Sep 1st, 2004 | Esperanto, Essays, Perspective | No Comments
By Wassim Nassif
How do you get a German, a Lithuanian, a Yiddish-speaking Jew, a Pole, and a Russian to resolve their differences when there is no common language among them? Such was the dilemma faced by Ludovic Lazarus Zamenhof, an ophthalmologist living in Bialystok, a small rural village in northeastern Poland (then a part of the Russian empire), in the 1870s.
Zamenhof believed that much of the distrust and misunderstanding among his ethnic neighbors was the result of their simple inability to communicate, stemming from the differences in their various languages. This led him to believe that the creation of a neutral lingua franca—in effect, an international language—would, by breaking down the barriers to communication, open up social and economic understanding not only in his small rural community, but possibly on a much wider and more universal scale as well.
Thus Zamenhof embarked on a ten-year odyssey of researching and developing what would eventually become the constructed language Esperanto. The fruits of that labor, the Unua Libro de Esperanto (First Book of Esperanto), was published in 1887.
History of the language
Esperanto was conceived by Zamenhof as a language that would be simple to learn for speakers of any of the world’s languages—surely a daunting challenge. At the beginnings of his efforts, he contemplated a revival of Latin as a potential solution, but soon realized the language would prove too difficult for the task. Upon learning English, however, Zamenhof noted several grammatical structures that seemed advantageous—such as the fact that comprehension was not dependent upon how verbs were conjugated—which suggested concepts that would later be incorporated into his finished language.
Zamenhof still had the problem of a large vocabulary base, and how to develop a method of constructing words in an efficient manner. The solution came to him when, upon strolling down a road, he encountered two signs: “vejcarskaja” (Russian for porter’s lodge—place of the porter) and “konditorskaja” (confectioner’s shop—place of sweets). Reflecting on the structure of these nouns, he realized that the proper use of suffixes could greatly decrease the number of words needed in the vocabulary—a lexicon which in turn was chosen to be recognizable by the greatest number of speakers of the greatest number of languages. As a test of his emerging language, Zamenhof worked on translations and poetry to determine which of his linguistic theories really worked, and which needed to be discarded as being overly cumbersome or ungainly.
While at university in the early 1880s, Zamenhof set aside his ambitious linguistic project until he could complete his medical studies. During that time, he had handed his work over to his father for safekeeping. Unbeknownst to the younger Zamenhof, however, his father, thinking the project was pointless, burned the work. All that remained were four lines of a song Zamenhof had written. Devastated but undaunted, he bravely restarted work to prepare a new language textbook—the effort that resulted, in 1887, in the publication of the Unua Libro.
Learning Esperanto
Esperanto is not genetically related to any of the natural languages. However, its phonology and vocabulary were influenced by Indo-European languages, specifically those used by the ethnic populations of Bialystok. As a second language, therefore, Esperanto is far easier to learn if one is already a speaker of any of those European languages, than if one is a speaker of other natural languages—especially highly irregular, non-phonetic languages such as Chinese, English, or French.
There is also evidence that studying Esperanto before studying any other second language, especially an Indo-European language, speeds and improves learning. Learning subsequent foreign languages is easier than learning one’s first, where the use of a grammatically simple auxiliary language lessens the “first foreign language” learning complications. In one study, a group of students who studied Esperanto for one year, then French for three years, ended up with a better command of French than the control group, who studied French without Esperanto for four years.
Most of Esperanto’s vocabulary is made up of Latin, Greek, English, French, German, and some other Indo-European roots, with a few words from Slavic languages. It has a very logical structure, with similar suffixes for the same parts of speech; for example, -o for nouns, and –a for adjectives. Its phonetic alphabet—consisting of 28 letters, mainly a modified version of the Latin alphabet—ensures that all words are pronounced the way they are written, and vice versa. The alphabet does not include the letters q, w, x, and y, but adds six accented letters: c, g, h, j, and s with circumflex accent and u with breve accent, as well as several created letters that are not found on any national computer keyboard.
