Metaglossia: The Translation World

"People’s language and beliefs contribute to the societal use of pronouns of “he,” “she,” and “they,” according to a new study led by University of New Hampshire researchers.

Maria Papadopoulos

Thu, April 25, 2024 at 4:45 PM GMT+1·3 min read

People’s language and beliefs contribute to the societal use of pronouns of “he,” “she,” and “they,” according to a new university study.

Research at the University of New Hampshire looked at the use of pronouns in two different languages — including one where all pronouns are identity neutral — and found that people’s use of pronouns reflects not just the language they speak, but also their ideologies.

“Most people want to be thoughtful and inclusive and say they are open to using pronouns like “they” and “them” but in reality it can often be hard for some to make the shift,” April Bailey, assistant professor of psychology at the University of New Hampshire and lead author of the study, said in a statement.

 

“We wanted take a closer look at societal attitudes about pronoun use and see if it was connected to the language they speak and their beliefs about identity,” Bailey said.

In their research, published in the Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, the researchers asked a series of questions about pronouns to participants from two languages, English and Turkish, which have very different pronoun systems.

English pronouns commonly denote binary gender, for example “he” for men and “she” for women, researchers noted. In the Turkish language, pronouns are identity-neutral, for example, “o” can refer to “he”, “she” or “it” depending on the noun it refers to. There are not any specific masculine or feminine pronouns.

In a series of three studies, participants were asked to evaluate different types of real and hypothetical pronouns, including binary gender pronouns, race pronouns and identity-neutral pronouns. The researchers found that both groups generally endorsed the pronouns that were most familiar and common in their respective languages.

English-speaking participants mostly endorsed binary gender pronouns, like “he” and “she,” researchers found. Turkish-speaking participants mostly endorsed identity-neutral pronouns, like “o”.

The researchers also found that participants’ answers reflected specific ideologies so they looked at the social-cognitive process — how people process, store and apply information — to see how that affects the reasoning around pronouns.

Among both English and Turkish speaking participants, those who were high in essentialist ideologies about identity —assuming people are inherently and permanently either male or female — also endorsed binary gender pronouns and race pronouns more, showing that ideological beliefs can influence beliefs about pronouns, researchers found.

“Similar to other function words, like conjunctions, pronouns are some of the most frequently used words in any language,” Bailey said. “However, unlike those other words, pronouns can encode social information that may shape a person’s beliefs and how they reason about their social world.”

Researchers said there are valid debates on both sides of the issues, including why gender pronouns are helpful and also how they can alienate some non-binary individuals.

For instance, using “she” can make women more visible when referring to a more male-dominated field, researchers found. Yet, some who point to drawbacks may believe binary gender pronouns exclude non-binary individuals.

Language can shape how people think and despite recent trends toward using “they” and “them,” traditional gender pronouns, like “he” and “she” are still used more often, researchers found.

“The researchers hope their work will shine a light on why many English speakers struggle with using gender neutral pronouns like “they” and “them” and contribute to theories on how people reason about language and ultimately help inform policy-relevant questions about whether and how to implement language changes for social purposes,” the University of New Hampshire said in a statement about the study.

Co-authors on the study include Robin Dembroff of Yale University; Daniel Wodak of the University of Pennsylvania; Elif G. Ikizer of the University of Wisconsin-Green Bay; and Andrei Cimpian of New York University.

This is a developing story. Check back for updates as more information becomes available."

#metaglossia_mundus

"Mini-Grant: Julianna Gylseth, Ukuleles, and the Universal Language of Music

•  April 25th, 2024 /
• Spencer Tuinei /
 

The teachers and specialists in Provo City School District are our innovators. They are innovators, companions, and caretakers. The Provo City School District Foundation wants to recognize and support their efforts to make our schools a better place. 

This year, we’re speaking to a few around the district who have received mini-grants to ask them about their perceived need, their mini-grant product, the impact of their mini-grant, and lastly, advice for new and struggling professionals on how they can differentiate and extend learning in our schools.

We spoke with Spring Creek Music Teacher Julianna Gylseth about her mini-grant for new ukuleles, shared how the ukuleles are effective inroads for SpEd and multilingual students who have experience with stringed instruments, and how families can develop music literacy in their home, no matter the music level. Read our conversation below to learn more!

Q: What was the class issue, or where did you see a perceived need?

For my sixth graders, we have a “Sound Factory ” class for the kids that aren’t in Band or Orchestra. Ukuleles are part of this class, and the ukuleles give them a great chance to teach basic music literacy—they can read notes on the music staff and learn chords. We’re working on many two-part pieces this year: half of the students are learning chords, and the other half will play melodies.

Our old ukuleles are well-used. We must replace several of them and provide better instruments for these kids. 

Interestingly, I have many students who’ve recently moved into the country, and many of them know how to play string instruments. Many of the students from South America have experience playing a string instrument, or even ukuleles, in many cases. The ukuleles have become a way for these students to slide in, find their space, and see success quickly. 

Q: How can new music teachers try to extend learning or differentiate in their classrooms?

I have several kids who are special education students and many multilingual learners. The nice thing about music is that it is a universal language. They can all tap into it at some level.

For our special education students, I use stickers to help them find locations on the ukulele, and I create modified parts for students who need to catch up.

But there are a lot of access points in music. If you can’t play chords, we have melodies they can read from the note staff. 

Q: How can families experience or incorporate music in their house and family?

Music is in our community. Whether it’s a concert at the park or a local university, it’s all over, and you can and should take advantage of these free activities.

But I believe most families have a music culture their parents or grandparents passed down. For parents, just sharing that with their kids allows them to grow and continue extending those family traditions. 

And we encourage you to sign up your child to join the school choir. We have bands, choirs, orchestras, and more. Encourage your kids to take advantage of these opportunities. 

Sometimes, we think that music needs to be expensive, with costly instruments and fancy lessons, but our voices are at the heart of music. I encourage families to sing together and share their families’ songs. Everything else flows from there.

Communication Specialist

Spencer Tuinei"

#metaglossia_mundus

"Microsoft, Google earnings shine as AI drives revenue

San Francisco (AFP) – Microsoft and Google on Thursday drubbed quarterly earnings expectations as the tech titans continued investing heavily in artificial intelligence promising to shake up the way people live.

Issued on: 26/04/2024 - 00:41Modified: 26/04/2024 - 00:40

 

 

The results were cheered by Wall Street investors who pushed up Alphabet's share price more than 11 percent and Microsoft shares up nearly 4 percent in after-market trades.

Google parent Alphabet reported profit of $23.7 billion on revenue of $80.5 billion, crediting growth in cloud computing, YouTube, and online search advertising.

Artificial intelligence helped drive the Silicon Valley tech giant's business, according to Alphabet and Google chief Sundar Pichai.

"We are well under way with our Gemini era and there's great momentum across the company," Pichai said, referring to the Gemini AI model that powers services across the Google platform.

"Our leadership in AI research and infrastructure, and our global product footprint, position us well for the next wave of AI innovation."

Some $9.5 billion was brought in by Google's cloud computing unit, compared with $7.5 billion in the same quarter a year earlier.

Google also reported its first-ever dividend of 20 cents per share.

"Things are looking good for Google," said Emarketer senior analyst Evelyn Mitchell-Wolf.

However, the future of Google's core search business is not assured, the analyst cautioned.

Google faces an antitrust case in the United States, and the incorporation of AI-generated content into the company's leading search engine "will arguably be the biggest change to the search advertising market since its inception," Mitchell-Wolf said.

The earnings come as Google, Microsoft, Amazon and other rivals competing in the hot field of AI face scrutiny from regulators in the US and Europe.

The US Federal Trade Commission early this year launched a study of AI investments and alliances as part of an effort to make sure regulatory oversight can keep up with developments in the sector and stop major players from shutting out competitors in a field promising upheaval in multiple areas of business.

Amazon -- through its Amazon Web Services arm -- Microsoft and Google are the world's biggest providers of cloud-based data centers, which store and process data on a vast scale, in addition to being some of the world's richest companies.

Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella said sales in the January to March period rose by 17 percent from a year earlier to $61.9 billion, with net profit up by 20 percent to $21.9 billion.

Microsoft has been hugely rewarded by investors since it aggressively pushed into rolling out generative AI, starting with its $13 billion partnership with OpenAI, the creator of ChatGPT, in 2023.

The embrace of AI has boosted sales of its key cloud services, such as Azure, which have become the core of Microsoft's business under Nadella’s leadership.

Cloud giants Amazon and Google are also looking to beef up cloud sales by rolling out AI features to clients and prove that the AI revolution is more than just hype.

In its push, Microsoft has moved beyond OpenAI and signed partnerships with other promising AI startups such as Mistral AI, as well as investing heavily internationally.

In March, Microsoft also announced that it hired DeepMind AI and Inflection AI co-founder Mustafa Suleyman to lead up its AI unit, poaching one of the industry’s key figures from a promising startup.

Unleashed revolution

The succession of moves has often taken archrival Google by surprise and seen Microsoft pip Apple as the world's biggest publicly traded company.

"Microsoft's earnings show the company is well-positioned to profit from the AI revolution it helped unleash," said Emarketer senior director of briefings Jeremy Goldman.

 

"While monetizing AI as effectively as Google remains a challenge, Microsoft has positioned itself in the realm of consideration for ad buys -- something that wasn't necessarily the case even a few years ago."

Meta's results on Wednesday however were a first sign of AI fatigue.

The Facebook parent said its quarterly profits soared last quarter but worries over its spending on artificial intelligence saw its share price take a hit.

A potential dark cloud for AI is government regulators that are taking a closer look at Microsoft's ties with OpenAI and others amid fears that the giant is using its huge financial war chest to thwart the emergence of rivals.

Britain's competition watchdog on Wednesday was the latest to begin examining tie-ups between artificial intelligence firms and their US big tech partners, including Microsoft.

© 2024 AFP"

#metaglossia_mundus

In April 2024, Sketch Engine introduced new corpora for Icelandic, Czech, and parallel corpora for Arabic. Explore these new corpora and their tools.

