render an interpretation without the adequate training, and thinking that no one will know if he makes an interpretation error, but this may not be the case. I have known of some interpreters being sent away in the middle of a job for poor performance.
On one occasion, I provided interpretation for a couple whose child was hospitalized. At the end of the session, the father posed several questions to the doctor in perfectly good English. I inquired afterwards why they needed my services if the father was proficient in English. The father answered that my services were for the benefit of the mother, who did not understand English; that even though the father’s English was good, it did not mean that he could accurately interpret for his wife. They were more comfortable employing an interpreter. Another time, while interpreting in a deposition, the client, client’s attorney, and I all spoke the same native language. If an interpreting error was made, the client’s attorney would definitely have noticed.
Some generalists will accept assignments that they are not qualified to do for financial reasons. I view being a translator or interpreter as a noble profession that is rewarding in so many ways. We are the conduits that enable LEP clients to have fair access to a number of services that might not have been possible because of language barriers. Without them, we wouldn’t be working. Therefore, we owe it to them to be properly trained and qualified so that we can deliver the exceptional service that they deserve.
HOURS OF PLEASURE
BY RAFFAELLA BUSCHIAZZO
On February 25 at 5:30 PM, a group of NCTA members, all aficionados of our monthly Happy Hours, met in Oakland at the Pacific Coast Brewing Co. The pub is in an elegant 1876 building where several museum pieces are on display. It’s conveniently located downtown, a block from the 12th Street Bart Station in an area that has been renewed and now hosts cafes, restaurants, and interesting shops, from the well-known Ratto’s European Deli to an exotic African products boutique.
After a hard day of work we enjoyed a drink while relaxing and chatting with colleagues who share the same interests. You can’t talk with just anyone you meet about the difference between cognates and “false friends,” their important role in learning languages, and how excruciating it is to see them badly translated. But at our Happy Hours you have an attentive audience ready to start an intelligent discussion on these sorts of topics. Bob Killingsworth, Sylvia Korwek, and Sharlee Merner Bradley were the key participants in this interesting debate.
I particularly enjoyed exchanging book titles such as Suite Française by Irène Némirovsky and trying to remember the name of that Nobel-laureate Portuguese writer … Salgado? Salvado? We all had his name on the tips of our tongues and Sharlee satisfied our curiosity on the spot by consulting Wikipedia directly on her iPhone. We all exulted when she pronounced the name of the well-known author of several masterpieces: José Saramago!
If you wish to organize a Happy Hour where you live, just drop me a message at events@ncta.org.