Slang "no brainer" -- a challenge for translators

[Wilson Gray]

When I was in the Army in Germany in the early 'Sixties, I was
surprised to hear Germans say, "Das ist nicht _fair_!" Like, they
don't have a word for "fair"? Apparently not. A glance into the
current Langenscheidt's shows that "fair" is still the word for
"fair," with a version of the German pronunciation assimilated to the
spelling now acceptable, but the pswaydo-English pronunciation is
still preferred.

Admittedly, we use German words like "Weltanschauung," when we could
use "worldview," instead. But you won't hear words like either of that
falling trippingly from the tongue of the man in the street.

-Wilson

On 10/28/06, Cohen, Gerald Leonard <gcohen at umr.edu> wrote:
> ---------------------- Information from the mail header -----------------------
> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       "Cohen, Gerald Leonard" <gcohen at UMR.EDU>
> Subject:      Slang "no brainer" -- a challenge for translators
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
>      It's sometimes possible to appreciate the wealth of British/American slang by seeing the difficulty of translating some of its items (with proper nuances) into other languages. One such item is "no brainer" which the German news program tagesschau.de was unable to translate with a corresponding German slang/colloquial expression.
>
>     In a recent interview, Vice President Dick Cheney was asked with respect to the interrogation torture-method known as "waterboarding": "Would you agree a dunk in the water is a no-brainer if it can save lives?". To which he reportedly replied: "Well, it's a no brainer for me".
>
>      The tagesschau.de translator had to find a roundabout way to render "no-brainer" in each instance. In the first one, he/she reported that Cheney was asked if he shares the view that a dunking (to save lives) is "nicht der Rede wert" [literally: "not worth talking about/mentioning."].  For the second instance the tagesschau item simiply reported that Cheny shares that view.
>
>    Below my signoff is an excerpt from the tagesschau.de item. It's titled "Rechtfertigte Cheney Foltermethoden?" (= Did Cheney Justify Torture Methods?"), and the English sentences presented in the item below appear in the original article.
>
> Gerald Cohen
>
> [from today's tagesschau.de]:
>
> Wenige Tage vor der Kongresswahl sorgt eine Äußerung von US-Vizepräsident Dick Cheney für Aufregung. Vertreter der oppositionellen Demokraten und Menschenrechtsorganisationen werfen Cheney vor, Folter gerechtfertigt zu haben. Das Weiße Haus weist die Vorwürfe zurück.
>
> Anlass des Streits ist ein Radio-Interview, dass der Vizepräsident am Dienstag dem Sender WDAY in Fargo (US-Bundesstaat North Dakota) gegeben hatte. Moderator Scott Hennen fragte Cheney, ob er die Ansicht teile, dass "Untertauchen nicht der Rede wert ist, wenn es Leben retten kann" ("Would you agree a dunk in the water is a no-brainer if it can save lives?"). In seiner Antwort sagte Cheney, er stimme der Ansicht zu ("Well, it's a no brainer for me"). Im weiteren Verlauf des Interviews sagte der Vizepräsident auch, er halte die Debatte über Verhörtechniken für "etwas dumm" ("a little silly") und lobte die Informationen, die während Verhören von Personen erhalten wurden, die von den USA des Terrorismus verdächtigt werden.
>
> <snip>
>
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--
Everybody says, "How hard it is that we have to die"---a strange
complaint to come from the mouths of people who have had to live.
-----
Whoever has lived long enough to find out what life is knows how deep
a debt of gratitude we owe to Adam, the first great benefactor of our
race. He brought death into the world.

--Sam Clemens

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