For a good fifteen years, Freehand was the professional's choice of graphic design program. During this time, it developed a loyal following and continues to occupy a prominent place in the affections of many a graphic designer. But, like all software, a failure to...
We have been blogging a lot recently about how Translation Memory (TM) saves time, money and hassle, as well as streamlining the entire translation process. The progress this field has seen in recent years have made TM an invaluable tool for translation. Put simply,...
In modern English, express is a verb meaning - broadly - to convey information, generally of a more personal nature, as well as an adjective meaning very fast. From the verb, we have formulas such as 'expression of regret', 'self-expression', 'expressing milk', whilst...
In recent blog posts we have looked at different forms of Arabic, including those used by the by the ex-leaders of Egypt, Tunisia and Libya. This post will focus on the way that different dialects of Arabic differ from Modern Standard Arabic (MSE) and each other, and...
What is the connection between Shibboleth and Parsley? OK, so clearly parsley has been used as a shibboleth at some point, but when and in what manner? Let’s start with what, precisely, a shibboleth is. Wikipedia, anyone? “A shibboleth (/ˈʃɪbəlɛθ/ or /ˈʃɪbələθ/) is a...
I have just come across a thrillingly imaginative bit of etymological scholarship, and I wanted to summarise it briefly for the non-Spanish-speakers among my readership. I was interested in the peninsular Spanish expression '(echar) un polvo', which is broadly...
Often, the first thing people want to know when they need a professional translation is how much it is going to cost. This is clearly a crucial question, but one which becomes more nuanced as we start delving deeper into the nature of translation. In short, there are...
We have emphasised the benefits and savings associated with building a Translation Memory (TM) for a particular customer, and the way that the TM gets better and better the more documents are processed using it. But a TM can also be built 'retroactively' - that is,...
We have a lot of trouble with food. A tortilla de patatas, for example, could be translated as Spanish omelette. But should we assume that English speakers know that what a tortilla is? Should you translate it as Spanish omelette even though (in the UK, at least) a...
Last week, I quoted two authors' divergent perspectives on writing in a language which has been imposed on your culture by a colonising power. Following on from this, today I want to look at a few approaches to the politics of literary translation. Tejaswini...