Language interpretation is commonly understood as a one to one job; for most cases, there are only two languages involved and the interpreter goes back and forth between the languages. But sometimes there are situations when multiple interpreters are needed because there are multiple target languages or that there is a rare language involved that needs to be interpreted through a third language.

For example, for a presentation in a foreign language, there might be a team of interpreters on standby, but they might not all have the same language pair. The presenter might be speaking in Japanese but only the Japanese interpreter can understand Japanese. The other interpreters however, understand English, and fortunately, the Japanese interpreter can interpret into English. Thus, the interpretation flow goes like this: Japanese presenter -> Japanese interpreter -> Other interpreters. There will obviously be a little bit of a lag between the interpreters, but in these kinds of situations, it is the only solution to ensure that all the languages are covered.

A different scenario is where there is a rare language involved and a third interpreter is needed. So for example, you might have a Triqui interpreter who can only speak Triqui and Spanish, but your client needs someone who can interpret from Triqui to English. In that case, you would need a different interpreter who can interpret from Spanish to English. Thus, the interpretation flow goes like this: Triqui -> Spanish -> English and then goes back like this: English -> Spanish -> Triqui. Relay will take a longer time, but the time is worth it because that can help interpreters perform even more accurately and completely.

There are the two common scenarios where you might need to use a relay team of interpreters. We hope this post will help you understand what language relay situations might be and how to deal with them.

One misconception people have when it comes to translation is that the process ends at translation. After the translator finishes the translation, they just submit it and that’s it. Of course, anyone acquainted with the translation industry would know that this rarely ever happens.

It’s always about team work. At Monterey Language Services, we are always looking for the right fit for a translation team which always includes a reviewer. Translation can become a long and difficult process if we don’t choose a right team, but then with the right insights and strategies, it becomes easier to control quality and get the desired results.

Lack of the natural flow probably is the most common scenario to be improved. Other than that, many things could be missed in a translation as well, whether it’s due to careless error or a difficulty of tracking everything that the client wants. This is why we need to start with the right foot by choosing a right team to work with for a specific project , and so we can ensure that the translation is accurate, complete, and easy to read.

Then, how do you know what kind of a team would be the best to use? It’s the same for translators and reviewers, you have to choose one that is the best fit for you and the project at hand. This means that even if you are used to using a certain team, you cannot always use them for every project that you have. The selection usually is based on subject specialization. Someone who writes well and is familiar with how subject terminology is used in their daily business. For instance, someone who has experience with the medical field, ideally familiar with whatever is being mentioned in the document. If a translator or a reviewer is unfamiliar with the subject, they may not catch certain errors or they may misunderstand the real meaning or commonly used terminology in that field.

Additionally, you need a team who are familiar with cultural conventions. For example, in Japanese, there are different ways of writing depending on the audience that the document is written for. If someone is not familiar with the different nuances of the language, they might flag certain phrasing or pronoun usage as errors, even though they are correct in the context of the document. This is why depending on the content, it is important to hire translators and reviewers with a certain amount of experience.

One other thing that you might want to be careful of is more in regards to your company itself. The team should be made aware of what is expected of them and what they expect the finished translation to look like and represent. This means everything should be kept handy and shared, including style guides, terminology lists, stop-word lists or any other kind of documents that they want the translation to adhere to. This will help everyone be aware of what they should be looking for when they are translating as well as reviewing.

Translation can be a trick business and there are a lot of different things that need to be kept in mind while working. For example, in technical translation, you want to avoid flowery language and instead make sure that you are translating the concepts written in a straightforward way with little to no room for interpretation. With literature, you are allowed more leeway with how you translate things since you are trying to match style and ideas rather than the words.

Things can differ slightly depending on what language you are working with, but it’s always important to remember your audience and the area that you are translating. This post will cover some basic things that you will want to keep in mind while translating from English to Japanese.

1. Honorifics. Depending on what you are translating, you will have to think about how you will write names. Japanese is a language that places much importance on politeness and hierarchy, so when translating from English to Japanese, it is important to make sure that you are able to incorporate honorifics into your translation if necessary. For example, while in English, there is only really one way to say “Your Company,” there are several ways to say it in Japanese, but if you are talking to a valued customer, you wouldn’t just say “Your Company.” You would say something that would be equivalent to saying “Your esteemed company” in English. It is important to do this to not only show respect, but also allow others to know the status of the relationship, that is, the hierarchy of the relationship.
2. Kanji versus Hiragana/Katakana. For those of you that do not know, the Japanese writing system has three ways to write out their words. Kanji are Chinese characters while Hiragana and Katakana are more similar to the English alphabet in that each individual character can be used to spell out words. The difference between Hiragana and Katakana though is how they are typically used. Katakana is often seen in contexts where foreign words are being spelled out while Hiragana is typically more for Japanese words. Together all three of these make up the Japanese writing system.