Sketch Engine offers access to hundreds of parallel corpora, including a selection of Arabic texts. Explore United Nations documents, OpenSubtitles texts, the OPUS collection of multilingual data, and more.

#metaglossia_mundus

"Two University of Botswana (UB) academics, Professor Thapelo Otlogetswe and Dr Goabilwe  Ramaeba, have published “A Dictionary of Setswana Personal Names”.

According to Professor Otlogetswe, the publication has captured over 8500 Setswana names, which compares favourably with the Oxford Dictionary of First Names that contains approximately 6000 names.

He observed that in hindsight, individuals may discover that their names were not included in the dictionary. However, he indicated that the criteria used for selection were extensive, drawing from a Setswana names database of over a million names.

In addition, he explained that the selected names were based on frequency, ranging from the most common to the least common names. As a result, the dictionary includes the top 100 common names. Professor Otlogetswe said the dictionary was a valuable resource for anyone fascinated by the cultural nuances and significance embedded within names. This was demonstrated by various speakers' humorous interpretations of different names and their meanings across the diverse cultural spectrum and regions in the country.

Meanwhile when giving words of support and encouragement, Professor Shole Shole, a retired professor from University of South Africa (UNISA) and Northwest University, said the dictionary was a very critical and inspirational contribution to linguistic research. Professor Shole added that the achievement was not only significant for Botswana but also for SADC countries.

 

He explained that through the dictionary, the authors had introduced Setswana names to the international stage hence paving the way for Setswana names to be used in foreign countries in the near future.

Professor Andy Chebanne, retired Professor of linguistics at UB, described the dictionary as well-structured while noting its ability to evoke memories and history for Batswana. He emphasised that the dictionary should be utilised in dikgotla instead of keeping it hidden away in libraries.

The publication is the culmination of years of research on Setswana personal names at UB and was partly funded by UB’s Office of Research and Development (ORD). This underscores the ability of UB lecturers to produce high-quality research works which aligns with the University’s strategic goal of becoming a research-intensive institution."

 

"Microsoft claims that small, localized language models can be powerful as well

by Bob Yirka , Tech Xplore

 

 

Microsoft has announced the development of a small, locally run family of AI language models called Phi-3 mini. In their Technical Report posted on the arXiv preprint server, the team behind the new SLM describes it as more capable than others of its size and more cost effective than larger models. They also claim it outperforms many models in its class and even some that are larger.

 

As noted with the release of the new models, SLMs are being developed to allow for locally run applications, which means they can run on devices that are not connected to the internet. Also in the new release, Microsoft describes Phi-3 mini-applications as 3.8B language models—a figure that represents the number of parameters that the apps can use.

The more parameters, the more powerful the model. GPT-4, for example, is believed to have more than a trillion parameters, which requires a massive amount of computing power and explains why it cannot run locally.

Microsoft also notes that the new SLM was trained using 3.3 trillion tokens, which means that despite its small size, it can still provide a reasonable degree of artificial intelligence. Phi-3, they also point out, is a progression from two earlier models, Phi-1 and 2, which were released to the public last year.

In its announcement, Microsoft claims that Phi-3 models rival the performance of GPT-3.5 and some other LLMs. They say that users will find them "shockingly good" compared to other small models. They will reportedly run on a computer with just 8GB of RAM.

The team also notes that despite their size, they were able to achieve such good performance by using especially high-quality data to train them, including filtered web data and information from textbooks. They also added new features to provide a more robust, safe and pleasant interactive user experience.

Microsoft has made the new models freely available to anyone who chooses to give them a try—they all can be downloaded from the company's cloud service on Azure and through partnering company sites. They can be run on both MACs and PCs.

More information: Marah Abdin et al, Phi-3 Technical Report: A Highly Capable Language Model Locally on Your Phone, arXiv (2024). DOI: 10.48550/arxiv.2404.14219"

#metaglossia_mundus

"In the maze of literary history, there are some books that have transcended the barriers of language so that hearts around the world can be moved.  These books are testament to humanity’s search for connection and solidarity. Indeed, only 16 literary works have been translated into more than 100 languages, which simply shows how some stories can stand the test of time.

Interested? Click through this gallery to find out what the most translated books in history are...

According to experts spread across 35 different countries, these are the top 30 books that have shaped the world, either for their beautiful stories of love, tragedy, and war, or for their satirical humor, social commentary, and timeless lessons that have changed our views on life over time. >   https://www.starsinsider.com/lifestyle/389448/30-books-that-influenced-the-world#google_vignette

#metaglossia_mundus

 

"In an exclusive interview with CBS News' Norah O'Donnell, Pope Francis called for "negotiated peace" in Ukraine and Gaza, noting the devastating effects war has on children.

By Caitlin Yilek

Updated on: April 24, 2024 / 7:37 PM EDT / CBS NewsPope Francis pleaded for peace worldwide amid ongoing wars in Ukraine and Gaza, telling CBS News on Wednesday that "a negotiated peace is better than a war without end." 

"Please. Countries at war, all of them, stop the war. Look to negotiate. Look for peace," the pope, speaking through a translator, told "CBS Evening News" anchor and managing editor Norah O'Donnell during an hourlong interview at the guest house where he lives in Rome. 

The pontiff frequently talks about the Israel-Hamas war in his addresses. He made a strong appeal for a cease-fire in Gaza and a prisoner swap between Russia and Ukraine during his Easter Sunday Mass earlier this month. 

He said Wednesday that he calls parishioners in Gaza every day to hear what they are experiencing. The United Nations has warned that famine is imminent and Palestinians are suffering from "horrifying levels of hunger and suffering." 

"They tell me what's going on," Francis said. "It's very hard. Very, very hard. And food goes in, but they have to fight for it." 

Asked whether he could help negotiate peace, he replied, "I can pray," and added, "I do. I pray a lot." 

Also on the pope's mind is the war in Ukraine and the devastating effects Russia's invasion of the U.S. ally has had on Ukrainian children. 

"Those kids don't know how to smile," the pope said. "I tell them something, but they forgot how to smile. And this is very hard when a child forgets to smile. That's really very serious. Very serious." 

The Vatican will be hosting the first World Children's Day in May — a two-day event dedicated to children ages 5 to 12. The event seeks to answer, "What kind of world do we want to leave to the children who are growing up now?" 

"Children always bear a message," the 87-year-old pontiff said. "They bear a message. And it is a way for us to have a younger heart." 

He also had a message for those who do not see a place for themselves in the Catholic Church anymore. 

"I would say that there is always a place, always. If in this parish the priest doesn't seem welcoming, I understand, but go and look elsewhere, there is always a place," he said. "Do not run away from the Church. The Church is very big. It's more than a temple ... you shouldn't run away from her." 

An extended version of O'Donnell's interview with Pope Francis will air on "60 Minutes" on Sunday, May 19 at 7 p.m. ET. On Monday, May 20, CBS will broadcast an hourlong primetime special dedicated to the papal interview at 10 p.m. ET on the CBS Television Network and streaming on Paramount+. Additionally, CBS News and Stations will carry O'Donnell's interview across platforms."

#metaglossia_mundus

"In the world of translation, relay translations often occur when neither the source language nor the target language is dominant. The relay language, the go-between, is dominant. An example is illustrated by the first translation of One Thousand and One Nights into Russian. ​

Feature

What Is a Relay Language?

Russian literature shaped the development of Korean culture after being translated into Japanese  

Steve Moyer

HUMANITIES, Winter 2024, Volume 45, Number 1

Photo caption

In a translation, a work of literature in one language is written anew in a second language. If a translation becomes the basis of another translation, into a third language, then the second language is called the relay language. Running by the Soviet painter Aleksandr Aleksandrovich Dejneka (1899–1969). 

―© Francesco Turio Bohm. All rights reserved 2023 / Bridgeman Images 

• Twitter
• Facebook

 

The basic give and take of translation seems simple enough. A work written in one language is translated into a second language. But it doesn’t always happen that way. 

Sometimes a work is translated from a second language into a third by a translator who doesn’t build from the original work. Instead, he or she works off the second language and produces a translation of a translation. In such cases, the second language, into which the work has already been translated, is called the relay language.  

So did many works of Russian literature come to be translated into Korean—via the intermediate language of Japanese. Just as in a relay race, in which a baton is passed from one runner to the next, Japanese passed the baton—linguistically speaking—of Russian literature in translation to Koreans, allowing them to swiftly adapt Russian novels and essays to their own developing and distinct national literature. 

Many of Korea’s intellectuals traveled to Japan to study for a time, especially from around 1905 through the 1920s. They pored over texts in Japanese, sitting shoulder to shoulder with their Japanese counterparts at colleges and universities in Tokyo and grappling with the same literary works. Many new ideas were streaming into Japan, especially from Russia, whose writers the Japanese greatly admired. Knowing little Russian, the Koreans read Russian authors in Japanese translations and translated them from Japanese into Korean.  

A short story by Anton Chekhov, “Sleepy,” caught the interest of the Japanese and had an impact on the Koreans at a critical juncture, as girls in their country were still being married off at a young age. Some of the child brides in Korea, according to contemporary newspaper accounts, reacted violently to their circumstances, burning down their houses while their husbands slept inside. In “Sleepy,” the protagonist, a thirteen-year-old servant girl who is sleep deprived, strangles the baby of the couple forcing her to work long hours. The two realities—child labor and children being married off—mirrored each other and cried out for reform. “Sleepy” and other stories by Chekhov came to be published in Korean. Additionally, Leo Tolstoy’s essay “What Is Art?” weighed heavily in how Korean artists and intellectuals began thinking about the role of literature in society after Koreans translated, sometimes adapted, this and other works of Russian literature from Japanese into Korean. Heekyoung Cho, in the NEH-funded Translation’s Forgotten History, meticulously studies the currents and crosscurrents of this cultural phenomenon and how it helped form Korean national literature.  

Photo caption

One Thousand and One Nights was translated directly into French and the French translation was translated into Russian—making French the relay language. Cover of the 1933 French edition of One Thousand and One Nights, illustrated by Raymond de la Nézière. 

