te haces el sordo

English translation: turn a blind eye / pretend not to hear / turn a deaf ear to something

10:35 Dec 6, 2014

Spanish to English translations [PRO]
Social Sciences - Education / Pedagogy / Counsellors' relations with other educators

Spanish term or phrase: te haces el sordo

SPAIN. From an article about the relations of school guidance counsellors with other educational staff. The whole sentence comes at the end of a statement by a trainee counsellor:

"“Nuestro trabajo se nota un montón; en un departamento con varios profesores, si hay uno que se ‘relaja’ no se nota tanto. Pero en nuestro caso, al estar sólo yo, si te equivocas eres muy visible. No trabajas o te haces el sordo y se nota”."

neilmac KudoZ activity Questions: 1872 (2 open) (106 closed without grading) Answers: 6252 Spain
Local time: 10:18

English translation:turn a blind eye / pretend not to hear / turn a deaf ear to something

Explanation:
From the (excellent) Granada University dictionary:

* hacer oídos sordos = turn + a deaf ear to.
* hacerse el sordo = turn + a deaf ear to, pretend + not to have heard, turn + a blind eye to.

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Note added at 1 hr (2014-12-06 12:18:32 GMT)
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I'd use "something": "turn a blind eye to something". It just means in general to not pay due care and attention to something unspecified.

Selected response from:

Simon Bruni
United Kingdom
Local time: 09:18

Grading comment

Thanks everyone for contributing. In the end I'll use something like "If you're not working or turn a deaf ear, it really shows."
4 KudoZ points were awarded for this answer

Summary of answers provided

5 +6

turn a blind eye / pretend not to hear / turn a deaf ear to something

Simon Bruni

4 +2

to play possum

Danik 2014

you pretend not to hear

Isolina Plata (X)

turn a blind eye / a deaf ear

Ana Vozone

Discussion entries: 7

neilmac

Spain

ASKER

I think they mean

09:22 Dec 7, 2014

a combination of all these things. Not listening, low profile (keeping your head down and muddling through)... not just in the odd case, but in general avoiding what should be the main task for these "educators". "Turning a deaf ear" probably comes closest...

Danik 2014

Brazil

@Simon

20:08 Dec 6, 2014

That is how I read it:
To my mind "turn a blind eye/ear" has a different meaning from "se hacer the sordo", only the image is similar. In this context it might refer to the attitude of a supervisor who might ignore (turn a blind eye) on a lazy teacher.
But in the post the focus is on the teacher him/herself, whose laziness doesn´t go unnoticed. So there is no use in "playing possum" or "keeping a low profile" as Charles suggests.

Charles Davis

Spain

@Simon

19:59 Dec 6, 2014

I see what you mean. That could be what it's referring to. My spontaneous reaction was to take it more generally; "hacerse el sordo" often does mean feigning ignorance, so I thought that was what it was implying, particularly because that's what so many people do in schools (and other places) to take it easy: relajarse, as they say here. But yes, they could mean deliberately ignoring problems.

Simon Bruni

United Kingdom

Am I misinterpreting it?

16:55 Dec 6, 2014

My interpretation is that it refers to a counsellor choosing to ignore a schoolchild's behavioural issue or misdeed. Otherwise, why would the author have chosen "te haces el sordo"? It seems an odd turn of phrase if the author meant just generally feigning ignorance to shirk duties - there are plenty of more obvious ways to say that in Spanish.

franglish

Switzerland

14:56 Dec 6, 2014

I read it as saying that if you make a mistake, there's no-one to share the blame, you can't hide behind someone else's back, you have to face up to it.

Charles Davis

Spain

Turning a blind eye

13:25 Dec 6, 2014

I think this is usually applied to deliberately overlooking something that someone else has done wrong or has failed to do. Turning a deaf ear is pretending not to have heard something. I don't think either of these quite fit the context, which is really about skiving by pretending not to be aware of what's going on, and not something in particular but things in general. A classic ploy: "Why didn't you do X?" "Oh, sorry, I didn't realise, nobody told me anything about it."

