LL-L "Language proficiency" 2010.06.29 (03) [EN]

Tue Jun 29 22:53:36 UTC 2010

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*L O W L A N D S - L - 29 June 2010 - Volume 03*

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From: Jacqueline Bungenberg de Jong <Dutchmatters at comcast.net>

Subject: LL-L "Language proficiency" 2010.06.29 (01) [EN]

Heather writes: I can detect a clear difference in my own skills of
translation of single words / idioms; if they were learnt at school/college,
I can usually match them pretty immediately. However if they were acquired
during a stay in the country in question, then I am usually stumped and have
to think up a context or a quote and even then sometimes the appropriate
word/s do not come to mind.

I understand this to be reflective of how the new language was learnt; if by
lists of vocabulary i.e. in school / college - translation is instantaneous
( usually) : if by life and living in the country in contact with speakers
then it is not so immediate and can fail to produce a single adequate
translation.

Perhaps the connections between languages within the brain perform
differently when learn differently.

Yes Heather, You describe a vexing problem indeed! One has the feeling that
one knows the word, or the expression, or the idiom; but what the heck was
its exact meaning???

There you are “standing with your mouth full of teeth”. (according to a
well-known Dutch idiom)

It is possible that it has to do with the way you learned that particular
term, but there are other explanations too. When we learn a foreign language
in high school, our native ability to absorb language is still partly
intact.  We learn a simple everyday vocabulary. Usually those words are
learned by rote; like the tables of multiplication. Later, when we get to
the country where this language is spoken, we are like chickens, picking up
a word here and an expression there and there is no reinforcement. It might
very well be a different way of learning, but having noticed that this
“looking for a particular word” is getting worse as time goes on it might
also belong to the class of “senior moments”.

The reason I say this is because it happens about as often when I am trying
to express something in Dutch as in English. Or worse even I am looking for
a Dutch or an English word and the French one pops up. It is a wonder we can
say anything and make sense at the same time!

Jacqueline,

Seattle US

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From: Obiter Dictum <obiterdictum at mail.ru>

Subject: LL-L "Language proficiency" 2010.06.29 (01) [EN]

Hello Heather,

Thank you for your contribution; and congrats to a new grandmother! :-)
Speaking of grandmothers, do y'all remember Margaret Thatcher's regal slip
of the tongue "We have become a grandmother!"?

> Fascinatingstring, this one but not ever having attained the giddy heights
of interpreter/ translator I wonder whether this pennyworth contributes
much.

We haven't yet, we will have when Jacqueline will start telling us about her
translation and interpreting solutions; interpreters are terribly
resourceful folks, they certainly beat journalists at that, aren't they
Jacqueline? :)
>
And thank you so much for your contribution; it's going into my future
paper.

> Andcan I tag onto this; at least half of these Language Proficiency mails
haveappeared blank on my screen. I was getting so fed up missing what was
going on,that I decided to forward a blank screen to Ron as proof. Imagine
my surprisewhen I found the missing mail in the forwarded screen!!! I have
had to readmost of the recent documents by pretending to Forward them! Does
anyone elsesuffer in this way?

Not exactly in this way; I for one have all characters other than straight
Latin as question marks in this mailbox. And in the mail I am answering,
there are no spaces between words. I suspect your mails are invisible
because we use the formatted (html) mode for mails in this topic; because of
some glitch en route, they may come to you formatted, in white characters,
so you don't see them. As you flip to answer with quoting, they all appear
unformatted (in the default black colour), so you can now see the text.
Perhaps Henry knows better.
I'm writing this in "plain text," and if Ron posts it as is, you can
possibly see it.

Marlou wrote:

"Some English media translated dummerweise asstupidly (not unfortunately, as
would have beencorrect) and fumed at Beckenbauer's arrogance :-) It seems
they save the moneyfor even the simplest intelligent translator. That is
stupid."

Absolutely. Cheap translators, cheap as they are, are NEVER good. I pay my
translator here in Moscow 13 eurocents per word, tax free, and get the
finest legal translation ever made between Russian and English and Japanese.
No, I don't really need them ALWAYS fine. I just keep the man busy and so I
can rely on him -- put on him my bottom dollar, for that matter, when it
comes to the crunch in some Russian, Hokkaido or Californian court.

Jacqueline wrote:

> Vlad, re the experience oftranslation. I have on my wall above my PC a
lithograph by JeanneVerdoux, called “Duet for two pens” !!!!!!!!
>
:) I found it on the internet and showed it to my translator (I am staying
at his place in Moscow). He told me that back in university (35 years ago)
someone told him of a Russian military translator who amazed people with
this trick: some one would say to him a sentence in Russian, and he would
write its English and Arabic translations with two pens/pencils held in both
hands, simultaneously. There were no details in that story, so we wondered
if the man wrote really simultaneously or alternating, word in English, word
in Arabic, word in English, word in Arabic, etc.
I also wonder if there are people who can do this trick in Hebrew. Anybody
heard of such feats? Mark, have you ever tried? ;)

Btw, the litograph is here:
http://graphics8.nytimes.com/images/2010/04/11/books/review/Howard-t_CA0/Howard-t_CA0-articleLarge.jpg

Thank you for reminding, Jacqueline. By the way, my translator has also a
picture above his PC here: CAT Tool Compare. The pic is here:
http://www.stumbleupon.com/su/1mN5Eg/catcompare.narod.ru/

Best regards,
Vlad Lee
Tokyo, Japan/Moscow, Russia

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