The translation industry scored a very nice mention on All Things Considered tonight, thanks to the sharp ears of Judy Jenner, who is both a translator and interpreter (this becomes important to the story!). Although I love (OK…worship) nearly all things NPR, their reporters have the somewhat aggravating habit of consistently using the expression, “speaking through a translator.” And as those of us in the industry know, part of what we translators love about our jobs is that we don’t have to talk while we’re working, and we leave the speaking to interpreters.
An All Things Considered segment that aired yesterday featured NPR’s national political correspondent Mara Liasson using the aforementioned “speaking through a translator” in reference to visiting Chinese leader Hu Jintao. Our ever-vigilant colleague Judy had had enough, and fired off an e-mail to NPR, pointing out that translators write and interpreters speak, and noting that she, as both a translator and an interpreter, surely knows the difference between the two. This afternoon my phone rang and it was NPR (not an everyday occasion here in my world headquarters!), looking for a quote on the topic and noting that especially because NPR CEO Vivian Schiller is a former Russian interpreter, they really wanted to get this right. It was exciting to be interviewed and I think it’s a good indication for the industry in general…at least the major media outlets want to keep their translators and interpreters straight! Huge thanks to Judy for alerting NPR to this issue in the first place, and to NPR for following up!
Good job, Judy & Corinne. I sometimes think that translators and interpreters get *too* hung up and scrappy on this distinction, when there are so many more things that clients also need to know. But your approach hits it just right; pleasant, informed, helpful, sense of humor. Way to go!
A great day for the profession indeed! Go translators and interpreters. 🙂
It is definitely about time that people start getting it right! Thanks Judy and Corinne!
Thanks for your nice comments! Chris, I agree, the “speaking through an interpreter” locution isn’t the end of the world, and I did reassure the NPR reporter that people know what they mean. However I do think that anything that gets us on the larger media radar screen is a good thing. And I really tried to absorb the Chris Durban lessons: keep it short, upbeat, don’t harass and harangue!
And now when I find myself faced with explaining this *again*, I’ll just point them to this post. Great work by you and Judy!
Thank you, Corinne and Judy, for correcting this common mistake. Although mixing these two professions up is not the end of the world, I think it is vital that above all translators and interpreters are educated on this topic. Sadly, many working in this profession aren’t aware of the difference and use the two terms interchangeably.
C: This is fantastic! How did they find you (in order to call you and get a quote)??
Great work!
Beth
NPR actually found me because of the ATA Public Relations committee (I’m the chair but I never really do media appearances…this time the media spokesman was in a meeting, which I cautioned him not to do again!). They were really pleasant to deal with and even let me re-record the clip after I muffed it the first time; so much less stressful than the time I was on the news live for ATA!
In some or probably most languages, “translate” is a synonym for “interpret”, in some it is not. Most languages simply make the distinction only when the distinction is clearly relevant and the speaker is aware of it, for example “uebersetzen” can mean both translate and interpret in German although they do have the word “dolmetschen” in German, and the same is true about “prelozit” and “tlumocit” in Czech.
As far as I remember, Japanese people always make the distinction between “honyaku” which means translate, and “tsuyaku” which means interpret. It may have something to do with the way characters are associated with a certain meaning in Japanese so that a more distinct connection is created in the mind of the speaker. No such fixed connection has been created for the words “Uebersetzen”, “traduire” or “translate” in the mind of the speakers of European language and we are not going to change it.
Lawyers who use interpreters for depositions should know the difference between “translate” and “interpret” and most do, but even so, often they don’t bother to make the distinction between the two words every time.
Translators are not going to change popular culture in a given country. And even if we did, it’s not exactly going to “translate” into higher rates for us, is it?
So why bother. This distinction between the meaning of “translate” and “interpret” makes for a hot topic among translators in this country and I don’t really understand why.