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TJ translators: trend-follows, not trend-setters

One of the basic tenets of the translation by emulation approach outlined in this blog on translating technical journalism (TJ) is that that the translator should emulate the best practice of professional journalists working in the same or a closely allied area of specialisation in the translator's target language. Here 'best practice' includes monitoring trends and preferences with regard to evolving terminology. As the name implies, translation by emulation (TBE) proposes that the translator should follow exemplary terminology and usage trends, but not move ahead of the curve by adopting new terms before they have become established.

So what should the TBE translators do when a recognised standards organisation introduces new terminology? First, they should keep abreast of developments. Second, they should emulate their chosen exemplars.

The ICAO recently published a circular (n° 328) on what it calls 'Unmanned Aircraft Systems (UAS)'. This and other ICAO documents on the same subject define a new set of terms that can be summarised as follows:

Unmanned aircraft (UA) & unmanned aircraft systems (UAS) – the current ICAO terms – are also referred to as remotely piloted aircraft (RPA), unmanned aerial systems (UAS), unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs), unmanned aerial vehicle systems (UAV systems), remotely piloted vehicles (RPVs), remotely piloted vehicle systems (RPV systems), uninhabited aircraft, uninhabited aircraft systems, and drones.

[The question of how to present term-acronym pairs  – especially  term-acronym pairs containing the plural noun 'systems' or the non-count noun 'aircraft' – will be discussed in a separate post.]

For the moment, it would seem that 'drone' is dominant in the lay media, 'UAV' is popular and  RPV is gaining ground  in TJ, while bodies like the ICAO are promoting UA and UAS. In naval defence journalism, articles on unmanned aerial, underwater and surface vehicles (UAVs, UUVs and USVs) may refer collectively to UxVs, offboard systems or drones.

In such cases, TBE stands for a trend-follower approach, not a trend-setter approach.

Bellos on translating technical journalism

This post follows those of 30 October, 11 November and 17 December 2011 referring to David Bellos's Is that a fish in your ear? (subtitled, Translation and the meaning of everything). The 'fish', incidentally, refers to the 'Babel fish' in The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams. (published by Harmony Books in 1979). For more, see this video.

In chapter 28, entitled What Translators Do, Bellos writes:

Here's a tiny example of the kind of changes translators make in order not to change anything much at all. In (a 2003 issue of) the multilingual 'in-flight magazine' supplied to travelers on the Eurostar train, a page is devoted to graphics demonstrating the size and achievements of the whole enterprise of high-speed rail through the Channel Tunnel. One of the bubbles features "334.7 km.h," which is glossed in English as "The record breaking top speed (208 mph) a Eurostar train reached in July 2003 when testing the UK High Speed 1 Line." It is followed by the following French text:  

 Le record de vitesse d'un train Eurostar établi en juillet 2003 lors du test d'une ligne TGV en Grande-Bretagne.

The suppression of the 'miles per hour' speed in the French translation might be seen as simply conventional -- but the obvious reason for its omission is that it is of no relevance to French readers, who do not generally know how far a mile is anyway. More interesting is the French assertion that 208 miles per hour was the top speed of the train during the test, whereas the English asserts that the train's top speed broke a record -- no train had ever gone faster on a British track. But it's not a record for France, whose TGVs have exceeded that speed many times. So, for the French not to be frankly counterfactual, the translator has to rephrase and recontextualize. However, the real sublety in the recontextualization is when the "UK High Speed 1 Line" becomes just 'a high-speed line in Great Britain' in French. French readers do not need to know the embarrassing fact that Britain still has only one such line, when the French have many, and so they had also better not be told the proper name of a piece of railway engineering that is unique exclusively in British terms. Now linked more closely than ever by a fast train, Britain and France still provide two quite different contexts of use for even the simplest expressions. Translations naturally rephrase the message to adapt it to its altnerative context of use.