Simon Bruni

United Kingdom

How I'd phrase it

12:23 Dec 6, 2014

"If you don't do your job or turn a blind eye to something, it will be noticed."

Answers

7 mins confidence:

turn a blind eye / a deaf ear

Explanation:
Would this work?

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Note added at 7 mins (2014-12-06 10:43:07 GMT)
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Two minutes late...

Reference: http://www.monergism.com/thethreshold/articles/onsite/The-Bl...

Ana Vozone
Local time: 09:18
Works in field
Native speaker of:

Portuguese
PRO pts in category: 52

Notes to answerer

Asker: Yes, but to what? My problem is with the original, it dopesn't seem clear.

5 mins confidence:

peer agreement (net): +6

turn a blind eye / pretend not to hear / turn a deaf ear to something

Simon Bruni
United Kingdom
Local time: 09:18
Works in field
Native speaker of:

English
PRO pts in category: 319

Grading comment

Thanks everyone for contributing. In the end I'll use something like "If you're not working or turn a deaf ear, it really shows."

Notes to answerer

Asker: My problem is with the Spanish. Turn a blind eye yes, but to what? I was considering "look the other way" but am still not happy with the whole thing.

46 mins confidence:

peer agreement (net): +2

to play possum

Explanation:
I think the idea implied here is that you don´t go unnoticed if you relax work. In other words, you can´t play possum.
Just a curiosity: In Portuguese the equivalent expression would be "se fingir de morto".
("to play possum")
1.http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/play_possum
2.http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=playing possu...
3.http://idioms.thefreedictionary.com/play possum
4.http://dictionary.cambridge.org/us/dictionary/british/play-p...

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Note added at 2 hrs (2014-12-06 12:42:12 GMT)
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To my mind "turn a blind eye/ear" has a different meaning from "se hacer the sordo", only the image is similar. In this context it might refer to the attitude of a supervisor who might ignore (turn a blind eye) on a lazy teacher.
But in your post the focus is on the teacher him/herself, whose laziness doesn´t go unnoticed. So there is no use in "playing possum" or "keeping a low profile" as Charles suggests.
I was surprised about the idea of the "US audience". In fact I was searching for an English equivalent of the Brazilian expression "se fingir de morto" which sprung to my mind.

Danik 2014
Brazil
Specializes in field
Native speaker of:

German,

Portuguese
PRO pts in category: 12

Notes to answerer

Asker: This is fine for a US audience. I like Charles comment about "keeping a low profile"..

Peer comments on this answer (and responses from the answerer)

agree

Charles Davis: I agree: in this case it implies this. "Keep a low profile" would be another way of putting it, but same meaning.

26 mins

-> Thanks, Charles. The meaning is certainly the same, I just wanted to echange one image for another.

agree

philgoddard: I thought this was wrong at first, because I think of it as meaning to feign death. But it also means "to remain quiet and still to escape attention or remain undetected".

5 hrs

-> Thanks, Phil! Yes, that is the idea: "You 'feign" death to remain undetected"

neutral

Werner Maurer: Deleted my disagree after checking your links. Still not sure it's the best choice, though. Doesn't quite fit somehow. It has more to do with trying to remain unnoticed than with ignoring realities. But if, and only if, ur from USA I take it ALL back.

7 hrs

-> It has ALL to do WITH REMAINING UNNOTICED! And it doesn´t refer to any pupil but to the lazy teacher that may want to go unnoticed(note above!)! Thanks for changing to neutral but the next time please do your homework before giving your opinion!!!

1 day 1 hr confidence:

you pretend not to hear

Explanation:
As per Oxford dictionary

Example sentence(s):

You pretend not to hear

Isolina Plata (X)
Uruguay
Local time: 05:18
Native speaker of:

Spanish

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te haces el sordo

English translation: turn a blind eye / pretend not to hear / turn a deaf ear to something

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English translation: turn a blind eye / pretend not to hear / turn a deaf ear to something

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