However, when translating, it isn’t always clear when you should use either. You can use hiragana or katakana instead of Kanji and vice versa. Then there are situations where there might be a word in English that most Japanese speakers know, thus it doesn’t need to be translated into Japanese, and can just be phonetically written out in Japanese. For these distinctions, it is probably best to check with the client if you are not sure about which they might prefer, but typically you can just check online to see which version of the word is used more in the context of the original document.

3. Subject. In Japanese, it is normal for names or subjects to be dropped from sentences, so it can become a little difficult sometimes to determine with absolute certainty who or what is being talked about in certain sentences. For example, consider the following: “Sarah is out walking her dog. She will be back later.” If you were translating this into Japanese, you might use Sarah, but other than that, you would exclude “her” and “she.” You might even leave out “Sarah” depending on what the previous sentence was. Knowing when to drop the subject is an important skill to have and is easier for those who are native Japanese speakers than it is for English natives who learned Japanese.

There are many more important things to be careful of when translating English to Japanese, but this is just a short, and brief introduction into translating English to Japanese. I hope if you are starting out as an English to Japanese translator that you will find this short post helpful.

Many people confuse localization with internationalization or just think internationalization is a part of localization. However, while they might seem similar, internationalization and localization are overall two different things altogether. Knowing the difference between the two and how to identify each one will be something that will help you set yourself apart from the crowd.

First, let us define what localization is. Broadly, localization is taking one material and transforming it into something that is understandable and relatable in a different culture or region. This means that localization is all about adaptation. When localizing something, you will be looking out for concepts, symbols, and words that would not fit into the target culture or region. This means adapting the original product into something that looks as if it was not created in a different country entirely.

For example, this can be something as simple as general design. When looking at an ad or commercial, for it to be successfully localized, you will have to make sure that the info displayed (i.e. numbers, date, time, etc.) are all changed into the appropriate format. If you kept the dollar sign when changing an advertisement for your product for an audience that does not use USD, they would be confused about how much the product actually costs and if it is even sold in the country that they’re in.

Internationalization is different than localization in that it focuses more on trying to universalize settings. Internationalization can be thought of as a typically more “under the hood” kind of process, where you will focus more on the coding side of things. This means focusing on hard-coded strings, concatenation, and finding out what is supported in Non-English input and output. If this is not taken into account, anything that is displayed is at risk to not display correctly. Internationalization is therefore more of a system focused on making sure that the software itself has no problem being used in different languages and thus focuses a lot less on linguistic errors like localization is.

There are more subtle nuances between internationalization, but it will be easy to remember the overarching difference between the two if you just remember that localization focuses more on the linguistic aspects of things while internationalization focuses more on the software that the localization will use to display or function.

If you are thinking about expanding your business to a different region, most likely it will take a lot of work, and it isn’t always as easy as just translating your content to the target region’s language. There are many more steps that go into this before one can successfully gain a foothold in the new region, and one of the major things is to make sure you have a good grasp on is localization. While still a relatively new field, localization helps to ensure that when you expand to a new market, your product, marketing, social media, etc. have nothing that would negatively impact your brand’s image.

So what do you need to know about localization? Here are some of the highlights of what you need to be aware of when you begin localization. This will mainly focus on both the language aspect of the localization process as well as the marketing strategy of localization.

The first thing is that you know who you are marketing to. Not every product perfectly appeals to everyone in the same way. Some people will be much more interested in your product and some will not. You have to thus really know who you want to focus on. The language that you use to market your product to your potential customers is also very important, and you should thus make sure that any translation that is produced is reviewed by someone who is either a native of the country, or native currently living in the country. This will ensure that they are caught up with all current trends and know what can and cannot be included to avoid any unnaturalness or offensive language.

On the topic of using a native who is currently living in the target country, it is also important to note that they will be able to help to discern any cultural taboos such as design choices (i.e. colors, placement of letters, layout of advertisements, etc).  When they are reviewing the translation, they not only provide a fresh set of eyes with which to see the translation work, but they are basically acting as if they were a consumer seeing your product for the first time in the region you are trying to expand into. This will help to provide invaluable insight into what can be improved or fixed upon and help to develop strategies for the future.

Another thing that is important to take note of is making sure that the native speaker you ultimately choose is well vetted. Some companies might outsource this to other companies that have reviewers as to avoid some of the cost of vetting and hiring, but it is important to ultimately make sure that the reviewer who is chosen is not only proficient in the language that they speak, but also that they are able to understand the goal of your company as well as its culture so that it can properly be conveyed to the new market.

These are just a few of the things to know when starting localization of a product for a new region. Even for regions with similar cultures to your own, it is important to make sure that you have a native review whatever you have before releasing it. Doing so will save you a headache and possibly a fortune in potential legal fees or redesign fees.