―Photo © CCI / Bridgeman Images 

In the world of translation, relay translations often occur when neither the source language nor the target language is dominant. The relay language, the go-between, is dominant. An example is illustrated by the first translation of One Thousand and One Nights into Russian. Few Russians could translate Arabic in the eighteenth century, while the French had the noted classics scholar and orientalist Antoine Galland, whose translations of the work were published between 1704 and 1717. About 50 years later, Russian Alexey Filatyev translated One Thousand and One Nights from French (the relay language) into Russian.  

 

By the late nineteenth century, Japanese intellectuals became engrossed with what they regarded as fresh ways, in Russia, of writing about traditional subjects. At a time when peasant unrest was simmering in Korea, Ivan Turgenev’s A Hunter’s Sketches interested both the Japanese and, especially, the Koreans for its part in abolishing serfdom. The Koreans’ familiarity with and passion for Russian literature far outstripped their interest in English and French literature and other literary traditions in the West. Fyodor Dostoevsky, for example, came to be viewed by some Koreans as a “resistant intellectual” or sympathizer of peasants and workers. His writings provided food for thought and concrete examples of ways to address social ills at home in Korea. For their part, the Japanese had become especially interested in the nihilism of Turgenev in Fathers and Sons. The Koreans, however, did not always respond to the Russians in the same ways the Japanese did. They took the messages coming to them from Russian literature, interpreted them according to their own social circumstances, and translated the Russians into Korean, using the Japanese language as a go-between and filter but not hewing at all times to the same specific Japanese take on the Russians. 

 

Turgenev ignited great interest among the Koreans with his 1859 novel, On the Eve, which was translated three times (once as a play, once as a full-length novel, and once as a short story) from Japanese to Korean during the colonial period of Japanese annexation, 1910 to 1945. On the Eve concerns a Bulgarian revolutionary and a Russian woman who admires him and decides to take up the cause. One Korean adaptation of a Japanese translation has the woman, Elana, follow the man, Dmitri, from Russia to Bulgaria and become more politically involved than in Turgenev’s original. Another Korean produced a summarized translation of On the Eve, reducing Turgenev’s novel to eight pages, which avoided political zeal and concentrated rather on the relationship between the man and the woman. Another translation, published in 1924, was a faithful rendering. The three examples demonstrate the array of translations coming onto the scene from Korean writers and translators at the time—adaptive in one case to underscore a desired value in a main character, summary in another case to excise vast passages considered to be of marginal interest, and, in another case, faithful, respecting the integrity of the original. 

Turgenev’s writings were translated into Japanese and from Japanese into Korean, where they proved influential. In this case, Japanese was the relay language. Here is an illustrated scene from On the Eve by Ivan Turgenev, first published in 1859. 

―Album / Alamy Stock Photo 

Literary traditions in Japanese stretched back many centuries and encompassed many ideas, forms, and genres, both new and old, that developed on their own in Japan and came later from Chinese literature. Japan possessed a mature national literature, while late in the nineteenth and early in the twentieth century Korea did not. As a protectorate, Korea had been under the heel, culturally, of China for centuries. The Korean language was perceived by Korea’s own elites as inadequate for original literary work. Translation itself, though, had been, since the mid fifteenth century, an evolving genre in Korea, where it was regarded as highly as original work. Consequently, when Korean writers began translating Russian authors from Japanese, they easily adapted these works to their own circumstances as the country developed its own sense of a national literature. Translations, especially ones serving as adaptations rather than literal renderings, became a way of introducing new modes for broaching traditional subjects such as love, romance, and emotion, and as a way of examining entrenched cultural practices, such as early marriage, both for girls and for boys. Korean writers and translators were keenly aware of currents of world literature at the time, as they were translating other literatures and acquiring a sense of their own literary tradition. 

Yi Kwang-su, a writer credited with authoring the first modern Korean novel, The Heartless, was born in 1892 in what is now North Korea, and was sent to Japan in 1905 to study. Sojourning back to Korea by 1913 for a brief teaching stint, he was struck by the segregation of Korean and Japanese train passengers. This was shortly after the Japan-Korea Annexation treaty, when Japan gained control of newspapers, administrative and economic reforms, and the gendarmerie, police, and military. Yi went to Japan again in 1915 and studied in Tokyo in the liberal arts division of Waseda University, which was becoming a mecca for the study of foreign languages and literatures. Waseda had a department of Russian literature. In his second year at the progressive institution, Yi began writing The Heartless. Eventually, Yi went back to China in 1919 (he had lived in Shanghai in 1914) and became  involved in protests against Japan’s annexation of his homeland. His life took another, unexpected, turn later, back in Korea, as he came to be seen as a collaborationist with the Japanese. Estimations of his contributions to Korean national literature, however, remain intact. 

The Heartless was on the vanguard of Korea’s national literary awakening. Yi wrote in Korean vernacular and created a tone of moderate politeness between his characters. He was an early proponent of relatively informal modes of address among people of different social rank. At the same time, he promoted the idea that Korean was an artful language and worthy of poets, novelists, and essayists. In one compelling passage, an anxious young woman is on her way to visit the home of her future husband to meet his relatives. As she arrives at the house, she notices the family name inscribed on the gate and thinks how beautiful the characters look. Yi, profoundly moved by Tolstoy’s “What Is Art?”, downplayed the Russian novelist’s ideas on universal Christianity and emphasized instead his stance on the power of art and literature to transmit the feelings and emotions of an artist or novelist to a viewer or reader—an idea that proved influential in Korean literature. For Yi, as for Tolstoy, emotion in a work of literature was paramount. 

 

Yi was a towering figure in the development of Korean literature in the early twentieth century, but he stood among dozens of other men and women writers who contributed mightily to this development. Women writers, due to the Confucian hierarchies set in place by the Chinese, composed their works primarily within the household and came onto the literary scene later than men. Among the men writing and publishing at the time was poet Kim Ki-jin (1897–1926), who also studied at Waseda University and came to regard the social realist Turgenev as the most important Russian writer for Koreans. Kim greatly influenced Pak Yǒng-hǔi, (b. 1901) a writer who argued for a national literature that addressed social problems, especially the plight of workers. For both of these Korean writers, the Russian Revolution had a huge impact, and both men became devotees of what they saw as Russian materialism. In the broadest sense of translation, then, Korean writers were recognizing parallels between realities in their own country and those described in the literature of both czarist and revolutionary Russia and rendering impressions of these parallels into their own nascent national literature and literary criticism.

 

 

Newspaper readership was increasingly important in Korea, making newspapers a valuable platform for essays by writers such as Kim and Pak as well as fiction, including translations of Russian literature, published in installments. Original literature modeled on Russian works also appeared in the newspapers, sometimes with standard plot lines that hearkened back to Korea’s fin-de-siècle literary roots, often presenting characters expressing emotion in more overt ways than previously, as is the case in The Heartless. This decades-long process had been made possible by the ongoing influx of adaptive translations of Russian authors by way of Japanese translations.  

 

Koreans began translating literature from Japanese in earnest starting in 1900, and the activity continued into the 1920s. One reason for Korea’s interest in Russian literature was proximity. Russia was a regional power, and conflicts such as the Russo-Japanese War of 1904–1905 brought Korea into closer contact with Russia. The reasons both the Japanese and the Koreans were especially sympathetic to Russian literature had much to do, too, with the regulation of political speech in czarist Russia, a rapidly modernizing Japan, and a cultural awakening in colonial Korea. In all three countries literature took on the role of freely expressing, or attempting to express, the hopes and desires of their peoples, or, as Tolstoy would have it, their emotions. It is a well-worn cliché to refer to translators as couriers of culture. Early twentieth-century translators in Japan and Korea, however, not only met that responsibility but raised the bar and, in Korea’s case, created the foundations of a national literature. 

 

About the author

Steve Moyer is managing editor of Humanities.

Funding information

Heekyoung Cho of the University of Washington received $50,400, in 2014, for her book Translation’s Forgotten History: Russian Literature, Japanese Mediation, and the Formation of Modern Korean Literature. NEH has funded a vast array of translation projects stretching back for more than five decades. The first such grant was awarded in 1969 to Bonnie Crown of the Asia Society to support the translation of several works of Asian literature into English. In July 2023, independent scholar Randolph Trumbull was awarded $60,000 for an annotated translation of Chinese novelist Yuan Ling’s Silent Children. In August, Michael A. Rapoport of Florida Atlantic University received $60,000 for work on a translation of Fakhr al-Din al-Razi’s Compendium of Philosophy and Logic. Over the decades, NEH has supported translations of Boethius, Walter Benjamin, Sumerian tablets, Mongolian folklore, and Noh plays, along with poetry and prose from Flemish, Finnish, Iranian, Egyptian, Sanskrit, Urdu, Catalan, Low German, and Native American languages such as Cherokee, Lakota, Navajo, and Tlingit. NEH grants have also supported projects translating the complete prose of Greek poet C. P. Cavafy and studying a Victorian-era English-language Beowulf for children. Other notable awards have gone to Robert Fitzgerald in 1973 for his verse translation of the Iliad; to Francis Steegmuller in 1982 for a translation of the letters of Gustave Flaubert; to Gregory Rabassa in 1980 for translations for an anthology of selected works of Padre Antonio Vieira, a seventeenth-century Jesuit who spent most of his life in Brazil; and to Richard Pevear in 1988 for his translation of The Brothers Karamazov. 

Republication statement

This article is available for unedited republication, free of charge, using the following credit: “Originally published as “What Is a Relay Language?” in the Winter 2024 issue of Humanities magazine, a publication of the National Endowment for the Humanities.” Please notify us at publications@neh.gov if you are republishing it or have any questions.

Sources

In addition to Heekyoung Cho’s Translation’s Forgotten History, the following books provided background and analysis: A History of Japanese Literature by Shuichi Kato, Yi Kwang-Su and Modern Korean Literature: Mujŏng by Ann Sung-Hi Lee, and A History of Korean Literature, edited by Peter H. Lee."

#metaglossia_mundus

""Eritrea (MNN) — Eritrea and Ethiopia’s relationship is complex, but Bible translation work for the Eritrean Kunama continues across borders and continents.