Esperanto has a relatively regular grammar, as well. As an agglutinative, or “combined” language, it has no grammatical genders and limited regular verb conjugation. Nouns and adjectives have two cases, nominative and accusative, and two numbers, singular and plural. Nouns and adjectives must agree in case and number. Verbs do not agree with their subjects. The accusative ending can be used to show the destination of a motion, or to replace certain prepositions when preferred. This allows for a more flexible word order, such as that found in Greek, Latin, and Russian.
Despite Esperanto’s somewhat clinical-sounding rules for building words and sentences, these very guidelines lead to a great deal of double meanings, and in fact Eperantists are quite fond of wordplay and humor based on their language.
Esperanto today
Today, Esperanto is the most widely spoken of the constructed languages. While not an official language of any country, it is nonetheless the official working language of several non-profit organizations, mostly Esperanto organizations. In addition, UNESCO has recognized the value of Esperanto in two different resolutions.
A survey of the number of Esperanto speakers worldwide by SIL International—a service organization that works with people who speak the world’s lesser-known languages—found that 1.6 million people speak Esperanto at a level that goes beyond greetings and simple phrases. There are even, the survey found, between 200 to 2,000 native Esperantists—individuals for whom Esperanto is actually akin to a first language!
People often learn Esperanto online through websites like lernu! (http://www.lernu.net/). The word lernu is Esperanto for “learn,” in the imperative mood. Lernu! is a multi-lingual website, whose goal is to inform the community of Internet users about Esperanto and help them learn the language, easily and free of charge. The courses designed to teach Esperanto are arranged to suit varying levels of difficulty. Students who encounter any problems can get help from live tutors.
Despite representing only a tiny fraction of the world’s population, and thus falling far short of Zamenhof ’s goal of a universal language, Esperanto remains a passionate dream for its adherents. Building on the legacy of Zamenhof ’s vision—developed as a result of the unhappy and sometimes violent misunderstandings he witnessed in his home village of Bialystock—these standard-bearers continue to keep the flame alive, for worldwide understanding, equality among nations, and mutual respect among peoples and countries.
“Esperanto,” after all, means “One who hopes.”
For more information
Jokes:
http://www.esperanto.ch/komentoj/sxercoj.html
Games:
http://mpovorin.narod.ru/ludoj/ludoj.html
News and chat:
http://gxangalo.com
Dictionary:
http://www.vortaro.org
Instruction:
http://www.cursodeesperanto.com.br/
Tongue twisters:
http://www.uebersetzung.at/twister/eo.htm
Music:
http://www.vinilkosmo.com
The Bay Area is the home of Esperanto-Ligo por Norda Ameriko (The Esperanto League for North America, a National Esperanto Association, http://www.esperanto-usa.org/), as well as the San Francisco Esperanto Regional Organization (http://ttt.esperanto.org/us/SFERO/) and the League of East Bay Esperantists, both of which have offices in Oakland.
How to say it in Esperanto
Creative Therapy Associates’ famous “How Are You Feeling Today?” poster/postcard reproduced on Translorial page 19 is also published in Esperanto by AIMS International Books (www.aimsbooks.com). In English, the emotions are, from right to left and top to bottom: Exhausted, Confused, Ecstatic, Guilty, Suspicious, Angry, Hysterical, Frustrated, Sad, Confident, Embarrassed, Happy, Mischievous, Disgusted, Frightened, Enraged, Ashamed, Cautious, Smug, Depressed, Overwhelmed, Hopeful, Lonely, Lovestruck, Jealous, Bored, Surprised, Anxious, Shocked, and Shy.
Other common expressions
Hello: Saluton [rough pronunciation: sa-LOO-ton]
Goodbye: Is revido [jis reh-VEE-do]
I love you: Mi amas vin [mee AH-mahs veen]
Thank you: Dankon [DAHN-kon]
Test yourself
What does it mean: Unu bieron, mi petas. [Oo-noo BEE-airon, mee PEH-tahs]
Answer: “Beer, please!”
