Would you hire someone who has taken a few drawing classes to create the architectural plans for your new two-story house? The answer of course is no. So why do people routinely think that any bilingual person can do a translation? This is probably because we are usually not taught about translation during the schooling process, including college and graduate school. Even literature experts don’t always know how translation works. However, translation is a complex procedure that requires education, training, and talent. Here are some facts that will help you understand a little more about the art of translation so you can hire the right person for your project.
Translation is a profession. Like doctors, school teachers, or chefs, translators are professionals who need training, acquired through specific courses and programs, and experience, obtained through years of translating. Some translators have certificates or graduate degrees in translation studies. Others have degrees in the literature of the language they translate or in special subject areas. All translators must have excellent reading and writing skills in at least two languages. The job of the translator is to first understand the source text and then render it into natural language in the target text, but for that to happen, he or she works with certain methods, tools, and processes. Translation doesn’t just magically happen. It’s hard work that involves investigation, careful thought, and informed creativity.
Translators generally translate into their mother tongue. There is a common misconception that translators can translate into any of their languages, acquired or otherwise. However, most translators’ compositional skills are stronger in their mother tongue. Therefore, it is highly recommended that they translate into their native language from the language or languages they have acquired. An exception to this may be someone who grew up in a bi- or trilingual home, but even then most people will have one language they favor.
Translation requires knowledge of two cultures. Translation is not just about words. It’s also about culture. While a common language may indicate certain collective histories, few people would say, for example, that Britain and the United States are the same culture. Professional translators understand the differences between the two cultures being translated for things like swearing, formalities, or customs. Some cultures are highly religious and homogenous; others are secular and diverse. All of this must be understood by the translator as the work is being done. Many translators either live or have lived in the country whose language they translate. If they don’t live in that country, they try to travel there often and keep up with news and cultural events whenever possible.
Language variants of specific countries should be considered. Similar to the issue of cultural understanding is that of language variants. For instance, the English spoken in the U.K. uses different vocabulary than the U.S. does. The same goes for mainland Spanish and Latin American Spanish. Even among Latin American countries, vocabulary and language forms can vary considerably. In fact, language can be different depending on a given region of a country. Do you say “soda” or “pop”? The answer depends on what part of the country you’re from. A good translator needs to understand and implement these variants.
Translators work on subject matter they understand. Just as you wouldn’t hire an amateur artist to design a large house, it would probably be unwise to hire a medical translator to translate a historical novel. Of course multitalented people exist, but in general you want the translator to have as much knowledge of the subject matter as possible. For instance, someone who has a degree in history is probably better suited to translate a text on the Spanish Civil War than someone who studied biology, and if that person wrote their dissertation on early twentieth-century Spain, that’s even better!
The genre of the text counts. Writing has all sorts of genres, from poetry to narrative, from the essay to UX content. While most translators are versatile in this respect, each genre is distinct and generally translators specialize in one or two of them. A translator may be great for website content but not so good at translating a sonnet. Likewise, a literary translator may brilliantly translate a novel but fail at translating an engineering manual. This means you need to hire a translator with expertise in your particular genre.
In the question of professional translators vs. machine translation, translators win. Some people think that machine translation can replace human translators, but this is a fallacy. Language, idiomatic by nature, is far too complex to be thoroughly understood by machines. That is why translating something like “that’s a horse of a different color” can’t be rendered by direct translation, which is what machine translation does. In Spanish, for example, the equivalent phrase would be “that’s flour of a different sack.” Sounds weird, huh? But beyond idiomatic phrases, machines can’t always keep track of even basic things like gender or more subtle matters like tone or register. Humans can.
Each translation is unique. Every translator translates any given phrase (or three-volume novel!) in a way that may be completely distinct from other versions of that text. The important thing is that the text capture the sense of the original and sound natural in the target language. When we read War and Peace in an English translation, we are reading a unique version of Tolstoy’s work, and if we were to compare the ten or so English translations of this novel, each one would have similarities in meaning but would not necessarily contain the same words or phrases. Undoubtedly, the style would differ from translation to translation even if every translator meticulously considered Tolstoy’s own style. Therefore, every translation, especially literary translation, is a new and unique version of the original.
Translation is different from interpretation. Translation has to do with the written transformation of a text from one language to another. Interpretation happens verbally in a live setting; in other words, it occurs in a nearly simultaneous manner and it’s oral. Most bi- and multilingual language experts specialize in either interpretation or translation—and they appreciate it when you understand the difference.
When it comes to business and academia, hiring a cheap translator may cost you a lot in the long run.We’ve all see the examples of bad translations and poorly proofread signs that businesses and hotels are famous for on the internet. Why did this happen? Instead of hiring a professional translator or copyeditor, the companies just googled the phrase or wrote it themselves, resulting in sometimes ridiculous signs. This then made the business look bad. To save a few pennies, they became the laughingstock of Twitter. In the case of academia, not hiring a professional could mean your article is awkward or ungrammatical, and publishers might outright reject it, or they might ask for multiple rounds of revisions—if you are lucky enough to get an editor who is patient. High-quality translation and editing support your career and help you get published in well-respected journals in a timely fashion. And when you succeed at publishing, your institution is happy too. It’s a win-win situation. Moreover, a clean, legible text in another language reflects back on you, so this is another great reason to hire a professional.