Wednesday, August 20, 2003
European Union Translation Costs
Twenty official languages = $1 billion. Details here.
The EU has some translation troubles despite the expense:
[T]he English which echoes through the glass and concrete halls of the EU is not quite the same as is heard in Buckingham Palace.
"English always gets butchered," said one of the EU's 700 interpreters. "International English is a kind of pidgin English."
Interpreters, a tight-knit crowd, are reluctant to go on the record about their shortcomings, but one can glean plenty of examples simply by putting on a pair of earphones.
Take, for instance, the French speaker whose "head counts" became "hit counts." Or the Dutch representative who told a colleague he didn't "want to mow the lawn before your feet." He meant to say he didn't want to "cut the rug out from under you."
After you finish laughing, you might take a moment to be afraid. You see, the EU is worried about just 20 tongues. Clinton Executive Order 13166 requires any recipient of federal funds to function in any language anyone speaks at any time -- and there are over 300 languages spoken in the United States!
What the EU admits it can't do for just twenty languages, the United States is requiring be done for 15 times as many languages.
|posted by Jim on 2:37 AM|
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