Süddeutsche Zeitung am 11. August:

bq. Erst nach und nach jedoch wird offenbar, wie sehr das Aus für den kleinen Münchner Spezialstudiengang das Ausbildungs-Modell für Übersetzer und Dolmetscher in ganz Bayern in eine Schieflage bringt. Händeringend suchen Berufsstand und Kultusbeamte nun nach einer Lösung.

bq. Dass die Misere entstehen konnte, hat seinen ursprünglichen Grund nicht in der Eilentscheidung der FH, sondern liegt an einer bayerischen Besonderheit. Überall sonst in Deutschland ist die Ausbildung von Übersetzern und Dolmetschern ein akademisches Studium, das bundesweit acht Universitäten und fünf Fachhochschulen anbieten. In Bayern dagegen wird sie der beruflichen Bildung zugeschlagen und ist an Fachakademien angesiedelt. Fünf gibt es in Bayern, zwei davon in München. Die dreijährige Ausbildung endet mit einer staatlichen Prüfung, die jährlich mehrere Hundert ablegen. Wer wollte, konnte bislang an der FH noch ein viersemestriges Studium draufsatteln, um das Diplom zu machen.

I mentioned in an earlier entry that the Munich Fachhochschule translation course is closing.

Richard Schneider’s Nachrichtenportal at the Übersetzer-Portal links to an article in the Süddeutsche Zeitung that appeared on August 11th on the topic.

The curious thing about this article is that it laments the loss of something that never really got off the ground. Richard Schneider is also of the opinion that Bavaria needs a university translation course. Germany, says the article, has eight universities and 5 Fachhochschulen offering an academic course. Bavaria has five Fachakademien offering a vocational course.

The article points out that the current Bavarian Fachakademie qualification is recognized by some British universities, so students can get a British MA. That’s one of the anomalies now. Qualifications are very important in Germany. And lack of them may have a long-term effect on your salary. You can get an MA in Germany and go grey achieving it. You can get one in Britain in a year, if you can pay the fees and do the work.

Antje Kopp, Vice-President of the BDÜ, forecasts that court interpreters will soon need an academic qualification (she refers to a Green Paper of the EU commission on the harmonization of criminal procedure). In which languages, I wonder?

Language hat links to a superb list of names of European cities in several languages at wordiq.com, via a comment from vicente at Pepys’ Diary.

Here’s Athens:

bq. Afiny (Russian, Ukrainian), Ateena (Finnish), Aten (Norwegian, Swedish), Atena (Croatian, Romanian), Atenas (Portuguese, Spanish), Atēnas (Latvian), Atene (Italian), Atenes (Catalan), Atény (Czech, Slovak), Ateny (Polish), Athen (Danish, German, Norwegian), Athén (Hungarian), Athene (Dutch), Athènes (French), Athény (alternative Czech name), Athína – Αθήνα (Greek), Atīnā (Arabic), Atina (Bulgarian, Serbian, Turkish)

Many names are like this, just spelling variations, although Turkish is often good for a surprise, and I didn’t know Istanbul was Miklagard in Old Norse.

I would have said Braunschweig, not Brunswick, in English, and Hannover (Hanover for the dynasty, though), and I would say Auschwitz is only used for the concentration camp, not the town.

LATER NOTE: There was a trackback to this entry by Wortfeld, from which I realized that the list of names is in Wikipedia, and may well have started there.

I hope the title is correct. I don’t understand that much Italian, although I can get through the Marriage of Figaro or La Traviata.

Via my referrers: Frenetica fannullona (who says there is a provincial saint of translators called Luciano Bianciardi, although I find him described only as a writer), and from her blogroll:

fogliedivite
cittadina del mondo
botteghe color cannella

and following those blogs’ blogrolls,
This land is my land, by Anna FDD – she writes in English
Verba manent /Zu

Sonja Tomašković’s Translator’s Blog links (on 11th August – not sure about a permalink) to the Bundesverwaltungsamt, which has PDF files on Bürgernahe Verwaltungssprache and Sprachliche Gleichbehandlung von Frauen und Männern.

Sonja points out that these are particularly useful for translators into German. I know a lot of translators, usually men strangely enough, start making defensive noises at the idea of non-sexist language, and that reference is not a barbed comment at any of the regular commenters here – but at all events I do find non-sexist and PC language sometimes required by clients.

Personally I like to increase my knowledge of bürgerferne Verwaltungssprache (I hate the word bürgernah).

BBC News reports that hundreds of unpublished poems by Philip Larkin have been found in Hull (via Cronaca).

Large parts of the German newspaper taz (tageszeitung – but it never capitalizes its own name) appear without capital letters for nouns today, for instance this:

bq. Elfriede Jelinek, schriftstellerin:
“ich habe das damals gemacht, um die hierarchie der wörter aufzuheben – diese idee, dass ein substantiv mehr wert sein soll als ein verb. das stand natürlich in der tradition der wiener gruppe, und die war wiederum vom dadaismus geprägt.

bq. ich würde es auch heute wieder tun, wenn ich es bei einem text für nötig halten würde.

bq. ich bin davon aber wieder abgekommen, weil ich der meinung bin, dass es nichts bringt und auch die lesbarkeit nicht erleichtert. ich halte deshalb auch nichts davon, es zur regel zu erheben.”

bq. H. C. Artmann, dichter:
“Große anfangsbuchstaben meinetwegen, aber sonst bin ich für kleinschreibung. Schon allein wegen der ästhetik muss das schriftbild aussehen wie eine gebetsschnur, wie ein rosenkranz mit aufstrebenden buchstaben und mit buchstaben nach unten.”

bq. Renée Zucker, schriftstellerin:
“kleinschreibung ist einfach und herrlich zeitsparend – (weil ich nur mit drei fingern tippe).”

bq. Jacob Grimm, verfasser des deutschen wörterbuches, 1854:
“den gleichverwerflichen misbrauch groszer buchstaben für das substantivum, der unserer pedantischen unart gipfel heißsen kann, habe ich [] abgeschüttelt.”