The endnote on p353 adds: Eurostar Metropolitan, June 2010: 5. The changes make it clear that this sentence was translated from English into French, and not vice versa. A back-translation of the French would probably give: "Top speed reached in July 2003 by a Eurostar train during testing of a high-speed line in the U.K."

Every aspect mentioned by David Bellos comes under the broad heading of what I call translation by emulation.

Supprimer l’édito ... dans certaines situations

The title line is drawn from a post entitled L'édito : sa place est dans les journaux on Les feuilles volantes -- Le blog de SFM Traduction. My colleagues at SFM Traduction are absolutely right. They also beat me to it by posting on this important aspect of 'translation by emulation'.

Headlines, take #2

After reading Headlines, take #1, some readers might think that my claims apply more to general journalism than technical journalism.

I trust that the following examples from Jane’s International Defence Review (JIDR), Jane’s Navy International (JNI)  and Jane's Defence Weekly (JDW) will convince you that English-speaking journalists specialising in naval defence use the same types of devices as their colleagues writing for everyday newspapers.

Device: techno-metaphor
JIDR, 13/03/07: Gas turbine design ignites race for naval powerpacks
Device: techno-metaphor
JNI, 13/02/07: Power trip: re-energising naval electric weapons
Device: humorous naval metaphor
JDW, 14/02/03: Is the alliance holed below the waterline?
Device: humorous naval metaphor
JNI, 11/05/05: UK casualty ship project faces major surgery
Device: pun
JNI, 17/03/06: Singapore moves to realise its Formidable ambitions
Device: pun
JDW, 29/07/05: Not-so-spritely Seasprite plan still off course

Headlines, take #1

My post dated 11/11/11 referred to David Bellos's Is that a fish in your ear? (subtitled, Translation and the meaning of everything). Chapter 7 features a number of clear, succinct descriptions of well-known translation challenges.
The section on headlines says that the target-language version of a source-language headline "must conform to the general conventions of headline writing" in the target-language culture "because headline writing is just as much a genre -- a particular kind of language use restricted to particular contexts -- as promising, christening, threatening, and so forth".
French headlines and article headings typically explain quite a lot of what is to come, often at greater length than English headlines.
English headlines are often written specifically to intrigue, arouse curiosity, trigger a smile (using a pun or other play on words or language) or even be thorough enigmatic, since the point is not so much to summarise as to entice the reader to read on.
This approach can also be considered as an aspect of 'translation by emulation'.

Much the same approach applies to caption writing.

To sum up, headlines and captions should be drafted after completing the translation of a technical journalism article. The words of the source texts are a minor consideration. The aim has to be to write headlines and captions that work in their own right for the assumed or explicity defined target audience.

NavTechGloss: M&M review

Le 15 décembre 2015, Mer et Marine a écrit à propos de "A French-English Glossary of Naval Technology":

Les professionnels français du domaine naval militaire le savent : les traductions du français vers l'anglais de textes techniques sont, parfois, loin d'être évidentes. Et, jusqu'ici, il n'existait pas vraiment d'outil très spécifique pour aider à la traduction de tels textes. Ce problème est désormais solutionné puisque Steve Dyson, traducteur et rédacteur technique pour l'industrie française de la défense navale depuis plus de 15 ans, vient d'éditer un glossaire français-anglais de la défense navale. « Cet ouvrage s'adresse aux traducteurs avertis et aux spécialistes de la défense navale. Il est le fruit de la traduction/adaptation de français en anglais de milliers de pages de journalisme technique concernant la défense navale et des sujets connexes », explique Steve Dyson.

Il s'agit d'un outil très spécifique en ce qui concerne le sujet (la défense navale), la « matière première » (des articles de journalisme technique destinés à promouvoir des produits, services et entreprises français) et l'approche traductologique que l'auteur désigne par « traduction par émulation ». L'auteur s'est permis d'écrire l'introduction (« Why this glossary is the way it is ») et les autres pages préliminaires en anglais. Il espère que l'utilisateur francophone l'excusera !