Corinne McKay has a blog entry summarizing how to translate official documents.
Just to consider one point: she, and one of her commenters, use graphics of the original logos in the translation.
Use a screenshot or graphics program to enhance your translations. Many official documents include stamps, university logos, seals, etc. If you use a screenshot or image manipulation program, you can copy these over onto your translation for a truly official-looking translation.
To my mind that’s not on: a translation should be purely text. On the few occasions I have OCR’d the original certificate, I have always deleted the logos. My reasoning was that a copy of a logo is not a translation. But in addition, am I authorized to use the image of a university seal or some such? And in addition, I can say whether something is a seal, a stamp, embossed etc.
The commenters assume it varies from country to country. Is that right? We have lots of sets of guidelines in Germany, where court-certified translators like myself exist, but I don’t feel bound by those guidelines unless I agree with them myself. Of course, when I do translate something, the translation usually goes abroad, so I need not fear the pettifogging ways of the German authorities.
I had a look at the book Translating Official Documents, by Roberto Mayoral Asensio (link to amazon.co.uk), St. Jerome Publishing 2003, and I could see no suggestion that seals should appear as graphics either. Perhaps the USA is the odd one out here?
LATER NOTE: After some discussion on Corinne’s website and in particular a footnote from the superbly credentialled Tom West (hi, Tom!), Corinne has revised her opinion on this point.
Aside from the interesting question of whether some countries require the original (or copy of the original) seal or logo to appear on the translation, I’m more concerned about the blogger’s choice of words: “Use a screenshot or graphics program to enhance your translations (…) you can copy these over onto your translation for a truly official-looking translation”.
Is it me, or does that sound entirely unprofessional?
I doubt whether any countries will require such logos. It’s sooner a matter of whether they are officially allowed.
I would not be surprised to learn that unauthorized use of official logos or seals here in Germany would constitute some sort of forgery. However, I will confess to having “enhanced” some certified translations in this manner, primarily as a aid to orientation for a reader trying to cope with a large stack of translated documents. (Some “packages” for emigrating persons can be quite large.) Letters of recommendation often bear logos of the companies issuing them, and customers are quite pleased to receive a translation bearing the same logo. In a strict sense, however, I think the legality of this is a bit dodgy in some jurisdictions at least if someone were inclined to make an issue of it.
I suppose an addendum stating that the use of logos and seal copies is strictly for purposes of orientation and does not constitute official endorsement might improve the situation a little. But I won’t place any bets; better to seek an official statement from the court with which I am sworn.
What exactly are we talking about here: translation of hard-copy originals or of electronic files, or both? (And what exactly are “official” documents?)
In the work-for-hire translation biz, the default assumption is that if you the translator receive a file, say a Word file, to be translated, you translate all the machine-readable text and return the file in the same form, with all the logos, embedded graphics, etc. still present. (If the client wants non-editable text inside images to be translated, it must say so and pay extra.)
With a hard-copy translation, why would a translation including facsimile reproductions of graphic elements be any more improper than the combination of a photocopy of the source document stapled to a text-only translation? The one uses half as much paper as the other.
If the client wants text-only, the client should say so explicitly.
Asensio defines it as ‘translations that meet the requirements to serve as legally valid instruments in a target country’.
An example would be, if I translated into German (which I don’t) a U.S. or British birth certificate to be submitted by the client to the German register office in connection with a marriage. Usually, the authority that wants the translation wants the original too, to compare, and does not directly express any desire as to what form the translation should take.
The original is normally an original paper document, which the translator has to see physically before confirming that he or she saw the original (a certified translation of a copy may not be acceptable – client has to find that out).
I imagine a document with graphics would be accepted, but I’ve never done one. It would not obviate the need to attach a photocopy, though, because the photocopy shows what the source text looked like, and if it has been tampered with the authority can see that. It isn’t always necessary or desirable to attach a photocopy, but that has nothing to do with whether you copy over graphics or not.
Anyway, the purpose of the translation is to help a foreign authority to understand a birth /marriage /death certificate, driving licence, college or university diploma and so on. The translator should add notes on any peculiarities in the original, alterations, or for example if the document says it is only valid if it is in a certain colour, you say whether it was in that colour.
Surely granted patents are official documents, and many of those are pretty much meaningless without the graphics that go along with the application.
And surely legislative acts and ministerial decrees are official documents. Translations of those are made for many different purposes. I think you need to be much more explicit about the purpose you have in mind for a translation of an official document.
Hi Bob – no, this is a semantic problem. What is usually meant by ‘translating official documents’ does not include patents and Acts. It means documents that are certified and used for official purposes. Maybe the term is misleading, but we’re just talking at cross purposes.
It is definetly illegal in Germany to by your own authorize a translation you made by inserting the insignia of anybody to it, thereby suggesting he approved your translation. That is of course worse if it is a governent paper.
Even if you are a certified translator you can’t jut do that without authorization.
If only from a legal point of view I would not touch this as a translator. This is a matter for the client to insert his own identity and authorize.
“Letters of recommendation often bear logos of the companies issuing them, and customers are quite pleased to receive a translation bearing the same logo. In a strict sense, however, I think the legality of this is a bit dodgy in some jurisdictions at least if someone were inclined to make an issue of it.”
Without the approval of the company that issued the recommendation this is Urkundenf