The whole knotty problem of deciding who is a native speaker (Muttersprachler) of the target language, and whether a translator can have two native languages and how to tell, is neatly sliced through in an advertisement for a patent translator to translate mainly into English in the Süddeutsche Zeitung:

bq. The translation department in our Munich office is seeking a qualified TRANSLATOR with English to mother tongue standard to start as soon as possible. …

bq. We are looking for a translator with a careful and conscientious working manner who enjoys a challenge.

bq. … we are offering you an attractive and responsible position as part of an international team.

I wonder how you test ‘mother tongue standard’.

(found on the pt group at Yahoo, thanks to Silke)

But in the USA, the ironworkers have taken over the topping-out ceremony, wood or no wood.

A page at Columbia University (taken from The Ironworker) gives the history of the topping-out ceremony:

bq. At one time, Europe was covered with a vast forest. Those who inhabited the forest were dependent on trees for their survival. …

bq. Scandinavian mythology suggests that humans originated from trees and our souls returned to the trees after death, giving each tree a spirit of its own.

bq. Humans began constructing their shelter with wood. Before cutting a tree, they would formally address the forest, reminding it of the consideration they had always shown toward the trees and asking the forest to grant use of a tree for construction of their home. When the house was complete, the topmost leafy branch of the tree used would be set atop the roof so that the tree spirit would not be rendered homeless. The gesture was supposed to convince the tree spirit of the sincere appreciation of those building the home. …

bq. The custom of placing a tree on a completed structure came with immigrants to the United States and became an integral part of American culture in barnraisings and housewarmings.

This takes me back to learning Russian at Berlin University with Siegfried Tornow, who must have done linguistics and told stories about bears and trees in Indo-European times. (This was in 1967-68 – I wonder how old he is now?)

Last week I was invited to the topping-out ceremony (Richtfest) of the multi-storey car park they’ve been building opposite my office since January.

But then we were told it wasn’t a real Richtfest. As some translators know (and others don’t), there is a sequence of building trades (Gewerke) in a building project.

For instance, the sequence might be (in part): piling, drainage and sewage, masonry, roofing, plastering, rainwater plumbing. gast and water mains, painting and decoration.
Trades in English here, in German here.

For a Richtfest to take place, the carpenters have to come in and make a timbered roof. There are no wooden beams in the car park, so no tree on top.

The Deutsches Rechtswörterbuch defines Gewerk as Zunft (guild).

This picture does not show the beer, which was in large quantities elsewhere. And I didn’t stay for the food, as I was working.
The speaker is Thomas Jung, the Oberbürgermeister of Fürth, whom some would apparently translate as Lord Mayor (there was a recent discussion on pt of how to translate Oberbürgermeisterin without making her sound like a mayor’s wife). Someone said Senior Mayor for Oberbürgermeister (there is a Bürgermeister too).

On July 21st I had an entry on a new language invented in Regensburg. I have now received an email from one Robert Maier, who apparently knows something about this but mysteriously describes himself as ‘happily far from Regensburg’. I reproduce it here and also in the comments below the earlier entry, which I have temporarily re-opened. I don’t imagine the original commenters will all see it, either way:

a few comments/flames?! from someone who – for his own taste – knows way too much about the thing…

New language not a COD… well it used to be; aber auch dort hatte man wohl so eine Art Rechtschreibreform. (Although COD was quite o.k. IMHO, theres sth very fishy about all this new language/un-language business…)

Tomas points to the issue of empiricity & testing, and quite rightly so… but his linguistics prof might be made aware of the fact daß seine (und mithin auch meine) Zunft ganz fröhlich an der ganzen internationalen Planspracherei mitgebastelt hat. Otto Jespersen gab der Welt Novial – http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Novial – , André Martinet war in den Vorstufen von Interlingua – http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interlingua_%28Plansprache%29 – beteiligt, und selbst der Name de Saussure taucht in den Annalen der Interlinguistik auf – allerdings nicht Ferdinand, sondern sein Bruder René; der dafür aber recht umtriebig auf der Esperanto-Seite der Dinge: http://www.fenetreeuropetv.com/forum/read.php?f=1&i=13456&t=10984

