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July 23, 2008

Mayor Bloomberg, my translation role model

Many of our clients struggle with the challenge of when and how to translate communication from English to other languages spoken by employees. The fact is, translation is difficult and expensive. As a result, far too many companies avoid the issue, delegating the problem to local management and hoping that translation is occurring.

That’s why New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg is my role model. Yesterday he announced an executive order requiring that city agencies offer services in the six most common languages spoken in New York City: Spanish, Chinese, Russian, Korean, Italian and French Creole.

We all know that New York is a multicultural city, but it’s surprising how many New Yorkers struggle with speaking English; by Mayor Bloomberg’s count, 1.8 million (out of 8 million) residents have little or no proficiency in English. And, nearly one-half of all New Yorkers speak a language other than English at home, with 25 percent of residents speaking a primary language other than English.

Having these demographic facts at his fingertips no doubt helped Mayor Bloomberg and his team make the decision to sign the order.

Here’s my question: Do you have similar demographic information about your employees? Could you draw a pie chart illustrating the major languages spoken by employees? Could you say with certainty how many employees struggle with English, and how many are proficient in English but don’t speak it as their native language?

Are you using this data to inform your translation strategy?

Posted by Alison Davis at 01:39 PM | Comments (3)

July 08, 2008

Want to compunicate?

No, it’s not a typo . . . it’s a new word, a verb, that’s been coined to describe this situation: “To chat with someone when you are in the same room, each on separate computers, and you talk via Instant Messenger instead of speaking to them out loud, in person.”

The new list, compiled by advertising agency Cramer-Krasselt, and reported in MediaPost, is interesting in that many of the words refer to communication of some kind.

Take, for instance:

Info Snacking: v. - Wasting time at work by surfing the Web.

Blacking Out: v. - To turn off any device that people can reach you with (cell phone, two-way, computer, home phone, morse code, etc.) in order to avoid someone.

Dotcomrade: n. - A friend or acquaintance that you met online but have never met in person.

Or, the scariest word of all:

Defriend: v. - To remove somebody from your established list of contacts, considered the ultimate snub on social network.

Gotta go, to check out my Googleganger.

Posted by Alison Davis at 09:35 AM | Comments (0)

July 07, 2008

English as a second language

I’m a recovering English major. Although I know way too much about literature, and still spend most of my spare time reading, I’m trying to cut back. Really, I can quit anytime.

Well, maybe not, but I do try to keep in mind that most employees are not avid readers. Their idea of a perfect vacation is not a beach and a book. They don’t include “read Anna Karenina” on their “100 Things To Do Before I Die” list, they don’t care about “increasing their word power,” and they don’t go around bemoaning the death of literacy.

Words are just tools to employees—not something to craft, argue over, or negotiate approval of.

And, if Michael Erard is correct in his July Wired column, those words are about to undergo a significant shift. Mr. Erard’s prediction is that as non-native English speakers take over the language, English will morph into something quite different, the way that Latin became the foundation of French, Italian, Spanish and other languages.

The facts are these: By 2020, native speakers will make up only 15 percent of the estimated 2 billion people who will use English. Already, most conversations in English are between non-native speakers who use English as a common language.

Mr. Erard adds this surprising fact: An estimated 300 million Chinese—roughly equivalent to the total U.S. population—read and write English. But because many of these Chinese don’t get much practice speaking the language, a new dialect is emerging that he calls “Chinglish”—English sprinkled with Chinese grammar, idioms and pronunciation.

Will this be the death of English? Mr. Erard argues that just the opposite will be true: English will bear “unusual fruit” and become a part of many other languages, a global tongue called “Panglish.”

While purists may fret that English is being corrupted , everyone else in the world will just keep talking. And isn’t that what language is for?

Posted by Alison Davis at 03:16 PM | Comments (1)