By Katie O'MalleyApril 25, 2024

Eritrea (MNN) — Eritrea and Ethiopia’s relationship is complex. In 2018, these two nations ended twenty years of conflict, which is estimated to have killed a hundred thousand people and displaced one million. 

Then, only two years later, Eritrea fought alongside Ethiopia against a paramilitary group in Ethiopia’s Tigray region. That war ended in 2022, but in December of last year Eritrean troops were still present in Tigray. In the past two weeks, unrest has flared up again in Tigray, displacing nearly 29,000 people.

Even as concerns for the region’s long-term stability rise, an Eritrean Bible translation team is at work own people: the Kunama of Eritrea.

“They (the Kunama) have for decades experienced hardship through civil war in their country,” says Meg Hunt with Wycliffe USA. “Many of them have migrated to neighboring countries — and then actually several of them have come to North America as part of their refugee experience.” 

Population displacement due to Tigray conflict, 12 January 2021 (Photo courtesy of USAID via Wikimedia Commons)

Kunama translation teams live Ethiopia and North America. Together, they feel the effects of the regional tensions. 

“For the team that is translating the Old Testament (in Ethiopia), they are being targeted by the local government, so it’s been hard for them to continue to feel safe in that environment,” Hunt says.

“Although they have resettled into different cities (in Ethiopia), in more rural areas refugees experience fear of being relocated to refugee camps back in Northern Ethiopia where there is still unrest.”

For the North America team, who is working on the New Testament, their pressures are less dangerous but still real.

“It’s actually pretty incredible that it’s entirely volunteer-based in North America. The challenges for them are really that they’re balancing a lot. They’ve got a lot of things of care for their own families, their day jobs. But again, they’re so committed to translating God’s Word,” Hunt says. 

“One of the things that is really unique about the translation is that because they are a diaspora team, working together across multiple time zones and continents, keeping in step with one another is an opportunity and a challenge that they have.”

Meet this dedicated Bible translation team here. Several books of the Bible have already gone through community testing — one of the final steps before they go to print or audio publishing. The books are Ruth, Jonah, Haggai, Matthew and Galatians.

You can be part of this Bible translation project spanning the globe through your prayers and your partnership. Learn more and sign up for prayer updates here.

“Pray for the safety of these Kunama team members, especially those in Ethiopia. Pray for the just energy and stamina to continue this work,” Hunt says."

#metaglossia_mundus

"UMass Amherst faculty are invited to submit a proposal by May 6 for “The Foundations of Translation, Interpreting, and Language Access,” an outreach initiative for high school students and other introductory audiences.

April 24, 2024

The Translation Center is seeking content creators for “The Foundations of Translation, Interpreting, and Language Access,” an outreach initiative for high school students and other introductory audiences.

The learning experience, currently in a pilot phase with students and a teacher at Revere Public Schools, offers an exploration of the world of translation in its many dimensions, sheds light on language access, provides insights into career pathways within the language industry and the broader benefits of such knowledge for diverse career trajectories, acknowledges contributions by professionals and educators and encourages linguistic diversity and commitments to language learning.

UMass Amherst faculty are invited to submit a proposal by May 6. Proposals will be reviewed, and selected candidates will be notified by May 20. Selected contributors will receive $1,000 as additional compensation or research funds.

The center aims to have material – created by an industry expert, practicing professional or professor – available to high schools and other organizations interested in providing introductory educational programming related to the topic. 

Topics already covered include:

• AI Literacy in Translation and Interpreting
• Translator and Interpreter Basics
• Language Brokering
• Interpreting in Public Service and Community Settings
• Schools and Language Access
• Language Legalities and Language Access Advocacy
• Translation and the Arts and Recreation
• Video Game Localization
• Healthcare and Language Services and Supports
• Film, Media and Accessibility
• Business and Localization
• Translation Literacy and Shaping a View of the World
• A Professional’s Toolbox
• Language Justice
• Translation and Interpreting Workshops

To apply, complete the Google Form found at https://forms.gle/CGwcFRVgwJnYgtxo8.

For more information or questions, contact initiative founders and developers Regina Galasso at rgalasso@umass.edu or Isabella Craft at icraft@umass.edu."

#metaglossia_mundus: https://www.umass.edu/news/article/translation-center-seeks-content-creators-outreach-initiative

 

Publié le mercredi 24 avril 2024 à 21h35min

Mamadou Lamine Sanogo, directeur de recherches en sociolinguistique se demande pourquoi l’arabe n’a pas été nommément cité au même titre que l’anglais et le français dans la constitution burkinabè réformée qui a élevé les langues nationales au rang de langues officielles et le français et l’anglais au statut « de langues de travail ». Dans les lignes qui suivent, il analyse, entre autres, la place et le rôle de cette langue dans le dispositif institutionnel du Burkina, y compris dans la législation linguistique.

« Quand vous comptez vos amis, tous ceux que vous oubliez tombent automatiquement dans le groupe de vos ennemis ».
Proverbe africain

Si la réforme constitutionnelle de décembre 2023 a marqué une rupture avec l’ordre ancien en élevant les langues nationales « officialisées par loi » au rang de langue officielle et le français et l’anglais au statut « de langue de travail » (article 35 révisé), dans cette révision constitutionnelle, une grosse surprise est le silence total sur le cas de la langue arabe. En effet, il n’y a aucune mention de cette langue dans la réforme constitutionnelle alors qu’elle a fait l’actualité dans des dossiers récents comme l’implication de l’État dans les écoles d’enseignement arabe, par l’érection de médersa publiques à travers le projet PREFAA .

La question principale est donc de savoir : Pourquoi la réforme constitutionnelle ne fit-elle aucune référence à la langue arabe ? Quand on sait qu’elle est présente dans notre système éducatif bien avant le français, on est en droit de se demander ce qui a motivé cette situation. Quand on sait qu’il y a eu des établissements d’enseignement arabe exclusivement contrairement au cas de l’anglais, il convient de se demander s’il s’agit d’un oubli ? Ou encore, si l’on voit le contraste entre la progression du nombre d’établissements et la régression de cet ordre d’enseignement sur le plan institutionnel, on se demande si cela n’a pas un lien avec sa non figuration dans la nouvelle réforme.

Lire aussi : Burkina / Officialisation des langues nationales : « Donnons-nous les moyens d’appliquer notre nouvelle politique linguistique pour espérer amorcer le développement », exhorte Mamadou Lamine Sanogo

Pour rappel, sur le plan institutionnel, on est passé de Direction Générale de l’enseignement arabe du MEBA au Service de l’enseignement arabe au MENAPLN . Ou encore sur le plan économique malgré le regain d’intérêt pour les échanges avec les pays du monde arabe et ou enfin sur le plan diplomatique où l’arabe est l’une des langues de travail de l’Union Africaine… on ne peut que se poser des questions surtout que l’auteur lui-même qu’est l’État ne communique pas beaucoup sur cette réforme laissant libre cours aux spéculations de toute sorte, y compris la désinformation. De tout ce qui précède, on est en droit de se demander pourquoi l’arabe n’a pas été nommément cité au même titre que l’anglais et le français dans cette constitution réformée ?

Dans les lignes qui suivent, nous allons nous interroger sur la place et le rôle de cette langue dans le dispositif institutionnel de notre pays, y compris dans la législation linguistique. En d’autres termes, il s’agit de s’interroger sur ce que vont devenir les locuteurs de cette langue et plus spécifiquement les établissements d’enseignement arabe dont le nombre est de plus en plus important. Cette attitude ne va-t-elle pas ternir davantage l’image déjà négative de ces écoles auprès de l’opinion publique ? Quel sera donc l’avenir des écoles et universités arabophones en gestation accueillent les arabisants ? Et le département d’arabe de l’Université Joseph Ki-Zerbo va-t-il survivre aux conséquences de cette réforme linguistique ? Les diplômés des établissements d’enseignement arabe qui ont déjà du mal à se positionner sur le marché de l’emploi ne voient-ils pas leur situation s’aggraver ? Et sur le plan religieux, les 80 à 85% de musulmans -suivant les régions- qui considèrent cette langue comme la « langue sacrée du coran » ne vont-ils pas prendre cette attitude comme une mesure de glottophobie envers leur langue et partant, envers leur religion ?

Nous partons selon laquelle de l’hypothèse les attitudes et considérations envers une langue a des conséquences sur les rapports avec la communauté linguistique. Autrement dit, si vous accordez une considération à une langue, la communauté qui s’y identifie se trouve ainsi valorisée, voire glorifiée. En revanche, le contraire peut être considéré comme une stigmatisation, une discrimination, une haine, voire « une guerre des langues », pour reprendre le titre d’un ouvrage faisant référence sur ce sujet en sociolinguistique .

Le premier intérêt de ce texte est qu’il vient à un moment où des arabophones s’indignent devant le silence brouillant et très manifeste sur le cas de la langue à laquelle ils s’identifient en tant que communauté linguistique avec ses ressentis et ses motivations. Ensuite, l’arabe étant considérée comme « langue sacrée » du Saint Coran, de nombreux adhérents à cette confession religieuse s’interrogent sur les intentions réelles du gouvernement, surtout au moment où l’État a lui-même construit des établissements d’enseignement franco-arabe et a ouvert un département d’arabe à l’Université Joseph Ki-Zerbo. De même, l’histoire du rapport conflictuel entre l’arabe et le français dans notre espace rappelle des souvenirs douloureux d’intellectuels arabophones taxés de « lettrés fanatiques », déportés, voire fusillés ou même décapités . Si l’administration moderne francophone prend cette décision, il va sans dire que l’on ne peut pas empêcher les arabophones de penser à « une poursuite des opérations », pour paraphraser une certaine presse.

Le déroulé des présentes réflexions comportera deux parties essentielles. Dans un premier temps, faire l’historique de l’enseignement l’arabe dans notre pays à travers son usage dans le système éducatif. Ensuite, en second lieu, nous allons nous pencher sur les implications socio-politiques de la réforme constitutionnelle de décembre 2023. Mais avant d’entrer dans le vif du sujet, il convient de présenter l’arabe aussi bien dans sa typologie que dans son rayonnement géostratégique actuel.