Das bei persistent illusions erwähnte Sommerloch… genau, das war auch mein erster Gedanke. Das passt auch, da gehört das auch hin – just like the Loch Ness Monster, Bigfoot and the Yeti… :)
(“Persistent Illusions”, actually – true true true… seems like the world of science has been hunting for THE international language ever since the early 17th century… and before that for the philosopher’s stone. Genau dasselbe, genau den gleichen Realitätsgehalt…)

Incidentally, you mention the UFO content of the institute’s name… actually, the acronym is meant to indicate the equivalent of R&D – or rather D&R: Entwicklung Und FOrschung… die Überlegung, ob das denn die richtige Reihenfolge ist, überlass ich jetzt aber dir… (but sure *does* remind of one song of Schwaben’s finest (of 1979 vintage), “Schwoißfuaß”: “Guck, guck, i han E UFO gsäa…”)

Und was Qoh angeht: Klingonisch, warum nicht? Once the fundamental auxlangers’ (auxiliary language proponents) postulate of “we need an artificial language to ease communication between people of differnt languages” is accepted… there is nothing, absolutely NOTHING, that would make one language preferable over any other (which is my huge heresy against them all, right).
[Und von daher nehmen diese Leute in Regensburg auch ihren Stolz von wegen, no grammar. Vielberth apparently assumes that it is grammar which causes the worst difficulties when learning a language – und darauf fußt das ganze Ding. Daß das Vokabular notwendig anschwillt, wenn man (wie dort betrieben) die ganze Morphologie lexikalisiert… tja! Oder? “The real intrinsic difficulty of learning a foreign language lies in learning to master its vocabulary.” Henry Sweet, 1899 – not a word about grammar…]

Anyway, das brannte mir so am Freitagabend grad mal noch so unter den Nägeln.
Happily far from Regensburg,
viele Grüße –
Robert

Ist es wirklich sinnvoll für einen Übersetzer, lustige Fehlübersetzungen auf der Homepage zu veröffentlichen? U. a. hat es die Wirkung, dass der Leser Übersetzung mit Fehlern assoziiert. Oft liest man immer wieder dieselben Beispiele, die manchmal erfunden sind.

Dann gibt es Geschichten über Fehler in der Werbung, z.B. soll es einen Chevy Nova gegeben haben, aber no va bedeutet auf Spanisch “fährt nicht”. Die Geschichte stimmt aber nicht.

Some translators like to post a list of amusing bad translations on their websites. Sometimes these are lists that are passed round in email and on the Internet and aren’t even genuine. Then you show that you did not have the energy to make your own collection, and you also encourage the reader to associate translation with errors.

There was an apocryphal story, a kind of urban legend, that a car called Chevy Nova had its name changed for Spanish-speaking countries because no va means ‘it doesn’t work’.

However, other stories are true. There was a full-page Air France ad in a British paper a few years ago with the slogan ‘Air France wants you to fly united’. I am ashamed to say I haven’t got the details, but I remember a number of people mentioning it at the time. And Des reports in a Smörgåspost (first item) of a Honda near-miss in Scandinavia in 2001, with what later became the Honda Jazz:

bq. Honda was all set to lauch a marque of car with the jolly name of “Fitta” globally, until they were alerted that “global” includes Scandiwegia, and that that name might have certain issues in the ‘Wegian market: “fitta”, in Swedish, corresponds very exactly to the literal (anatomical) meaning of the Engleesh ‘c’-word (albeit without the connotational baggage – ‘Wegian swearing is organised otherwisely).

This could at least be traceable.

Some stories are collected here. A level higher is a linguistic fun page with good links. Looking at the top page, I wonder if deep linking wasn’t enough.

Maurice Druon said in Paris that French should be the language of the EU justice system, because it ‘reduced the risks of differing interpretations to a minimum’.
The initiative is apparently also supported by other dignitaries of various nationalities. A French state prosecutor said the move was meant to counter juridical decadence (i.e. failure to speak French?).

This inspired Trevor to some variations on the theme.