Poll: Do you regularly have to translate slang & colloquialisms as part of your work? Thread poster: ProZ.com Staff
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This forum topic is for the discussion of the poll question "Do you regularly have to translate slang & colloquialisms as part of your work?".
View the poll results »
| | | | Mary Worby 
United Kingdom
Local time: 16:00
German to English
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Most documents I translate are official documents. I do, however, sometimes translate market research responses and interviews, and these tend to be more colloquial.
One of the most memorable jobs I ever did was an interview with some prisoners about drug usage. It certainly tested my knowledge for colloqualisms and, shall we say, colourful language and I did have to send the translation back to the customer with an advisory note! It certainly felt odd using such strong language in ... See more Most documents I translate are official documents. I do, however, sometimes translate market research responses and interviews, and these tend to be more colloquial.
One of the most memorable jobs I ever did was an interview with some prisoners about drug usage. It certainly tested my knowledge for colloqualisms and, shall we say, colourful language and I did have to send the translation back to the customer with an advisory note! It certainly felt odd using such strong language in a professional context! ▲ Collapse
| | | | Sonia Hill
United Kingdom
Local time: 16:00
Italian to English
| Sometimes, but not on a regular basis | Jul 7, 2011 |
Most of the documents I translate are written in "proper" Italian, but I do sometimes get jobs that include expressions in dialect. I have quite a good understanding of Neapolitan, having lived in the area for a long time, but I struggle with some of the others and often have to ask for clarification.
I once translated a transcription of an interview with an early 20th century convict from a small village in Southern Italy. All his responses were in dialect and it was very hard work, but i... See more Most of the documents I translate are written in "proper" Italian, but I do sometimes get jobs that include expressions in dialect. I have quite a good understanding of Neapolitan, having lived in the area for a long time, but I struggle with some of the others and often have to ask for clarification.
I once translated a transcription of an interview with an early 20th century convict from a small village in Southern Italy. All his responses were in dialect and it was very hard work, but interesting too! ▲ Collapse
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in a contentious and complex divorce case I had to translate a few letters exchanged between husband and wife and they were, to put it mildly, colourful!
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neilmac
Spain
Local time: 17:00
Spanish to English
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But I have to be careful not to use them myself in my dealings with clients.
| | | | Giles Watson
Italy
Local time: 17:00
Italian to English
In memoriam
Colloquialisms and regionalisms crop up quite often in the newspaper articles, wine-related articles, websites and guides, and even some of the books I translate. If I don't know the expression, my dictionaries are no help and I can't get a straight answer out of Mr Google (you can usually find such expressions on the web but their meaning and/or connotations may be unclear), I ring up one of my Italian "informers".
Thank goodness for flat-rate phone tariffs!
| | | | DianeGM
Local time: 18:00
Member (2006)
Dutch to English
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Ocassionallly ... when I translate verbatims and other marketing / advertising texts, press releases, etc.
| | | | Thayenga
Germany
Local time: 17:00
Member (2009)
English to German
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Not as part of my work for clients.
However, there are quite a few colloquialisms in my own works which are being/ to be translated.
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Eser Perkins
Türkiye
Local time: 18:00
English to Turkish
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SITE LOCALIZER
My first encounter with this kind of challenge was a test translation I did for a video subtitling agency. It was a long time ago. Since then, I turned in another sample translation to another subtitling agency which was a collection of movie quotes, and I think my translation of the famous Casablanca quote "Here's lookin' at you, kid" got me the job. I signed with this agency to translate movies, sitcoms and the like, and that is an enormous supply of slang, colloquialisms, puns and not to ment... See more My first encounter with this kind of challenge was a test translation I did for a video subtitling agency. It was a long time ago. Since then, I turned in another sample translation to another subtitling agency which was a collection of movie quotes, and I think my translation of the famous Casablanca quote "Here's lookin' at you, kid" got me the job. I signed with this agency to translate movies, sitcoms and the like, and that is an enormous supply of slang, colloquialisms, puns and not to mention the cultural stereotypes. I also translated a collection of Nasreddin Hodja stories where I encountered many culture-specific sayings and clichés mixed with archaisms and old-fashioned (old as in medieval) slang which posed an enormous challenge not to sound patronizing and too streetwise for the context. I do get other texts in marketing field, and also the newsletters where the language is almost as informal as the daily spoken language which, by the way, is full of field-specific jargon, short-cut terms related to that particular industry, since the target audience is the employees of the company that issues the newsletters. ▲ Collapse
| | | | Amy Duncan (X)
Brazil
Local time: 12:00
Portuguese to English
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I translate books, voiceovers from concerts, marketing promotions, etc., quite a bit, and occasionally surveys. The surveys have the most slang and usually quite a few "naughty" words. I enjoy all of this immensely, because I'm quite good at deciphering slang.
Next week I have to proofread a list of words having to do with smelly feet, bad breath, stinky armpits and other unmentionables!
| | | | Elena Novski
Canada
Local time: 11:00
Russian to English
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Sometimes, for social interpreting, which is not my core business, though
| | | | Patricia Charnet
United Kingdom
Local time: 16:00
Member (2009)
English to French
I must admit that it's something I've never encountered
either it's because of my specialisations: medicine and law - everybody is nice to each other - at least in writing
or simply because my main language combination is English to French - and I've only dealt so far with English gentlemen and ladies who maintained a good entente cordiale <... See more
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I translated a screenplay. It was fun.
| | | | Nora Escoms
Argentina
Local time: 12:00
English to Spanish
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In addition to business / legal texts, I translate books for teenagers and sometimes children as well, more or less regularly. They can be quite challenging to translate, and I thoroughly enjoy them!
| | | | isabelmurill (X)
Local time: 17:00
English to Spanish
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I translate books. Contemporary fiction books always offer challenging slang. And when I translate non-fiction, marketing and business colloquialism is the rule!
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