Ainsi, il faut noter que l’arabe qui est une langue du groupe sémitique de la famille chamito-sémitique (ou afro-asiatique), est l’une des langues les plus répandues en Afrique. Langue officielle des 11 États sur les 56 que compte le continent, l’arabe est l’une des langues de travail dans les organisations internationales et à ce titre, elle occupe une place de choix dans les grandes tribunes comme celle de l’Union Africaine. 4ème langue démographique au monde après le chinois, l’espagnol et l’anglais avec environ 200 000 000 de locuteurs, elle fait partie des 5 langues internationales en usage dans les grandes tribunes internationales. Aujourd’hui, l’arabe est langue officielle de 23 pays du monde dont 11 en Asie, 11 en Afrique et 1 en Europe (Malte).

Lire aussi : La langue maternelle : Un concept difficile à définir dans notre contexte

L’historique de cette langue dans la zone Afrique de l’Ouest puis dans la colonie de Haute-Volta monte que « l’enseignement arabe » -terminologie coloniale occidentale- a contribué à la formation des premières élites africaines en Afrique de l’Ouest même si la politique linguistique coloniale a fini par les exclure pour des raisons idéologiques et économiques. Pour rappel, la langue arabe a une implantation historique remontant à très loin car elle se situerait aux environs du VIIè dans certaines zones historiques, notamment l’Ouest, de notre territoire actuel. D’après Ki-Zerbo J. il y avait des lettrés en langue parmi les esclaves déportés en Amérique et ces derniers ont joué des rôles importants dans la mémoire de l’esclavage, dans l’éclosion de la littérature afro-américaine et surtout dans les sciences et technologie. Quand on sait qu’on pouvait être condamné à mort juste parce qu’on savait lire et écrire dans les champs de coton, ces derniers ont réussi tout de même à « sauver » la mémoire des déportés.

De même, outre les théocraties comme le Macina, le Foutta Toro, le Foutta Dialon, le Royaume dioula de Kong… l’arabe a été la langue de conseillers marabouts auprès de rois comme au Ghana, puis le Mali et le Songhay avec les Ibadites. L’instruction religieuse de la classe politique et l’influence des familles maraboutiques ne passent pas inaperçue lorsqu’on qu’on se penche un instant sur l’organisation, le système éducatif, le fonctionnement des cours royales ainsi que la tenue des procès et autres juridictions bien organisées. Dans le domaine des relations diplomatiques, les Mandé-dioula – ces principaux agents de l’expansion de l’islam- ont contribué, à n’en pas douter au rayonnement politique et économique des peuples du mandé à travers les routes du commerce transsaharien ainsi que l’islam porté par cette même langue.

Plus près de nous, à la période coloniale, l’arabe a joué un rôle important dans l’histoire coloniale de notre pays ; car été utilisée par de nombreux lettrés résistants comme barrière à « la mission civilisatrice ». Nous avons Hamed Baba Sanogo dans le Dafinna (Lanfiera), Sekou Tall dans le Macina et Samory Touré dans le Wasulu.

Sur le plan de l’éducation, l’arabe peut être considérée comme la première langue ayant été portée par un système éducatif formel par l’introduction des écoles coraniques en rupture avec les cercles d’initiation dont le cycle est annuel, souvent 7 ans, voire 40 ans chez certains comme les Toussian et les Sèmè au Burkina Faso. Puis vinrent les écoles franco-arabes créées par Louis Léon César Faidherbe (1818-1889) dans le but de s’approprier et contrôler le système éducatif jusqu’à présent dominé par les lettrés musulmans.

Ainsi, dès sa prise de fonction, il réorganise l’école et impliqua les marabouts dans la politique scolaire qu’il entendait développer dans la colonie. S’appuyant sur l’arrêté du 31 octobre 1848 promulguant dans la colonie le décret du 27 avril 1848 du gouvernement provisoire sur l’instruction publique, il créa la première école laïque en mars 1857 dans le quartier Nord de Saint-Louis, capitale de la colonie à cette période. La même année, un arrêté réglementait les écoles coraniques communément appelées Daara ».

Puis, après une série de réformes sur l’usage des langues dans les tribunaux et les écoles, il fit par créer les écoles franco-arabes par un arrêté du 22 juin 1870 ou l’enseignement est dispensé dans les deux langues que sont l’arabe et le français. La même année , un arrêté viendra réglementer la gestion des langues au niveau de ces écoles :
Art. 3 : « Les enfants qui suivent les écoles musulmanes devront y apprendre à parler le français. Ceux qui, au bout de deux ans, ne sauront pas se faire comprendre couramment dans cette langue ne suivront plus lesdites écoles, et ne pourront plus fréquenter que l’école des frères ou l’école laïque ».

Art. 4. L’interdiction de tenir une école musulmane sera prononcée contre ceux dont les élèves ne satisferont pas à cette obligation, au bout de deux ans ».
Art. 5. En vue d’encourager l’étude de la langue française, il sera procédé, tous les ans, au mois de décembre, à un concours général entre tous les élèves des écoles musulmanes. Des prix en argent et en livre seront distribués à ceux qui satisferont le mieux aux épreuves de ce concours. »

Comme on le voit, plus qu’une volonté d’ouverture, il faut noter que cette stratégie vise à mettre l’enseignement arabe sous-surveillance et contrôler l’influence des « lettrés fanatiques ».

Lire aussi : Le Dioula : Langue et ethnie ?

Et enfin, arrivent les médersas par les salafistes, notamment les sortants de l’Université Al-Azhar du Caire ou de Damas en Siri. Ils obtiendront l’ouverture de la première école en Afrique de l’Ouest à Ségou en 1949 avant de se déployer à Nouna en 1953 puis, à Bobo-Dioulasso en 1954. Dans le contexte burkinabè, une medersa est un établissement d’enseignement confessionnel musulman dont la langue médium est l’arabe. L’introduction de ces écoles beaucoup plus modernes s’inscrit dans un regain d’intérêt pour un « islam pur » considéré par ses promoteurs comme plus proche de ses origines la sunna.

A ce jour, les établissements d’enseignement arabe gagnent du terrain face à l’échec de l’école en français. Si l’enseignement secondaire public est essentiellement urbain, il faut reconnaître qu’il y a plus d’établissements d’enseignement arabe dans le pays. En effet, l’enseignement arabe représente plus de la moitié de l’enseignement privé et plus de 70%, voire 90% des offres éducatives respectivement dans la Boucle du Mouhoun et au Nord du pays.

Des études ont estimé que le taux de scolarité tomberait à moins de 5% sans ces établissements. De même, les multiples crises qui ont secoué le système éducatif national depuis les années 1980 ont fini par créer les conditions d’une « revanche de l’enseignement arabe » (Otayek R 1993) . Par conséquent, nous assistons, dans certaines localités, notamment dans le Houet Nord « au retour des enfants » vers les écoles d’enseignement arabe qui répondent le mieux aux besoins éducatifs de la communauté comme nous avons pu le noter lors du forum sur l’éducation tenu en 2009 à Ouagadougou.

Des parents avaient émis le vœu d’introduire l’arabe et l’enseignement religieux dans les établissements publics de l’État. « L’État est laïc » a été la seule réponse à eux proposée par ces institutionnels garants de la laïcité et du rôle régalien de l’État. Où en sommes-nous aujourd’hui ? De même, on note que non seulement ces écoles « récupèrent les déchets » de la crise du système éducatif national francophone, mais elles forment également des acteurs économiques très performants qui impactent sur le tissu économique actuel du pays.

Malgré donc l’importance de cet ordre d’enseignement dans l’histoire de notre système éducatif et dans son actualité, on est donc en droit de se demander quelles sont les implications cette réforme ?

Notons d’entrée, que les acteurs de l’enseignement arabe se répartissent en deux grands groupes : 1. Les écoles coraniques et 2. Les écoles franco-arabes et les médersas. Les écoles coraniques péjorativement appelées « foyers coraniques » surtout par les acteurs institutionnels du système éducatif sont, comme nous l’avons vu plus haut, les premières formes d’écoles après les cercles d’initiation. Très liées à l’expansion de l’islam, elles réunissent « des enfants confiés » à un marabout qui organisent l’ordre d’enseignement suivant des méthodes d’encadrement de proximité.

La langue d’enseignement est exclusivement l’arabe. Cependant, nous assistons actuellement à l’introduction du français oral, sans doute pour des besoins de marketing. Les sortants de ces écoles apprennent le plus souvent le français « sur tas » et sont injustement taxés de locuteurs du français « des non lettrés » alors qu’ils sortent d’une longue scolarité méconnue, voire ignorée par l’Etat. Certains cadres du ministère en charge de l’éducation sont allés jusqu’à nous dire que « ces foyers coraniques n’ont même pas de programme », ce qui révèle souvent le degré de mépris envers ces écoles.

Quant aux écoles franco-arabe et médersa, les deux termes semblent être utilisés comme des synonymes alors que nous avons démontré que les premières sont la réponse de l’administration coloniale à une situation et les secondes des produits d’importation de réformistes musulmans. Dans ces établissements, le volume des heures d’enseignement de la langue arabe oscille entre 30 et 70% suivant les établissements. Ceux créés par l’Etat avec l’appui du projet PRFAA tentent d’amener les autres vers une harmonisation des programmes, conditions préalables à la reconnaissance des titres et diplômes délivrés par ces écoles. Il va falloir trouver l’astuce nécessaire pour rassurer ces promoteurs que la mesure qui ne cite pas nommément leur médium et matière n’est pas destinée à les exclure.

Lire aussi : Les noms propres n’ont pas de signification mais, une explication

Enfin, si les établissements d’enseignement supérieur arabophone sont une nouveauté dans les offres de formation dans notre pays, elles prolifèrent aujourd’hui et accueillent des jeunes burkinabè en quête de qualification. Les profils suivants eu égard aux formations initiales reçues sont :

• Lettres et arts,
• Langues,
• Communication journalisme,
• Sciences humaines et sociales,
• Sciences et technique,
• Informatique et électronique,
• Génie civil,
• Marketing,
• Ingénieries diverses,
• Théologie…

Les sortants de ces établissements pourront-ils se positionner sur le marché de l’emploi avec les mêmes chances que ceux des établissements francophones ?
Pour terminer, rappelons que les rapports entre le français et l’arabe, dans notre espace historique, ont été marqués par des conflits très violents au point de laisser des stigmates dans les relations entre ceux qui se considèrent comme les dignes et légitimes descendants des marabouts et autres intellectuels massacrés et ceux considérés comme la relève de l’administration coloniale. Par conséquent, toute approche vers ce pan de notre histoire qui aborde le sujet de l’arabe et l’islam doit intégrer ce passé douloureux au risque de soulever des souvenirs désagréables. Et c’est bien à ce titre que l’on dit que s’il y a une histoire des langues, elle est le versant linguistique de l’histoire des communautés.

