Ken Sakai
President |
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"Honyaku Kotohajime" (Beginnings of Translation) - No. 54
"Essence of Technical Translation"
This month, I would like to choose a topic about technical translation and relay this essence to my audience. However, I do not intend to give the secret instructions for highly advanced technical translation techniques. (If someone has some secret techniques, I am the first one who wants to hear them.) My intention is to provide a "Back to the Basics" list for technical translation. For some of these list items, most technical translators may already be aware; but these basic things also tend to be easily forgotten nowadays, so that I have outlined ten basic items for translators, as follows:
- The basic tone of a translation should be a direct translation.
(Meaning-based translation in a technical document should be minimized.)
- Technical terminology must be an accurate.
(Lack of accuracy in the technical terminology may cause a tremendous decrease in value in terms of translation quality.)
- Consistency in word choice is very critical, and that doesn't just apply for technical terminology.
(A technical document quite differs from literature or essays, and maintaining consistency is really a key factor on the whole.)
- Carefully find out what the subjects and objects are in a sentence.
(Many Japanese documents are missing subjects or objects and it is common for translators to face quite a challenge.)
- Verify if there are any logically contradictory or inconsistent sentences after the translation is finished. If so, please make a note and inform your client clearly.
(This habit will protect your translation accuracy and usually your client appreciates what you have found and conveyed.)
- Check on any leftover areas of translation, for example, within images or tables.
(For many graphics or tables, scanned images are used, so it is not editable. However, you can add a note beside the graphic images and show your translation clearly.)
- If you have engaged in technical translation jobs from a certain industry, find industry-specific dictionaries, and utilize them all the time.
(Electronic dictionaries usually do not contain explanatory descriptions. So I would still recommend regular bound dictionaries.)
- Furthermore, industry specific magazines or reference books are very good resources to increase your inside knowledge of the industry and updated technology trends.
(Most industry specific magazines have free subscriptions.)
- Build up a technical translators' network.
(Create a reciprocal relationship with other translators. However, I have seen that many translators have an aversion to creating and maintaining such relationships in general.)
- It is needless to say the importance of Internet search skills. In addition to that skill, being a good judge when facing a mighty ocean of information which can be found online is vital.
(Much information contained in websites is not always accurate, so that building a skill for judging information instantaneously is very important.)
You may come up with more qualified items to be added to the list. However, I would reserve not making this too advanced and complicated in order to avoid creating an overwhelming list. We, translators are all working for our clients, so that my point of view stands on our client's side. I would greatly appreciate any comments on my list.
Ken Sakai
President
E-mail: KenFSakai@pacificdreams.org |
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 The Japan Journals 1947-2004
by Donald Ritchie
Any English-speaking Japanophile certainly knows the name Donald
Ritchie. Well known for his translations and analyses of Japanese
cinema, Ritchie opened the door for Japanese movies to the Western
world. He was not only able to analyze the films, understanding
both Eastern and Western sensibilities, but also befriended the
filmmakers, and could often speak of the film's production from
a first-person perspective. However, Ritchie didn't write only about
movies. He has written numerous essays and books on Japan and the
Japanese people.
Now PDI is happy to present, in commemoration of over 50 years
of writing on Japan, Donald Ritchie's latest offering, The Japan
Journals: 1947-2004. This is a collection of writing which
spans Ritchie's entire life in Japan, and how shows both the man
and the country changed, grew, and adapted over the last half century.
As numerous as memoirs are in popular literature today, none can
compare to the close reality of a journal done in real time. We
can be assured that not only are the accounts accurate in content,
but also in the perspective of the writer at the time of the writing.
Even in the briefest of entries Ritchie is able to describe not
only what is going on around him, but his personal take on the situation,
often with a humor that is never disrespectful. Here is a portion
of the entry from September 26, 1955:
'In the morning Beppu looks less garish, but also less attractive.
It looks, in the new light, like a town with a hangover...When I
look out I see the steamer coming in from Osaka, right on time.
It will dock precisely when it is supposed to.
'The boat is crowded with school children, all leaving Beppu... to
exotic Kansai. Yes, I have been there, I say when asked. I saw Kyoto
live. No, the golden Pavilion is not made of real gold (this in
answer to a first-year student), but it looks like it. No, I do
now know how much a geisha costs (this in answer to a high school
junior)-his chances of acquiring one are, in any event, slight.'
The book is wonderfully edited by Leza Lowitz. Her biographical
notes add to the big picture the journal entries create, and her
organization is refreshing. For example, instead of putting the
entries strictly in chronological order, she sometimes orders them
by other criteria. Early in the book there is a section where, thanks
to his film writing which had appeared in Western publications,
he was tapped to host many famous Western visitors to Japan in the
late 1950s. How timely it was reading the entry about Truman Capote.
Over 70 black and white pictures are scattered throughout the
text. Many of the photographs capture Ritchie with the famous names
he worked and socialized with, such Akira Kurosawa, but there are
also pictures of the close friends he describes in the stories he
tells. Ritchi's talent as a photographer is apparant, and the pictures
of writer Yukio Mishima are especially haunting.
Although Japan Journals is hardly in the voyeuristic vein
of a tell-all, Donald Ritchie does not hold back the often intimate
details of his affairs. Ritchie did not go to Japan with a mission
to build ties between Japan and the Western world, but did so, somewhat
in spite of himself. He is never an apologist for the Japanese way,
or for the Ritchie way. Japan Journals is not only fascinating
for it's look at Japan through western eyes, but also in how Ritchie
develops the ability to look at himself through the eyes of Japan.
 Order Online
Now you can order The Japan Journals 1947-2004 for $18.95 US, plus shipping and handling. We can ship your order right away. To order, visit our web bookstore or call us at 503-783-1390. You may also e-mail us at bookstore@pacificdreams.org.
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