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<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center; font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;" align="center">=====================================================<br>
<b>L O W L A N D S - L - 29 June 2010 - Volume 03</b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center; font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;" align="center"><a href="mailto:lowlands.list@gmail.com" target="_blank"><span style="" lang="FR">lowlands.list@gmail.com</span></a> - <a href="http://lowlands-l.net/" target="_blank"><span style="" lang="FR">http://lowlands-l.net/</span></a><br>
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<p style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;" class="MsoNormal"> </p>
<p style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;" class="MsoNormal">From: <span class="gd"><span style="color: rgb(121, 6, 25);">Jacqueline Bungenberg de
Jong</span></span><span class="gi"> </span><span class="go"><<a href="mailto:Dutchmatters@comcast.net">Dutchmatters@comcast.net</a>></span></p>
<p style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;" class="MsoNormal">Subject: <span class="gi">LL-L "Language proficiency" 2010.06.29
(01) [EN]</span></p>
<p style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;" class="MsoNormal"> </p>
<p style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt; font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="color: rgb(0, 112, 192);">Heather writes: </span>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.</p>
<p style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt; font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"> </p>
<p style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt; font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">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.</p>
<p style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt; font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"> </p>
<p style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt; font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">Perhaps
the connections between languages within the brain perform differently when
learn differently. </p>
<p style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt; font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"> </p>
<p style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt; font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="color: rgb(0, 112, 192);">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???</span></p>
<p style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt; font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="color: rgb(0, 112, 192);"> </span></p>
<p style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt; font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="color: rgb(0, 112, 192);"><span style="color: rgb(0, 112, 192);">There you are “standing with your mouth
full of teeth”. (according to a well-known Dutch idiom)</span></span></p>
<p style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt; font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="color: rgb(0, 112, 192);"> </span></p>
<p style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt; font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="color: rgb(0, 112, 192);">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”.</span></p>
<p style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt; font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="color: rgb(0, 112, 192);"><span style="color: rgb(0, 112, 192);">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!</span></span></p>
<p style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt; font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="color: rgb(0, 112, 192);"><span style="color: rgb(0, 112, 192);">Jacqueline,</span></span></p>
<p style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt; font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="color: rgb(0, 112, 192);"><span style="color: rgb(0, 112, 192);">Seattle</span><span style="color: rgb(0, 112, 192);"> US </span></span></p>
<p style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;" class="MsoNormal"> </p>
<p style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;" class="MsoNormal">----------</p>
<p style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;" class="MsoNormal"> </p>
<p style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;" class="MsoNormal">From: <span class="gd"><span style="color: rgb(91, 16, 148);">Obiter Dictum</span></span><span class="gi"> </span><span class="go"><<a href="mailto:obiterdictum@mail.ru">obiterdictum@mail.ru</a>></span></p>
<p style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;" class="MsoNormal">Subject: <span class="gi">LL-L "Language proficiency" 2010.06.29
(01) [EN]</span></p>
<p style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;" class="MsoNormal"> </p>
<p style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;" class="MsoNormal">Hello Heather,<br>
<br>
Thank you for your contribution; and congrats to a new grandmother! :-)<br>
Speaking of grandmothers, do y'all remember Margaret Thatcher's regal slip of
the tongue "We have become a grandmother!"?<br>
<br>
> Fascinatingstring, this one but not ever having attained the giddy heights
of interpreter/ translator I wonder whether this pennyworth contributes much.<br>
<br>
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? :)<br>
><br>
And thank you so much for your contribution; it's going into my future paper.<br>
<br>
> 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?<br>
<br>
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.<br>
I'm writing this in "plain text," and if Ron posts it as is, you can
possibly see it.<br>
<br>
Marlou wrote:<br>
<br>
"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."<br>
<br>
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.<br>
<br>
Jacqueline wrote:<br>
<br>
> Vlad, re the experience oftranslation. I have on my wall above my PC a
lithograph by JeanneVerdoux, called “Duet for two pens” !!!!!!!!<br>
><br>
:) 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.<br>
I also wonder if there are people who can do this trick in Hebrew. Anybody
heard of such feats? Mark, have you ever tried? ;)<br>
<br>
Btw, the litograph is here: <a href="http://graphics8.nytimes.com/images/2010/04/11/books/review/Howard-t_CA0/Howard-t_CA0-articleLarge.jpg" target="_blank">http://graphics8.nytimes.com/images/2010/04/11/books/review/Howard-t_CA0/Howard-t_CA0-articleLarge.jpg</a><br>
<br>
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:<br>
<a href="http://www.stumbleupon.com/su/1mN5Eg/catcompare.narod.ru/" target="_blank">http://www.stumbleupon.com/su/1mN5Eg/catcompare.narod.ru/</a><br>
<br>
Best regards,<br>
Vlad Lee<br>
Tokyo, Japan/Moscow, Russia</p>
<p style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;" class="MsoNormal"> </p>
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