Idioms

Idioms/proverbs/clichés can be one of the hardest bits of a language to learn, and they can also be really challenging to translate.

If a Swedish text says, “Don’t sell the bearskin before you’ve shot the bear,” should the translator keep that phrase as is (to retain the Swedishness of the text) or replace it with, say, “Don’t sell your chickens before they’ve hatched” (to make the text fit the English language better)? Or is there another, better solution (a footnote, for instance)? Interestingly, when I go to schools to talk to young people about translation, they are always evenly divided on this topic, with half the people wanting to keep the Swedish phrase and half wanting to replace it with an English equivalent.

When someone recently sent me a link with a list of Swedish idioms, I found it very interesting.

I then found a bunch of similar sites for English-language idioms, and I quite liked this one.

Perhaps you can add additional links for other languages in the comments.

Illustrated “Untranslatable” Words

I really liked these pictures of untranslatable words, but I do have to question the premise: if the words/concepts aren’t translatable, how can they be turned into illustrations? Drawing is a form of translation too, right?

Round-Up of Articles

It’s time for another round-up of interesting articles and other links.

I love Oliver Burkeman’s weekly column in the Guardian (and his two books based on the column). A recent column was on writing. He notes: “It’s the writer and reader, side by side, scanning the landscape. The reader wants to see; your job is to do the pointing.”

The New Yorker questions whether literature should be useful.

The BBC notes that young people are lacking language skills. “The UK’s education system is failing to produce enough people with foreign-language skills to meet a growing need from business, the CBI has said. Nearly two-thirds of about 300 UK firms surveyed by the business lobby group said they preferred staff with these skills. French, German and Spanish were highly prized but Arabic and Mandarin were growing in importance, it said.”

Test your vocabulary knowledge.

Check out these fascinating graphics on language in the U.S.

And, finally, a piece on slang.

Crowd-sourcing Verb Meanings

The people at this project at MIT contacted me to tell me about it: basically, they are crowd-sourcing the meanings of verbs in order to get a deeper sense of what words mean than what dictionaries offer.

You can check it out here.

A Round-Up of Articles

My colleague Jo Drugan, who also teaches translation, sent me this fascinating story about historical vocabulary and anachronisms. For translators, finding language that suits the context can often be very challenging, and may require research.

This is another article sent by a colleague, this time Kate Griffin, who also works for the British Centre for Literary Translation. Happily, this article discusses how translation is becoming more visible in the US in academia.

Research often suggests that knowing multiple languages is good for us, but this article states that speed-learning a language is good.

If you can read Swedish, this piece claims that “poets are dangerous as translators”.

And sticking with Scandinavia, if you a want a laugh, watch this video to learn some Danish.

Memidex

I recently learned about Memidex, which calls itself “the Internet's first definition, audio, and etymology index of its kind”. What do you think?

Fun Foreign Vocabulary Words

I recently mentioned The Wonder of Whiffling website and now want to also mention its sister site, The Meaning of Tingo. I love books and websites on unusual words.