Jost Zetzsche

Jost Zetsche's e-letter for translation professionals is an interesting insight into various recent developments.

Its 158th issue includes a note on translation quality: in the brave new world of machine translation and crowdsourcing (now "sharecropping"), quality has been replaced by the concept of usefulness.

Also mentioned is the latest batch of Google Input Method Editors (IME) for 14 languages (Arabic, Bengali, Farsi, Greek, Gujarati, Hindi, Kannada, Malayalam, Marathi, Nepali, Punjabi, Tamil, Telugu, and Urdu). They can be downloaded for free.

"Once installed, they become one of the keyboard languages you have available in Windows (just like the different languages you can install via Windows that are accessible through the small language icon on your taskbar). The concept is that you have easy access to those languages by being able to use a Western-language keyboard, type the pronunciation of the word in the respective language, and the IME will give you a number of auto-complete suggestions of alike-sounding real words in that language with the language-specific characters you can choose from (very much like Windows IMEs for Chinese, Japanese, or Korean)."

And finally, some free alignment editors:
"The alignment tool YouAlign from the same company as the above-mentioned SynchroTerm has now been declared free for good (it was originally supposed to be for a limited time). It's a fantastic offer -- it uses the same engine as the commercial counterpart AlignFactory; it offers the same wide range of file formats, including PDF; and the only limitations are file size (1 MB) and that you can align only one file pair at a time (the latter limitation can easily be circumvented with file concatenators -- I use Twins File Merger)."

More information on Jost can be found on this website. You can subscribe to the fortnightly free newsletter via this site.

JoSTrans special issue (13) now online

This issue is devoted to Chinese<> English translation. All articles are free to view online here:http://www.jostrans.org

Translators Struggle to Prove Their Academic Bona Fides

I've already sent this round as an email, but I think it has a place on the blog too. See this article: http://chronicle.com/article/Translators-Struggle-to-Prove/63542/?key=SzglJ1FrMiQeYnE0eiBCKCYBbnMtdRotOCVEYHkaYFFc

2010 EU English-language translation competition

"We are waiting for the 2010 EU English-language translation competition!" is the name of a new group on facebook.

If you are able to translate from at least two official EU languages into native-standard English and are interested in a varied, interesting, challenging and well-paid position as an EU institution translator, join this group now!

You must also hold an EU passport to be eligible.

When the competition is officially announced, all members of this group will be informed.

http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=189470229968&ref=mf

LionBridge survey

LionBridge, a numeronym for L10NBridge and one of the biggest companies in the localisation industry, has an interesting blog to which you can subscribe at http://blog.lionbridge.com/

Until 31 January you can participate in their Global Social Media Survey on http://blog.lionbridge.com/social-media/

Meet the Translation Group

The Translation Group was founded in 2001 when we launched the first MSc in Scientific, Technical and Medical Translation with Translation Technology in the UK. Since then, the Translation Group has gained itself an international reputation for the quality of its Translation Studies research and teaching, particularly in the fields of specialised and audiovisual translation.


We offer a wide range of stand alone courses in translation technology for those looking to learn more about this ever-changing area, we also run a very successful e-learning course focusing on software and game localisation, and an intensive summer course in audiovisual translation.

We organise a series of seminars delivered by leading Translation Studies scholars and practitioners of translation from other universities and companies in the UK and abroad. These seminars promote both professional and research-based aspects of translation and offer our students a unique opportunity for informal contact with leading academics and professional translators.

We invite applications from students wishing to study for the degrees of MPhil or PhD by undertaking research in a range of areas or disciplines within Translation Studies.
We also welcome academic visitors who are interested in our work and want to spend a period of research leave with us.

more information about the Translation Group via http://www3.imperial.ac.uk/humanities/translationgroup

Getting started - welcome!

Dear blog visitor

Welcome to the blog of Imperial College’s Translation Group. In an era where everybody feels entitled to voice opinions in blogs, and jury or voter based programmes make up a significant part of television broadcasts, it is not our intention to just add a blog for its own sake.

We intend to use this as a platform for events that are organised by the Translation Group and to make the things that happen around the department available to a wider public.

As such you can be expecting announcements of upcoming events such as Saturday or Summer Courses, a Getting Started in Translation Profession Week, visiting speakers, visiting academics as well as news and faits divers from both translation studies and the wider translation industry.

The blog is set to allow for visitors and users to add comments yourselves, so please feel free to contribute constructive content in any way, shape or form you consider appropriate.

Enjoy!
Imperial College London’s Translation Group