Ich war auf der Google-Suche nach “Unzugänglichkeiten”, um zu überlegen, ob ich “witterungsbedingte Unzugänglichkeiten” mit “weather-related Acts of God” übersetzen sollte. Ich glaube, manche Leute verwechseln Unzugänglichkeiten mit Unzulänglichkeiten, vielleicht ist auch dies witterungsbedingt.

Auf jeden Fall fand ich eine polnische Seite, die wohl aus dem Polnischen ins Deutsche maschinell übersetzt wurde. Es erinnert stark an die falsch buchstabierte Spam-E-Mails, die zur Zeit so häufig sind.

Auf jeden Fall sollte es eine Lehre denen sein, die sich entscheiden, MÜ-Seiten für ihre wichtigen Inhalte zu benutzen:

bq. Herzlich Willkommen Gast! Möchten Sie sich anmelden? Oder wollen Sie ein Kundenkonto eröffnen?
Der wird nur Kräuterheringe Augenblicke einnehmen und wird auf das Meiden viel plötzlicher Abbrechen erlauben.
Der unversehrt volle Tag-Verkäufer : +43 699 12774145
Der Mangel an gesucht durch Dich des Elementes bezeichnet nicht ihn Unzugänglichkeiten ! Wir warten auf Fragen Angebote per e-mail Adresse.
Wir wünschen günstiger Einkäufe !

Today’s guest blogger, unknown to himself, is Derek Thornton, technical translator, erstwhile bilingual blogger. I don’t know why his website describes itself as außer Betrieb, as the links seem to work. But I think part of the structure is down.

Derek reports (I pinched this from CompuServe, Foreign Languages Forum):

The Daily Reflector, Greenville, North Carolina, reports today some preliminary results of a $250,000 federally-funded study to determine whether farm workers are more uncomfortable picking cucumbers on a hot day than on a cold day.

A Spanish translator played a significant part in the study, testing cognitive impairment by getting migrant Mexican farm workers to count numbers forwards and backwards from 5 am to 5 pm.

I am attempting to obtain funding for a follow-up study to determine whether listening to Spanish numbers being translated backwards in a hot cucumber field is more uncomfortable at 5 am or 5 pm for independent freelance translators or for migrant translation agency serfs.

The design of my study takes account of my observation that translating efficiency is also affected by ambient temperature and that the symptoms of deteriorating translation skills (impaired ability to recite Spanish numbers backwards, headaches, sore throats, faintness and heavy perspiration) are shared equally with exploited migrant cucumber pickers, especially after starting work at 5 am and translating right through to 5 pm.

Object of my study is to help reduce the mortality amongst Spanish translators from heat stroke and unprovoked attacks with cucumber hoes.

bq. ECU-based researchers are collecting the final data in a four-year heat stress study that explores how temperature affects farm workers. The study has gathered information ranging from the impact of buildings near the field to the type of crops workers are harvesting.
….
Funded by the U.S. Department of Agriculture and the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health, the study cost nearly $250,000 for the four-year period.
….
After analyzing the data, which they expect to finish collecting in September, the scientists and educators hope to release findings that will help farms improve the health, safety and productivity of the laborers who work their land.
….
Because deterioration of cognitive skills is a symptom of heat stroke, Amanda Fields, the 23-year-old Spanish translator working with the study, tests workers’ memories.

Language hat found the word adminicle recently (quoting Cassell Concise Dictionary):

bq. 1 an aid, support. 2 (Sc. Law) corroborative evidence, esp. of the contents of a missing document.
I particularly like the OED’s last citation:
1872 Daily News 2 Oct. 5 Floriculture and other adminicles of civilisation.

I seem to have lost one of my Scot law glossaries,but the Butterworths one has it (here’s the Lockerbie trial wordlist, which mentions both glossaries at the top – the Lockerbie trial was held in the Netherlands, part of which was declared Scottish soil for the duration, although they got by without the word adminicle):

‘adminicle – an item of helpful evidence’

That adds a lot, doesn’t it?

LATER NOTE: But I lie – of course the word was used in the Lockerbie trial (as a Google search on adminicles showed):

bq. 16 The conclusion regarding the presence of this
17 clothing within the suitcase containing the bomb then
18 becomes a fixed point around which all other adminicles
19 can be tested and examined.
20 And once it’s understood that the plot was of
21 Libyan origin, using the resources of the Libyan
22 Security Service, the conclusion relating to the bag
23 from KM 180 can be further fortified by other
24 adminicles of evidence.

However, I do think Shanghai United Food Additives Co. gets it wrong:

bq. So we can satisfy factories’ needs for kinds or quantity of food additives and special food adminicles and we can give clients much help on delivery, QC, payment and service.

It would also appear to be a Catalan word (like ‘Woddy Allen’).

Germans are always keen to have a balcony, especially in this weather. (Indeed, the popular press often says they are saving money by spending their holidays in Balkonien).