Just for fun
According to a February 25, 2004, press release, the Esperanto version of the Wikipedia (en.wikipedia.org)—an open-content, polyglot encyclopedia—had 11,000 articles, making it the tenthlargest language in the Wikipedia.
The first film produced in Esperanto was called Angoroj (1964). Incubus, produced a year later, starred William Shatner, himself an Esperantist; it is the only known professionally produced feature film with entirely Esperanto dialogue.
Besides Esperanto, the most famous constructed languages are the Klingon and Vulcan languages of the movie and TV series Star Trek, and the languages of J.R.R. Tolkein’s Middle-earth mythologies (Sindarin, Quenya, Khuzdul and others).
The minor planet (1421) Esperanto is named in honor of the language. It was discovered on March 18, 1936 by Yrjö Väisälä, a Finnish astronomer.
Though the United Nations does not recognize Esperanto as an official language, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights has been translated into Esperanto.
Google, the Internet search engine, has the capability of displaying the Google interface, tips, and messages in Esperanto. When using Esperanto as a search keyword, Google will return about 2.6 million hits, some of which are sites written in Esperanto.
Esperanto accounts for more than 99% of all published material on constructed languages.
As depicted in the poem “Utopia” (article page 20 of Translorial), albeit in black and white, the flag of Esperanto is green with a white area (green 2:3, white 1:1) in the top left corner with a green 5 pointed regular star pointing upwards centered in it. The meaning of this symbol stands for the hope (green) of the five continents united (5-pointed star) in common understanding and peace (white color). And because Dr. Zamenhof was a thorough gentleman, he even wrote the anthem to go with it.
Sep 1st, 2004 | Business Services, Essays, Perspective | No Comments
By Christian L’Écuyer, President
Les Traductions COTRAD Translations (Quebec, Canada)
(Editor’s note: This article is a condensation of a much larger piece originally published in “The Voice,” the Newsletter of the Translators and Interpreters Guild (Canada), in 2002. With generous permission from its author, the article has been significantly abridged and edited for publication in Translorial.)
What is a co-operative, and how does it work? Does it have realistic and potentially profitable applications—both in monetary and social terms—for translators in today’s commercial environment?
Unlike a purely commercial venture at one end of the spectrum and a non-profit association on the other, a co-operative lies somewhere in between. It actually combines a “cooperative,” people-oriented strategy with sound business principles designed to generate self-sustaining (and beyond) income. Sometimes known as “employee-owned companies,” co-ops may be less well-known than other types of businesses, but they are far from uncommon. As of 2001, according to a study by the government of Quebec, there were 47,000 co-ops in the United States, with over 100 million members.
In the Canadian model, where self-employed professionals cannot create or become a member of a trade union, co-ops have tended to emerge in a particular market or field in response to needs that have often remained unmet in the economic environment, participating in the mainstream economy largely by default. Viewed this way, cooperatives are often seen by their proponents as correctives to the prevailing profit-driven economic structure in a specific market.
In this structure, co-operatives may in fact have a greater success rate that that of commercial ventures. The reasons for this may be traced to investors’ frequent lack of interest in serving a particular community, or too keen an interest in the bottom line. Co-op members are concerned with profits, too, of course, but their criteria for success encompasses more than just merely financial rewards. A co-op’s strengths and successes, in fact, stem from sustained grassroots links with a community of members, in the localities in which they live, or even through the Internet.
This egalitarian perspective is showcased by the democratic structure of a co-op, in which share-holding is not a factor: the association operates on the principle of “one person/one vote” for all business decisions, as distinct from a system in which seniority, job title, or even relative economic value determines influence. Participating in the co-op as both workers/artisans and as managers/directors, all regular co-op members share in the joys and pains of co-ownership and co-management. This means that regular co-op members can bring issues to the attention of fellow “cooperators” and to the elected board, and participate in finding a solution from within. They are the ultimate decision-makers. In this sense, some cooperators consider their statutes and by-laws as a type of collective agreement.
