Around the web – October 2017

Here is your round-up of popular news stories about translation and language for the month of October.

• World Literature Today has launched its inaugural translation prize for students in translation studies programmes. Submissions are open until January 1st.
• What is one of the cardinal sins of translation? Relying on unreliable, questionable sources …
• Talking of relying on unreliable sources, one of the most-widely circulated news stories this month was about the Palestinian man arrested by Israeli police because Facebook translated ‘Good Morning’ to ‘Attack Them‘.

Photo from the Facebook post that mistranslated ‘good morning’ to ‘hurt them’

• Why is Argentinean Spanish seemingly so different to a lot of other dialects of Spanish? Find out here.

Buenos Aires market (Credit: Michael S. Lewis/Getty Images)

• “Over the years the European institutions have developed a vocabulary that differs from that of any recognised form of English.” Here are 11 examples of the odd dialect called EU English.

EU flags outside the European Commission building on October 24, 2014 (Photo by Carl Court/Getty Images)

• The BBC looked at six translations that went seriously wrong – from amusing errors to major mistakes.

HSBC’s “Assume nothing” slogan was translated to “Do nothing” in several countries before a costly rebranding.

• What are the (inflated) origins of the word ‘blimp‘?

A blimp is a non-rigid airship that takes its distinctive shape from – and is, of course, held aloft by – the gas inside its envelope.

• Russian dressing isn’t Russian, and Panama hats aren’t from Panama: a look at some names that are totally incorrect.
• Despite many years speaking French as my second but daily language, I’m still guilty of a few of these …
• Humour: how to calm down a translator.

 

Further reading:

• October 16 was World Food Day: here’s a post from the archives about food and language
• Around the web – September 2017
• Around the web – July & August 2017