Translators are proving their worth twice in this week’s World in Words podcast: in New York, they’re helping elderly Russian speakers fill out their census forms; in Louisiana and Mississippi they’re interpreting for Vietnamese-American fishermen whose livelihoods are threatened by the big oil spill. Also, which tastes better: Silverfin, Kentucky tuna or Asian carp? Plus, a conversation about counting: some languages are more numerate than others.
Stories of translating, renaming and counting
Tagged with language linguistics census counting translation world
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The multilingual census, and why Thais win at Scrabble
In this week’s podcast, the U.S.Census Bureau is firing on all linguistic cylinders to ensure that non-English speakers are counted in this year’s census. Things don’t always go smoothly: in Vietnamese, the word “census” got translated into something closer to “investigation”. Also, how to pronounce that unpronounceable Icelandic volcano, Scrabble obsession beyond the English-speaking world, and five unique Japanese expressions.
From: http://www.theworld.org/2010/05/05/the-multilingual-census-and-why-thais-win-at-scrabble/
Tagged with language linguistics census scrabble
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Translating the Untranslatable : NPR
Linguist Christopher J. Moore has made a career of searching out some of the world’s most "untranslatable" expressions â words from around the globe that defy an easy translation into English. Moore shares a few of his linguistic favorites from his new book In Other Words: A Language Lover’s Guide to the Most Intriguing Words Around the World.
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=4457805
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PRI: To the Best of Our Knowledge
Cross Talk — There’s no English translation for the Dutch word "Gezellig."Are there things that can never be understood, expressed or experienced outside their home culture?We’re wandering the unmarked maps of cultural translation!
Tagged with translation language