Mamadou Lamine SANOGO
Directeur de Recherches en sociolinguistique

 

#metaglossia_mundus

"Miangaly Ralitera - Publié le 25 avril 2024

Selon les recherches effectuées par le centre de recherche « Sociétés, Dynamiques des Langues en Contact et Didactologie » (SDLD) au sein de l’école doctorale PE2Di de l’université d’Antananarivo, la langue malgache perd de sa valeur. «C’est plutôt la langue française qui est valorisée. Dans le domaine de l’éducation, par exemple, la langue française est la langue d’enseignement à partir de la troisième année d’études jusqu’aux études supérieures. Dans la société, les affiches sont en français. Les enfants appellent leurs parents ‘papa’ et ‘maman’ et sont encouragés à parler cette langue », déclare la professeure Vololona Randriamarotsimba, responsable du centre de recherche SDLD, lors de la cérémonie d’ouverture officielle du Colloque international sur la « Mondialisation et Pluralité Linguistique : Enjeux Éducatifs, Sociaux, Professionnels et Individuels. Pour un Regard Croisé », qui se tient à l’École Normale Supérieure d’Antananarivo du 24 au 26 avril, dans le cadre de la célébration du 20e anniversaire de ce centre de recherche.

L’un des objectifs de ce centre de recherche est d’identifier des solutions pour redonner à la langue malgache sa valeur. « Favoriser le plurilinguisme chez l’enfant est essentiel. Cela lui permet de reconnaître que sa langue est aussi précieuse que les autres », ajoute la professeure Vololona Randriamarotsimba. À Madagascar, outre la langue maternelle et le français, l’anglais, le mandarin et le comorien figurent parmi les langues les plus utilisées.

Miangaly Ralitera"

#metaglossia_mundus

"Background When patients do not speak the same language as their doctors, they face poorer medical outcomes, decreased doctor-patient trust, and a diminished desire to seek medical care. It has been well established that interpretation is an essential part of an accessible healthcare system, but effective use of such language services relies on both the interpreters themselves and the healthcare teams working with them. This study presents an interdisciplinary examination of the motivations of undergraduate student medical interpreters, a group which serves as a bridge between these roles. While not full-time interpreters, they receive official training and spend time serving patients in local clinics. Further, for those who aspire to careers in medicine, interpreting provides invaluable exposure to the medical field and early professional know-how. Methods Semi-structured individual interviews with undergraduate student interpreters were conducted to describe this multifaceted educational experience. A thematic analysis framework was employed to understand how and why they volunteer their time to interpret. Results Motivations of student interpreters were found to fall under three general categories: (1) personal identity, or connection to family, language, and their career aspirations; (2) community engagement, or the opportunity to make a direct impact on patients at an early stage; and (3) pre-professional experience, both in general and specifically in healthcare. Each of these contributes to the view of a student medical interpreter as a unique contributor to language equity in medicine, as they provide language services in the short-term as well as set themselves up to be linguistically and culturally competent providers in the long-term. Conclusions A greater understanding of student motivations adds to knowledge about language mediation and validates the utility of students in this role, encouraging the development of more student interpreter programs. Particularly in communities with high proportions of non-English speakers, these students can contribute to making medical care as inclusive and accessible as possible."

#metaglossia_mundus: Read more >  https://bmcmededuc.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s12909-024-05417-y

 

"University Of Galway Opens State-Of-The-Art Conference Interpreting Suites

/ 23RD APRIL 2024 /  GEORGE MORAHAN  The University of Galway has officially opened its state-of-the-art An Teanglann conference interpreting suites and teaching facility.

The facilities, which were funded by the university, the government and the European Commission, mark a significant milestone in the advancement of language interpretating training, education and research in Ireland.

Genoveva Ruiz Calvera, director-general for interpretation at the European Commission, opened An Teanglann, and said it was an honour to see the Commission's collaboration with the University of Galway "bearing fruit," with young interpreter graduates already providing Irish interpretation for the EU institutions.

An Teanglann is made up of three interpretation suites, with a total of six booths, each of which has standard two interpreter consoles and is equipped with the latest technology.

All three suites can be connected to allow for larger meetings, with greater language coverage, and also allow for remote simultaneous (RSI) training, which has become a market reality post-Covid.

 

 

The suites are designed to facilitate immersive learning experiences, further advancing interpreter education and hybrid teaching, which involves university trainers, who are all practising professionals, and interpreters working in international partner institutions within the EU and the UN

“The launch of these Conference Interpreting Suites represents a momentous occasion for our University and for Ireland as a whole and they are a strong symbol of our value of excellence and the opportunity for the highest standards in education," said Prof Ciarán Ó hÓgartaigh, president of the University of Galway.

The facility is being used by those studying on the MA in Conference Interpreting, which currently takes 15 students a year.

 

 

Students on the Masters programme this year come from Ireland, Canada, Spain, Colombia, Italy and France, with a spread of languages native to each country, as well as German and English. The programme has capacity to cater for other languages, depending on demand.

Susan Folan, programme director for the MA in Conference Interpreting, said the facility confirms the university's standing as the sole institution in Ireland offering specialised training for future conference interpreters.

"These new suites allow for multilingual meetings with interpretation in six different languages simultaneously," she continued.

"The technology links our students with professional trainers and interpreting researchers all over the world from right here on campus. Graduates are entering a dynamic and global profession having experienced a dynamic and comprehensive classroom.”

Minister of State with responsibility for the Gaeltacht Thomas Byrne added that he had no doubt that the suites would attract many students to the MA and "lead to a steady stream of skilled interpreting graduates with proficiency in Irish and in other languages who are available to take up important roles in Europe.""

#metaglossia_mundus

The Mississippi Administrative Office of Courts is seeking bilingual speakers willing to train and qualify as credentialed court interpreters.

An Ethics and Skill Building Seminar will be held May 30-31 at the Gartin Justice Building, 450 High Street in Jackson. The seminar registration deadline is May 24.

For the first time, the seminar is offered at no cost. A legislative appropriation to the Administrative Office of Courts Court Interpreter Credentialing Program allows the program to be offered at no cost to participants for one time only. Future seminars are expected to require a fee.

]Candidates for the program must already be fluent in English and a second language and must be willing to develop an understanding of legal terms and court proceedings. Participation in the Ethics and Skill Building Seminar is the first step in the Mississippi Court Interpreter Credentialing Program which trains, tests and qualifies individuals who wish to pursue court interpreting. The seminar will introduce the candidates to requirements for foreign language interpreting in court settings. The seminar will cover the role of the court interpreter, ethical requirements, modes of interpretation and credentialing requirements.

The 2023 Mississippi Legislature revised laws regarding language interpreters to provide broader language access assistance for people of limited English proficiency. The new law mandates court appointment of a qualified interpreter in all cases, criminal and civil, at no cost to the limited English proficient participant in litigation, with the cost borne by the county or municipality. Revisions to the statutes clarified that limited English proficient individuals are entitled to use an interpreter in any instance arising out of or pertaining to the individual’s involvement in litigation. See Miss. Code Ann. Section 9-21-73 (4).

The registration form for the Ethics and Skill Building Seminar is at this link:
https://courts.ms.gov/aoc/courtinterpreter/forms/Registration%20Form%20-%20May%202024.pdf.

For more information, contact Deenie Miller, Director of Language Access at deenie.miller@courts.ms.gov.

/// COURT, JACKSON

#metaglossia_mundus

28th International Conference of the African Association for Lexicography

1 - 4 July 2024

University of Pretoria

Pretoria

South Africa

Please, note that the deadline for the submission of abstracts for the conference is Tuesday, 30 April 2024. Please, see website (www.afrilex.co.za) for the format in which abstracts must be submitted. 

Call for papersMODERN

Date(s)

31

MAY

2024

Subjects

• Sociology
• Ethnology, anthropology
• Language
• Geography
• History
• Representation
• Political studies

Lieux, mots et objets de l’exil : des récits intimes aux constructions collectives

*  *  *

Published on Wednesday, April 24, 2024

ABSTRACT

Cette journée d’étude vise à approfondir notre compréhension des enjeux liés à la transmission transgénérationnelle de la mémoire de l’exil et aux rôles des différents acteurs dans les champs politique, éducatif, artistique et intellectuel dans la construction de ces récits mémoriels et de leurs différentes formes de diffusion, y compris à travers l’art. Cette rencontre mettra l’accent sur la question de juxtaposition, voire de la concurrence des mémoires dans l’espace public. De manière plus concrète, la journée se concentrera sur les lieux, les objets et les mots de l’exil, ces derniers compris comme le langage, les traces matérielles et les constructions discursives provenant autant des pouvoirs publics, des acteurs sociaux et des récits familiaux et qui contribuent à désigner ou à invisibiliser, mais aussi à façonner ou déconstruire les exils, les représentations des exilés et les expériences de l’exil.

ANNOUNCEMENT

Présentation

Cette journée d'étude vise à approfondir notre compréhension des enjeux liés à la transmission transgénérationnelle de la mémoire de l’exil et aux rôles des différents acteurs dans les champs politique, éducatif, artistique et intellectuel dans la construction de ces récits mémoriels et de leurs différentes formes de diffusion, y compris à travers l’art.