During the translation process there are a lot of moving parts that are necessary to ensure that a quality translation is produced. One of the main ones is, of course, the translator. Without a translator, there would be no translation to work with. However, the process does not stop there. There are various quality checks that need to occur to make sure that the deliverable is a representation of the best possible quality that can be produced.

To do this, reviewers are used. Reviewers can come in all shapes and sizes depending on the type of project or its size, but typically there is at least one reviewer involved in the translation process. Sending out a translation with a review is a sure way to ensure that the deliverables are in good order and shape. A reviewer is equally if not more important than a translator because they act as the final defense line against quality errors and even more importantly, they increase quality in discourse and presentation. There are reactive and proactive approaches to a translation process.

A reactive approach simply means that when the reviewer finds an error, they will correct it and submit it. Then the vendor (a translation company) might send it back to the translator to make sure that what the reviewer corrected was not a problem. Then if the translator finds an error in the review, they will correct it, which will prompt the vendor to send it back to the reviewer. This process could potentially go on for a long time if there are no measures in place for a more proactive approach.

This is why a more proactive approach is encouraged where there are set processes in place. Expectations are laid out beforehand, and everyone involved receives metrics to help translation and reviewing become more efficient. It also will help to eliminate any potential back and forth that might occur between different people involved. Of course though, the training involved is necessary to make sure that everyone is caught up and on the same page regarding their expectations.  A proactive approach in a translation process keeps projects in control. It’s especially valuable for large projects that involved many resources. A proactive process saves costs and headaches down the road.

Finally, client reviews, if those occurred, are looped back to the reactive and proactive approaches mentioned above. Usually a successful project is the end result of dedications from both the client side and the translation company side. Working closely together with the client is the most enjoyable part for us and that guarantees quality translations every time!

When it comes to translation and interpretation, one of the many unsaid expectations for people is that whatever they say or write will be perfectly converted into a different language. Many people expect a one to one conversion of language because they assume that all languages are fundamentally the same. However, that is a major misconception that is hardly corrected.

For example, even within English, there are regional differences that can sometimes prevent fellow English speakers from having the same understanding of even simple conversations. Winter can get cold, and when that happens, people in the United States (US) might want to buy a sweater. However, in the United Kingdom (UK), if you asked for a sweater, you might be met with some confusion. Sweater is not the common word that people in the UK would use. Instead, they would use the word “jumper.” Conversely, if you asked for a “jumper” in the US, you would be met with a lot of confusion because the word “jumper” is typically reserved for people who do such activities as jumping.

Moreover, word for word conversion is the number one killer in rendering translation and interpretation. Often times, target audiences have no idea of what a translation is trying to say is because of that. For example, we often have to adjust English to Chinese translations done by other people, and to make the focus of each point clear and to be sure it’s easy to read and understand. The issue is that the original translation was literally written in a way that followed English words and grammar too closely. Unfortunately, Chinese grammar is not the same as English grammar. Therefore, ideas/points were not communicated easily and clearly for Chinese readers.

Another tough aspect to deal with is related to cultures. Many translators or interpreters struggle to find a perfect fit to certain idioms or phrases that might be frequently used in one country, but not in another. For example, in Japan, every time they eat, they have a small ritual of expressing gratitude for the food both before and after eating the food. In most other cultures, there is no such ritual, so it is hard to perfectly translate it. In general, there are many phrases in Japanese to show respect that would not translate easily into other languages without the same kind of rituals. Instead, translators and interpreters will have to skirt around and find similar phrases or words that will be “good enough” to convey the meaning.

Culture is a big part of what makes languages end up having such a big gap in phrases and words, and because of that, a one to one translation is virtually impossible for languages. There will almost always be at least some tiny nuance that is lost in translation. Even so, translators and interpreters do their best to minimize these bumps in the road. Translators and interpreters ensure that even if nuances are lost, an understanding is still able to be passed on, which in our opinion is the essence of translation and interpretation.

One of the most common things that both translators and interpreters hear is that their jobs are going to become obsolete because of machine translation. Because engines like Google Translate exist, there are many who are unfamiliar with the interpretation/translation field that are confident that though machine translation might not be perfect, it is on track to replace human translators and interpreters in the near future.

This opinion has only been further enforced in the light of the current pandemic. With social distancing being encouraged, many businesses and individuals are moving away from face-to-face business and moving to the safety of digital solutions. With many people preferring in-person interpretation, and less interpreters willing to ignore safety conventions to fulfill these requests, there are some who would prefer to try machine translation.

In this day and age, there are sophisticated machine translation engines that can even almost do simultaneous interpretation. If the subject is within a specific, technical subject, the accuracy of the outputted translation goes up as well. Many would point to this as being the time for machine translation to rise in popularity and use.

