| The comfort zone is another issue... | Aug 19, 2007 |
One of my tenets is that, to do a good translation, the translator must be able to coherently write his/her own ideas (no matter how obsolete... or not) in both the destination and source languages.
To illustrate, I'm definitely not an interpreter. The data cache in my brain is too small for that. Maybe it's a 'manufacturing' flaw, but this same feature enables me to translate video for dubbing with impressively perfect metrics. I only do interpreting (consecutive! simultaneo... See more One of my tenets is that, to do a good translation, the translator must be able to coherently write his/her own ideas (no matter how obsolete... or not) in both the destination and source languages.
To illustrate, I'm definitely not an interpreter. The data cache in my brain is too small for that. Maybe it's a 'manufacturing' flaw, but this same feature enables me to translate video for dubbing with impressively perfect metrics. I only do interpreting (consecutive! simultaneous is impossible with this buffer) when I'm sufficiently at home with the subject to properly finish the presentation on my own, in case the speaker is abducted or drops dead.
Like any translator, I often step out of my comfort zone, but never go too far. Sometimes a client tries to hijack me into some more distant corners of human knowledge, and then I grip tightly to my comfort (or knowledge, if you wish) zone.
I have a thing with medicine, biology, and associated matters: I know nothing about it. I often see that some drugs quote, may have extrapyramidal effects, unquote. For me, this means that if a patient takes them in Egypt, s/he may actually be able to see mummies walking out from the pyramids to get some fresh air.
One client, who loves my metrics in translating for video dubbing, insisted in having me translating medical films. After a couple of videos explaining in detail some (gruesome!) surgical procedures, I came to the firm conclusion that I couldn't tell head from toes in them, so it would be pointless for me to translate them. Hence I put an end to it. No matter how much skilled proofing they put on it afterwards, my translation is useless, as I have no clue myself on what I wrote. The client was sad, but I referred them to a specialized translator, having degrees in both medicine and languages.
It always makes me wonder why some clients want to force certain specialized jobs upon translators who overtly state they don't have the required skills for them. Would they likewise insist in having, say, a pharmacist to fix their computer? ▲ Collapse
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