Around the web – May 2018

This week I had the pleasure of participating in a ‘Responsible Women’ Forum held at a local secondary school to talk to 13-year old girls about careers, ambitions … and the responsibilities that go with them! I’m also responsible for your May round-up of popular stories about translations and language.

• “A translator always makes choices.” says Dr Emily Wilson in a short video about her translation of The Odyssey into English.
• The European Council of Literary Translators’ Associations (CEATL) recently published guidelines for fair contracts.
• Why do more translators not use reviewers?
• Localisation fail: car maker Hyundai didn’t check whether the name of its latest SUV, ‘Kona’, was going to be universally acceptable …
• In Britain experts say ‘linguaphobia’ has deepened since the Brexit vote, reports The Guardian from the Hay literary festival. And on a similar subject, the BBC asked whether English can remain the ‘world’s favourite’ language?

English has changed since Chaucer’s day (Getty Images)

• GDPR came into effect on May 25th. This article by Pieter Beens looks at (nearly) all translators might to need know and do about it. (See also this video by the Belgian Chamber of Translators and Interpreters).
• Science has just settled the debate about whether it’s better to have one or two spaces after a full stop.

One space between each sentence, they said.

• There’s been a lot of talk recently about virtual assistants, but will they ever be able to speak like actual humans? (And do we want them to?)
• Grammar shouldn’t be blamed for the shortcomings of headline writers, says The Economist.

The weasel voice in journalism

• What is ‘brave’ about Brave New World? When book titles don’t mean what you think…
• And finally, in what is becoming a regular monthly “machine translation fail” section here, when Benjamin Netanyahu praised Israel’s Eurovision 2018 winner, his complimentary tweet in Hebrew called her “a cow” if translated into English by Bing.

Israeli singer Netta Barzilai performing with the trophy after winning the Eurovision Song Contest on May 12, 2018. (Credit FRANCISCO LEONG/AFP)

 

Further reading:

• Around the web – April 2018
• Around the web – March 2018
• Back to school!