Elle s’inscrit plus largement dans le cadre du projet de recherche et création « Bonjour fantôme » porté par la Compagnie de théâtre drômoise Le Centre imaginaire, l’Université Grenoble Alpes et le Centre du patrimoine arménien (CPA) de Valence. Celui-ci s’articule autour de l’écriture et de la préparation à la mise en scène d’une déambulation théâtrale sur la mémoire intergénérationnelle des rapatriés d’Algérie et d’un travail pédagogique en forme d’ateliers de recherche documentaire et création de récits avec les étudiants de Valence.

Notre journée d’étude constitue l’un des trois volets de ce projet et permettra d’interroger la fabrique des récits, leurs transmissions et représentations. Il s’agira notamment de questionner, avec les outils des sciences humaines et sociales, les aller-retours entre le récit intime et les constructions collectives (récit national, histoire dite « officielle », récit des acteurs, récits marginalisés, non-récits).

Dans une perspective à la fois historique et contemporaine, cette journée d’étude se veut interdisciplinaire et transversale, invitant des chercheur.es d'horizons disciplinaires variés et travaillant sur plusieurs aires géographiques et culturelles, à partager leurs analyses avec des témoins, des étudiants et des représentants du monde artistique.

Cette rencontre mettra l’accent sur la question de juxtaposition, voire de la concurrence des mémoires dans l’espace public. De manière plus concrète, la journée se concentrera sur les lieux, les objets et les mots de l’exil, ces derniers compris comme le langage, les traces matérielles et les constructions discursives provenant autant des pouvoirs publics, des acteurs sociaux et des récits familiaux et qui contribuent à désigner ou à invisibiliser, mais aussi à façonner ou déconstruire les exils, les représentations des exilés et les expériences de l’exil.

Axes thématiques

À partir de l’une des trois entrées (lieux, mots ou objets) il s’agira d’explorer :

• les représentations et les auto-représentations qui émergent de ces expériences et, à la fois, participent de la fabrique de mémoires collectives, discours et identités,
• les enjeux actuels de la transmission des récits et le rôle des acteurs (usages publics, institutions muséales, centres d'interprétation, musées et mémoriaux, transmission générationnelle, etc.),
• la juxtaposition de mémoires dans l’espace public, en essayant de dépasser l’idée de « concurrence » et proposer une forme de dialogue social,
• la place privilégiée qui peut avoir l’expression artistique dans cette forme de dialogue, permettant de resignifier ou de “théâtraliser” les mots et les expériences.

Format des contributions

Cette journée privilégiera le partage d’expériences. De ce fait, nous appelons des communications n’excédant pas 15 ou 20 minutes, afin de laisser un réel temps d’échange. Seront appréciées les communications qui proposent une réflexion autant sur le fond que sur la forme et attentives au dialogue avec un public large.

Envoi des propositions

Nous invitons tous les chercheurs intéressés à envoyer une proposition de communication à l’adresse : Mariana.Dominguez-Villaverde@univ-grenoble-alpes.fr

Les propositions doivent parvenir avant le 31 mai 2024.

Le résumé de 500-800 mots (hors bibliographie) doit être accompagné d’une notice bio-bibliographique de l’auteur avec son affiliation universitaire.

Comité d’organisation

• Akoka Karen. Sociologue et Maîtresse de conférences en Sciences politiques à l’Université Paris Nanterre. k.akoka@parisnanterre.fr
• Argaillot Janice. Maîtresse de conférences en civilisation latino-américaine à l’UGA, ILCEA4. Janice.Argaillot@univ-grenoble-alpes.fr
• Dominguez Villaverde Mariana. Maîtresse de conférences en civilisation espagnole à l’UGA, ILCEA4.   Mariana.Dominguez-Villaverde@univ-grenoble-alpes.fr
• Hanus Philippe. Coordinateur de l’Ethnopole « Migrations, frontières, mémoires ». philippe.hanus@valenceromansagglo.fr

En partenariat avec

• Le Centre imaginaire (Chabeuil)
• Le Centre du Patrimoine arménien (Valence)

Lieu de la manifestation :

• Campus UGA Latour Maubourg, Valence
• Centre du patrimoine arménien de Valence

Date de la manifestation

11 octobre 2024

SUBJECTS

• Modern (Main category)
• Society > Sociology
• Society > Ethnology, anthropology
• Mind and language > Language
• Society > Geography
• Society > History
• Mind and language > Representation
• Society > Political studies

PLACES

• Maison de l'étudiant Drôme-Ardèche | Centre du patrimoine arménien - 9 Place Latour-Maubourg | 14 rue Louis Gallet
  Valence, France (26)

EVENT ATTENDANCE MODALITIES

Full on-site event

DATE(S)

• Friday, May 31, 2024

ATTACHED FILES

• Appel à communication Lieux, mots et objets de l'exil.pdf

CONTACT(S)

• Mariana Dominguez Villaverde
  courriel : mariana [dot] dominguez-villaverde [at] univ-grenoble [dot] alpes [dot] fr

INFORMATION SOURCE

• Mariana Dominguez Villaverde
  courriel : mariana [dot] dominguez-villaverde [at] univ-grenoble [dot] alpes [dot] fr

#metaglossia_mundus

"The prominent literary and free expression group cancelled its awards after a backlash from nominees.

By Max Matza,BBC News

Prominent literary group PEN America has cancelled its annual award ceremony after dozens of nominated writers withdrew in protest of the war in Gaza.

The group, which is dedicated to free expression, announced on Monday that it was cancelling next week's event.

Nine of the ten writers nominated for a PEN book award had withdrawn from the contest because of its alleged lack of support for Palestinian writers.

The move comes amid a growing protest movement in the US in support of Gaza.

Of the 61 authors and translators nominated for a prize, 28 withdrew their books from consideration, according to a statement from the group.

"This is a beloved event and an enormous amount of work goes into it, so we all regret this outcome but ultimately concluded it was not possible to carry out a celebration in the way we had hoped and planned," said CEO Suzanne Nossel.

PEN America's Literary Programming Chief Officer, Clarisse Rosaz Shariyf, added: "We greatly respect that writers have followed their consciences, whether they chose to remain as nominees in their respective categories or not."

"We regret that this unprecedented situation has taken away the spotlight from the extraordinary work selected by esteemed, insightful and hard-working judges across all categories," she added.

A series of open letters signed by PEN nominees in recent weeks have criticised the group for allegedly choosing sides against Gaza in the war that started after the 7 October Hamas attack on Israel.

"In the context of Israel's ongoing war on Gaza, we believe that PEN America has betrayed the organization's professed commitment to peace and equality for all, and to freedom and security for writers everywhere," said one letter signed last month by several famous writers including Michelle Alexander, Naomi Klein and Zaina Arafat.

The writers argued that the group was acting as a "cultural front for American exceptionalism" and was complicit in "normalizing genocide".

Israel rejects the charge that it is guilty of genocide. For many of its citizens and supporters it is grotesque and offensive to allege that the state created after Nazi Germany murdered six million Jews in the Holocaust is itself committing genocide.

PEN says it condemns loss of life in Gaza and has created a $100,000 (£81,000) fund for Palestinian writers.

The awards ceremony was due to be held on 29 April."

#metaglossia_mundus

"...Sixty-one authors and translators were nominated but 28 withdrew their work, according to a statement released on Monday, forcing the organization to cancel next week’s event.

“This is a beloved event and an enormous amount of work goes into it, so we all regret this outcome but ultimately concluded it was not possible to carry out a celebration in the way we had hoped and planned,” said CEO Suzanne Nossel.

The boycott emerged amidst growing tensions with PEN, with authors urging the organization to take a stronger stance on the Palestinian crisis and advocate for a Gaza ceasefire.

In the letter, PEN was accused of acting as a “cultural front for American exceptionalism” and complicity in “normalizing genocide” by failing to address the situation in Gaza adequately.

“In the context of Israel’s ongoing war on Gaza, we believe that PEN America has betrayed the organization’s professed commitment to peace and equality for all, and to freedom and security for writers everywhere,” said a separate letter signed last month by several famous writers including Michelle Alexander, Naomi Klein and Zaina Arafat.

PEN America has defended its actions, citing its recent condemnation of the loss of life in Gaza, calls for a ceasefire, and the establishment of a $100,000 emergency fund for Palestinian writers.

The awards, which celebrates voices across various genres including writers of fiction, poetry, children’s literature and drama, was scheduled for April 29 at the Town Hall in New York City."

#metaglossia_mundus

"Recently, Meta launched Llama 3, a new AI assistant designed to improve social connections, engage in conversations, and make suggestions.

It’s hard to escape the conversation around AI these days. This is why earlier this year, we listed it as one of the biggest African tech trends to look out for in 2024. And explored some of the challenges, Google is trying to address with AI on the continent. Meta (formerly Facebook) has also become deeply engaged in its AI efforts. The tech company recently launched its new feature, Llama 3, a new AI assistant designed to improve social connections, engage in conversations, and make suggestions. The Meta AI assistant utilizes real-time search results from Bing and Google and has image generation capabilities that enable users to create animations and high-resolution images while typing. It is available at meta.ai. the web version that works similarly to ChatGPT. It has also been integrated into all Meta platforms.

The Llama 3 was only available in the United States until last week, when Meta made it available in several African Nations- particularly, Ghana, Malawi, Nigeria, South Africa, Uganda, Zambia, and Zimbabwe. The tech giant plans to expand into additional countries and languages. According to  Meta CEO, Mark Zuckerberg, “With LLaMA 3, Meta AI will now be the most intelligent, freely available assistant.” However, the enthusiasm around this new feature remains subpar. 

Recall that last year, Meta launched Threads. It was meant to be a Twitter clone that Meta launched as a companion to Instagram, the popular photo-sharing network it bought over a decade ago. Threads gained over 50 million users on its first day, signaling that many people were excited about its launch. Unfortunately, Meta’s launch of Threads fell short of expectations. Barely a month after its launch, the app’s daily active users dropped by 80%. Mainly because users found it limiting and lacking in functionality. This disappointment fueled a lower bar for future features and products from Meta. 

However, the lukewarm reception for Llama 3 can’t be solely attributed to the failed Threads app. In 2022, Meta also garnered immense hype for its grand vision for the Metaverse, a fully immersive virtual world. The tech giant rebranded from Facebook to Meta – a new name to focus on building the metaverse. The hype surrounding the Metaverse created unrealistic expectations about its immediate applicability and benefits for users, especially in developing regions like Africa. There were conversations about the potential applications of the Metaverse in areas like education, work, and entertainment, but lacked concrete implementation plans. 