The COTRAD example
In an organization like COTRAD—as with any other generalized co-operative—the “company” model comprises two parts: an association of members, and the actual business run by it. As distinct from consumers’ co-ops, where membership is open to all who care to shop there, membership in professional organizations such as COTRAD is limited to skilled workers—here, translators and language specialists.
Within this context, COTRAD has evolved its own “co-operative difference.” Among its unique characteristics is the equal distribution of work allotted to each member, in order to eliminate a sometimes cannibalistic mentality regarding job assignment, and to give all members a chance to earn a reasonable living.
This equity is achieved through a work allotment formula based on specific criteria as derived from the association’s experience over the past five years. In short, the member who has received the least work in the preceding ten weeks gets first choice in accepting incoming work. A sub-formula allows integration of a member’s fields of expertise in the process. The allotment formula, or “work roll,” is updated as new work comes in.
COTRAD requires regular members to manage a particular aspect of the overall business side: supervising the insurance file, maintaining the database for professional development, picking up the mail, actively promoting the co-op’s services, making sure the amounts paid or received are consistent with figures in appropriate databases, etc. These administrative responsibilities are done more or less on a bartering basis, in the sense that they are the members’ claims to ownership of the co-op.
The association is administered through a project management approach. Although an administrative assistant is employed on a part-time basis, the group nonetheless believes that involving the regular members in the administrative aspect of their own business is the best way for them to keep control of it. This process insures that the co-op remains the property of its artisans and reflects their inputs.
COTRAD hires, or “recruits,” new members only if the translation volume in a given field has increased in a steady and consistent manner, or to comply with the required minimum number of members. Candidates must of course provide an up-to-date résumé, an example of their translation skills with source text, and—in the case where a candidate does not have a recommendation from a current member—a 200-250 word composition in the second language, on cooperation or a related subject.
It is important to keep in mind that COTRAD is a legal entity separate from the individual translator or language specialist. Thus, it is first in the client’s line of fire when things go wrong, which is why the association pays extremely careful attention to the monitoring of all outgoing jobs. Monitoring involves one or more of the following: spot-checking, copyediting, intermediate revision, or full revision. All target texts are spot-checked by the project manager, who then decides if it is good enough to be sent to the client as is. If not, further copyediting or revision is applied to the target text. Such close monitoring is a value-added process that clients tend to appreciate.
One of the distinguishing characteristics of the COTRAD co-op is that translators are always paid. If the client has not paid a validated job within a reasonable period of time, the co-op will pay the translator his/her full honoraria and then use whatever legal recourses are available against the delinquent client.
When developing a new section or module of the cooperative, COTRAD calls on freelancers, allowing members to monitor the linguistic skills of the prospective new cooperators and put their co-operative spirit to the test. Rates are negotiated on a per job or per period basis, as in any agency, but members of COTRAD are paid according to specific guidelines (see sidebar).
In all, a little over 90 percent of the total fee paid by the client is re-circulated among the members who participated in getting the job done, and in getting the job in the first place. All surpluses generated in the fiscal year are reinvested in the company’s growth fund.
As to management training, there are currently very few schools of co-operative management, in Quebec or in North America as a whole. Many managers in commercial enterprises are trained to think in terms of hierarchy, not of democracy. This can create problems in managing a co-op, especially the tendency for such managers to want to transform their co-operatives into share-holding ventures.
That said, it is quite interesting that some profit-based approaches nevertheless struggle to emulate a community-based business model that is over 175 years old; we should thank work-team theorists for bringing the work co-operative formula back in the spotlight of 21st century management and for arousing a new interest in the true co-operative approach.
© Tous droits réservés / All rights reserved, La coopérative de traduction COTRAD, Aylmer (QC), Canada, July 24, 2002. Copyright of the version of these articles that appeared in ‘The Voice’ in July and December of 2002 is shared with TTIG.
