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From: minow@decvax.UUCP (Martin Minow)
Newsgroups: net.nlang
Subject: Re: Vowels, Tenses and Incoherent Mutterings
Message-ID: <237@decvax.UUCP>
Date: Fri, 14-Oct-83 21:07:54 EDT
Article-I.D.: decvax.237
Posted: Fri Oct 14 21:07:54 1983
Date-Received: Sun, 16-Oct-83 07:47:30 EDT
References: <3392@rochester.UUCP>
Organization: DEC UNIX Engineering Group, Merrimack, NH
Lines: 27

Actually, comments on translation sparked by Friedburg's
excellent article.

Karlgren's Law states that translations are always 15%
longer than the original.  This is because you have to
explain concepts in the destination language that are
implicit in the source language.  A Swiss friend who
works with me said she never understood what "vanilla"
meant when describing computer programs until she
found out about the American ice cream culture.

Consider, if you will, the following problem that I
had a few years back.  I was translating a document
that had been written by three people.  One used
"he/she", one used "you", and the third used passive
voice constructions to avoid having to mention gender.
(This is more acceptable in the source language, Swedish,
than in American English.)  What should I do?  Preserve
the variability (and poor style) of the original, or
choose one of the forms (or choose another)?  Note that
I am not interested in which form is "socially correct",
but which is proper for the translation itself.
(I don't remember which I chose, but I'm sure I normalized
the text.)

Martin Minow
decvax!minow