Even so, businesses still tend to prefer using interpreters when they can. There is, and will most likely never be a true replacement to a human interpreter. In fact, interpreters were already still able to work remotely even before the pandemic. With Zoom and over-the-phone interpretation, interpreters are still able to work without too much of a change to the experience.

Of course, there are still some difficulties and annoyances with remote interpretation, but it is still the most reliable and preferred method for interpretation. The same applies for translation. Most translation has been done remotely, and is still preferred over machine translation for the same reason businesses prefer human interpreters. Though machine translation is a powerful tool, it is still not reliable or trusted enough to fully replace the human touch. During this pandemic, the work of translators and interpreters may be affected, but it is not because of a rise in machine translation.

It is no secret at this point that the COVID-19 situation is still just as much of a threat as it was when the entire pandemic began. With the situation still not being contained whatsoever, what started as a pandemic that some though would optimistically end in months, has stretched out much longer, and is expected to not see any real improvement until maybe even the end of 2021. In the midst of this pandemic, everyone is finding themselves affected in different ways. Many are seeing a drop in livelihood and changes to their lifestyles. Though humanity as a whole are in an understatedly difficult position, many are finding ways to make this pandemic not completely kill their businesses.

When the pandemic first began, it was uncertain whether or not it would even be possible to procure toilet paper, or if you could even get into a line for a supermarket without having to wait multiple hours. But over time, health experts have been able to recommend safe practices that ensure the safety and prevent the spread of COVID-19. In the present, while there are still many things that we are not able to do, there are many more things that we can do now that make it possible to feel as if we are living as we used to.

Of course, people in general aren’t the only ones who had to find a way to adapt in order to have a taste of normalcy. Businesses had to find a way to continue their work without any detriment to their employees’ health or their profits. For restaurants, their answer was delivery. For schools, remote teaching has become a very viable option. And for business giants such as Google and Apple, they are allowing their employees to work at home until at least July 2021.

With the realization that the COVID-19 situation is not getting any better, companies now have to face with the unfortunate reality that there will not be an answer to this pandemic until next year. With that in mind, businesses are trying to get ahead of the curve, and allow for remote work for their employees to ensure that they are safe, and do not have to choose between their job and their safety. It is highly likely that more businesses will begin to adapt the same measures as the year goes on as long as they are equipped to.

Overall, with the end of COVID-19 nowhere in sight, businesses have to make the call that will bring their employees the most safety while also ensuring that they can function without there being too much impact to their day-to-day operations. Nobody knows when the pandemic will end, but it is certain that proper precautions need to be taken sooner than later if businesses want to survive this pandemic.

The coronavirus pandemic is changing many aspects of our lives: how we work, how we socialize, how we shop. It is even affecting the language that we use and how we communicate. We have all had to learn new terminology to discuss the virus, and this terminology has become commonplace. We have also created new words to express coronavirus-related ideas, or repurposed old words to make them relevant to the current situation. It is quite interesting to see the progression of language in this way.

Five or six months ago, the phrase “social distancing” was barely known, and was just starting to be introduced. Every time a news anchor mentioned it, they had to explain its meaning, maybe even show a little diagram to illustrate the concept. Now, unless you’ve been living under a rock, you hear anyone and everyone talking about “social distancing” several times a day. The same is true for other COVID-19 related terminology, including phrases like “flatten the curve.”

People are endlessly creative, even during pandemics. This is seen in the fact that people across the world are coming up with new words to express new concepts that have emerged due to coronavirus. One of the most popular examples of this in English is the word “covidiot” (“covid” + “idiot”) which describes people who willingly don’t follow the guidelines around COVID-19 to protect themselves and others. This is a fun list that gives some more examples of new and repurposed words in many different languages.

The COVID-19 guidelines that we are following might also change how we actually speak. We are wearing masks when we go outside and staying at least six feet away from people we encounter. Both of these practices protect our health, but also make it much more difficult to talk and hear each other. Sometimes we end up almost yelling just to have a brief conversation. For some of us, the difficulties of having an in-person communication make us weigh our words more carefully and focus on communicating as efficiently as possible- we don’t want to spend energy yelling about things that don’t matter!

As always, it is important to consider people who communicate differently than us, and do what we can to help them. One group of people facing particularly difficult communication challenges now is the deaf and hard-of-hearing community. Many of them rely on lip reading and seeing facial expressions to understand others, and with masks, this is now impossible. People have designed and started creating masks with clear plastic windows in them to allow for lip reading; there are several places now to purchase such masks online, or you can make your own by following a guide like this.

As professionals in the language industry, we at Monterey Language Services are fascinated by how this pandemic is changing our language and communication styles. We like to stay on top of these changes so that we can continue communicating as effectively as possible!