Nevertheless, Meta might be taking a different approach with this AI product. For one, instead of focusing on making it a stand-alone app, the tech giant is taking the integrated approach. Popular multimedia instant messaging app, Snapchat used the same approach. Last year, Snapchat successfully rolled out “My AI”, its ChatGPT-powered AI chatbot. This integration had a profound impact on user engagement. As of January 2024, Snapchat’s subscription reached 7 million paying users, up by 2 million since September 2023.

Meta has also been more transparent about the capabilities and limitations of the new feature compared to the initial hype surrounding Threads. Meta’s AI has several features designed to enhance user experience across Meta’s platforms. The AI assistant utilizes real-time search results to provide users with additional context and information about their Facebook feeds. This can facilitate more informed discussions and deeper engagement. It also fuels creativity with image-generation capabilities. On WhatsApp, the AI can generate high-quality images with improved text inclusion, as well as provide useful prompts for image changes. Users can access Meta AI while scrolling through their Facebook feeds, allowing them to request more information about a specific post. 

Africa, (like most parts of the world) is rapidly embracing AI. In 2022, African startups attracted over $1 billion in venture capital funding for AI-related ventures. Africa also boasts a significant talent pool for AI development, with over 40% of Africa’s population under the age of 15. Countries like Nigeria, Rwanda, Kenya, and South Africa have established national AI strategies and are investing in research and development initiatives. Last year, Nigeria took significant steps in inviting scientists of Nigerian heritage and renowned global experts to collaborate on the formulation of its National Artificial Intelligence Strategy. 

Meta’s AI also has an opportunity to stand out among African users. Facebook is the leading social media platform in Africa in terms of market share. Meta has more than 2 billion active daily users, with about 271 million Facebook users and a projected growth to over 377 million by 2025. Many people utilize WhatsApp, Facebook, and Instagram to create content and promote their businesses. Meta can also tailor its AI to address issues relevant to African users. This could be anything from language support for local dialects to solutions for information scarcity. Last month, Meta announced its plans to launch monetization features for content creators in Nigeria and Kenya, in June 2024. Its new AI feature represents another opportunity to show they’ve listened to user feedback and can create a valuable tool for its African market."

#metaglossia_mundus

"The Press Code of Ethics and Conduct available in seven of the country's 12 official languages.

By

 Quan Dambuza  -  April 24, 2024 

The Press Council of South Africa has taken a significant step towards linguistic inclusivity by making its Press Code of Ethics and Conduct available in seven of the country’s 12 official languages. Recent translations of the Press Code into isiZulu, isiXhosa, Sepedi, Tsonga, and Tshivenda signifies the ongoing commitment to embracing linguistic diversity within the South African media landscape.

Recognizing the importance of empowering indigenous voices to share their stories in their native languages, these translations aim to facilitate inclusive engagement among South Africans, enabling them to hold the media accountable.

As the world commemorates World Press Freedom Day, there’s no better time to celebrate this milestone and strengthen collaboration towards achieving a Free Press that values linguistic diversity.

To delve deeper into the significance of linguistic diversity in the South African media landscape, the Press Council, in collaboration with the South African National Editors Forum and the Indigenous Languages Action Forum, will be hosting a webinar.

 

Webinar Details:
Date: Friday, 3 May 2024
Time: 12:30
Platform: MSTeams
Registration Link: Click here to register

 

This webinar promises to be an insightful discussion on the strides made in promoting linguistic inclusivity and the collective efforts needed to further advance this important aspect of media representation. Don’t miss out on this opportunity to join the conversation and contribute to a more inclusive media environment in South Africa.

Quan Dambuza

https://pondolandtimes.co.za/

Publishing Editor at Pondoland Times and a proud member of the Association of Independent Publishers (AIP), is a digital maven recognized as the second runner-up for Mediapreneur of the Year at the FOYA Awards 2023. With a mastery of Digital Marketing, Email Marketing, and Search Engine Optimization, Quan is reshaping the media landscape. His dynamic leadership and commitment to excellence mark him as a force to be reckoned with, driving innovation and setting new standards in independent publishing."

#metaglossia_mundus

Choice

January 1, 2001

The first dictionary devoted to historical linguistics, the oldest scholarly branch of the discipline, this book fills a need. Most terms, laws, techniques, and processes that it defines are not listed in existing general or specialized dictionaries of linguistics. These include such tantalizing entries as "cranberry morpheme," "Dante classification," "lower-middle-class crossover," "'only-six' argument," "Northern cities shift," and "upper exit principle." Trask, a prolific author of student dictionaries in linguistics, provides clear definitions, examples, and lively commentary ranging from two lines to about half a page. He defines "pejoration," for example, as "a type of semantic change in which a word comes to denote something more offensive than formerly," and notes that "all of English 'churl,' 'villain' and 'boor' originally meant only 'farm worker,' but all have come to be insults, and much the same is now happening to 'peasant.'" The book includes a brief preface; lists of symbols, abbreviations, and tables; cross-references; and a 30-page bibliography. Although the price may seem high (a paperback edition would be welcome), the book's high quality and uniqueness make this a necessary purchase for all academic and many public libraries. J. M. Alexander; Carnegie Mellon University

 

#metaglossia_mundus

"On Friday afternoon, three professional translators participated in a panel, “The Bridge,” in Sanborn Library.By Julia Zichy

Published April 15, 2024

On April 12, Sanborn Library hosted a Q&A with three professional translators: Czech specialist Alex Zucker, Hindu and Urdu specialist Daisy Rockwell and Italian and German specialist Alta Price.

 

The event, dubbed “The Bridge,” was catered by the Nest Café and co-sponsored by the comparative literature program, the English and creative writing department, the Leslie Center for the Humanities and the Office of the Associate Dean for Interdisciplinary Programs. French and Italian department chair Andrea Tarnowski organized the event, which drew around 40 students from across the College’s humanities departments.

“Planning this event has really been an education, finding out the sources for who translates what languages, what the signs of successful translation are,” Tarnowski said. 

Zucker reflected on the powerful calling he felt to become a translator, explaining that he and his fellow translators had felt an “innate responsibility” to share certain non-English texts with the English-speaking world.

“Translation is … how we can understand people from across the world who are always to some degree different from us, yet also inextricably linked to us,” Tarnowski said. “It’s another individual, another representative of another group. You have to do a form of translation to understand that individual [and] understand their experience.” 

Zucker said he most recently translated the Czech text “A Sensitive Person” by Jáchym Topol, which was shortlisted for the European Bank of Reconstruction and Development Literature Prize in 2024. 

“Each book is its own theory,” Zucker said. “It is its own world. Each time we translate a book, we essentially create our interpretation of that book.”

In 2010, Zucker won the National Translation Award for his translation of Petra Hůlová's 2002 début novel, “All This Belongs to Me,” according to Tarnowski. Zucker was awarded the honor for his excellence in translating Czech culture successfully into the English language and retaining both the novel’s literal and metaphorical meanings, Tarnowski said.

During the panel, one student said learning a language can be like “building a lego” — as one learns language by building a cohesive structure of meaning. Yilu Ren GR, who is studying comparative literature, said she appreciated this metaphor.

“As a Chinese drill instructor, I use the lego metaphor to show students how the Chinese characters are combined into one Chinese word as the infrastructure of Chinese vocabulary, which is vastly different from the English vocabulary,” Ren said. “You’re putting pieces together, but it’s an organic new entity which we’re making from the pieces.” 

Ren — who hopes to pursue a career in translation after graduating this June — asked whether the “top experts in the field” are willing to teach prospective translators the art of translation. 

“Absolutely, I would love to lecture at a university about … the art of translation, but it’s just not a luxury that I particularly have or anticipate having, at least in the coming year or two,” Zucker responded.  

According to the Dartmouth English department website, the event was held in honor of English professor Monika Otter, who died on May 5, 2023. Otter, whose scholarship focused on the use of language, worked in Dutch, English, French, German, Greek, Italian, Provençal, Spanish and medieval Welsh.

Tarnowski concluded the program by emphasizing the intricacies of translation, as well as the creativity it requires.

“Translation is niche in the sense that the splashy success tends to be for the authors of a given literary piece,” Tarnowski said. “But I think that there has been over the last decade an increasing attention paid to translation as its own real craft or art as opposed to something that’s derivative. All the panelists have said here that they really make a new creation, and this creation should also be on its own terms.” "

#metaglossia_mundus

"The Association of Translators and Interpreters Ireland (ATII) and the DCU Centre for Translation and Textual Studies are holding an all-day, in-person conference on language and the law next month.

The event, entitled ‘Language and the Law: Interpreting and Translation in Legal Settings’, takes place on Friday 24 May at Dublin City University (8.15am to 5.30pm).

The organisers say that the conference will bring together legal professionals, researchers, trainers in the legal and language arenas, relevant NGOs, and language professionals.

‘Lack of regulation’

The ATII, formerly known as the ITIA, says that the lack of regulation of translation and spoken-language interpreting in Ireland has given rise to concerns about standards, lack of due process, and potential miscarriages of justice.

The conference will focus on the challenges and complex needs inherent in multi-lingual communication in three settings: garda stations, the courts, and international protection.

The event will also address the issue of legal translation in the public, private, and corporate domains, specifically in relation to risk and liability.

Training and qualifications

The conference will also discuss best practice in the training, qualifications, and work of legal translators and interpreters.

Speakers include:

• Barbara Rovan (President of EULITA, the European Legal Interpreters and Translators Association),
• John O’Shea (chair, FIT Europe),
• Professor Lorraine Leeson (Centre for Deaf Studies, TCD),
• Professor Yvonne Daly (Professor of Criminal Law and Evidence, DCU),
• James MacGuill SC, (former president of the Law Society and CCBE President),
• Wendy Lyon (solicitor),
• Dia Silverstein (solicitor), and
• Sarah Jane Aberásturi (legal translator and chair, ATII Certification SC)."

#metaglossia_mundus