Getting started
Co-ops tend to generate a higher level of motivation among members than a traditional corporation does. It also nicely smoothes out the pitfalls of independent work.
Four or five members with common and/or complementary interests is all it takes to start; virtually no startup money is required, only the usual dictionaries, software and computers. All members work from home, are linked through e-mail, or fax, or phone. They meet perhaps every three weeks in a chat forum, on an intranet site, or in person to resolve management issues or organize special production projects. Members revise each other’s work without fear of reprisals and at lower cost; as to the business side, all members look for, receive a commission on, and can accept work in all specialties that all members have. Add an administrative assistant to the group if you have some start-up money, and you’re on your way. Bonne route!
COTRAD’s payment guidelines
The company keeps 15 percent of all jobs as the “co-op’s earnings,” to pay its overhead, the administrative assistant, the accountant, its Internet connections, and its phone lines; to guarantee the members’ and the general public’s preferred shares; to defend a member’s work if necessary; and to provide for the members’ common fund, called the Co-operative Advantage Fund.
The project manager and/or finder share 12 percent of the paid amount. It is important to keep in mind that the finder or project manager for a particular job is usually a fellow member. Thus, this money is effectively redistributed among members (another way to reduce cannibalism and inequity).
If a translation is sent to the client after spot-checking, the translator gets approximately 73 percent of the fee. Should a translation need full revision, the translator would be paid only 50 percent. Although 23 percent is subtracted from the honoraria in the latter case, it helps a fellow member make a living and saves professional embarrassment in the process.
Add to these honoraria the 5 percent or so from the Co-operative Advantage Fund that the language professional can use for professional development workshops, collective insurance premiums, or for other work-related advantages, and the pay system is complete.
For more information
www.magma.ca/~cotrad, for more on the COTRAD Translation Cooperative.
www.ica.coop, the International Cooperative Alliance. You will find on this site numerous internal and external links on a variety of coop-related subjects. Reading ICA’s « Declaration of Cooperative Principles » is a must. Among other functions, the ICA has the mandate of representing the world’s co-ops at the UN.
www.ncba.coop, the National Cooperative Business Association in the US.
www.coopca.com, the Canadian Co-operative Association.
www.orion.qc.ca, a Canadian Counselling and Research Co-operative
You may also want to search the Web for “icagroups” (International Cooperative Alliance Groups); “cooperatives US;”“workers’co-ops”US; etc.; the USDA for its section devoted to cooperative businesses; and various American universities for their Co-op Management Programs—their sites often have links to successful American cooperatives or co-op resource groups.
Jul 1st, 1978 | Perspective, Translation | No Comments
from the introduction of the original edition of the Thesaurus written by Peter Mark Roget in 1852
“The utility of the present Work will be appreciated more especially by those who are engaged in the arduous process of translating into English a work written in another language. Simple as the operation may appear, on a superficial view, of rendering into English each of its sentences, the task of translating, with perfect exactness, the sense of the original, preserving at the same time the style and character of its composition, and reflecting with fidelity the mind and spirit of the author, is a task of extreme difficulty.
The cultivation of this useful department of literature was in ancient times strongly recommended both by Cicero and by Quintilian, as essential to the formation of a good writer and accomplished orator. Regarded simply as a mental exercise, the practice of translation is the best training for the attainment of that mastery of language and felicity of diction which are the sources of the highest oratory, and which are requisite for the possession of a graceful and persuasive eloquence. By rendering ourselves the faithful interpreters of the thoughts and feelings of others, we are rewarded with the acquisition of greater readiness and facility in correctly expressing our own; as he who has best learned to execute the orders of a commander becomes himself best qualified to command.
In the earliest periods of civilization, translators were the agents for propagating knowledge from nation to nation, and the value of their labors has been inestimable; but, in the present age, when so many different languages have become the depositories of the vast treasures of literature and of science which have been accumulating for centuries, the utility of accurate translations has greatly increased, and it has become a more important object to attain perfection in the art.”
