In any translation, accuracy and completeness are key. No matter what type of text you\u2019re working on, you need to use the correct target-language terms and avoid omitting any vital information. But this rarely, if ever, means translating word for word. Quite apart from the grammatical and syntactical errors this approach would generate, words almost always need to be seen in context, not in isolation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
That being said, there are some types of text, like technical manuals and spec sheets, that require more literal translation while others, like marketing copy, call for considerably more creativity. In fact, marketing and advertising documents generally involve more than straightforward translation into the target language and have to be localized in line with the target culture. As a result, the target text may differ significantly from the source in terms of wording and even key concepts.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
So, what exactly does localization entail? Explaining this can be tricky. But our seasonal example should give even non-linguists an idea of how literal translation \u2013 no matter how grammatically and idiomatically correct \u2013 can fall wide of the mark if there are relevant differences between the source and target cultures.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Let\u2019s imagine you\u2019ve been asked to render the following sentence in German: \u201cWhat did Santa bring you?\u201d No problem: \u201cWas hat dir der Weihnachtsmann gebracht?\u201d Job done? Well, that depends.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The translation certainly isn\u2019t wrong: It\u2019s grammatically correct, seems to convey the sense of the English, and will be easily understood by German speakers. But whether the German sentence is fit for purpose depends entirely on the context in which it appears.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Let\u2019s say our sentence is taken from a U.S. commercial that an international client wants to localize for the German market. In the original, an American parent is talking to their child; in the localized commercial, both characters are German. (Note: We\u2019re not talking about subtitling or dubbing the original here. Our client wants a complete reshoot for the German-speaking market.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Now our translation is starting to look problematic. It\u2019s not that Germans don\u2019t know who Santa is \u2013 as is clear from the many Father Christmases dangling from balconies or thronging the confectionary shelves of supermarkets. The issue is that Santa doesn\u2019t bring German kids presents. And that\u2019s not because those kids are worse behaved than their peers in the United States.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
In Germany and other central European countries, the person who makes kids\u2019 faces light up at Christmas time isn\u2019t Santa but the Christkind (or Christkindl). Unlike Santa Claus, this bringer of gifts is not an elderly gentleman, but rather a cherubic child. And he delivers his presents not on December 25 but on Christmas Eve \u2013 and not via the chimney.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
With this in mind, it\u2019s time to go revisit our translation and get it more in tune with the German cultural context. Fortunately, in this example, we only need to replace one word. Our sentence now becomes: \u201cWas hat dir das Christkind gebracht?\u201d And we\u2019re good to go.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Admittedly, this is a very basic (and deliberately loaded) example, but it gives you some idea of how challenging localization can be, especially where the central concepts of the source are unfamiliar in the target culture.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Imagine, for example, that you\u2019ve been asked to localize a German commercial based on \u201cDinner for One\u201d<\/strong> for an English-speaking audience. This 1960s English vaudeville sketch has been broadcast on German TV every New Year\u2019s Eve for decades and has become something of an annual tradition. However, to the amazement of many Germans, it\u2019s virtually unknown in the UK. And if you\u2019re wondering what \u201cSame procedure as last year?\u201d means above, you\u2019ve just proved our point.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In this case, you\u2019d better get ready for some interesting discussions with your client. Depending on their outcome, the final product might be very far removed from the German original. So far removed, in fact, that it is transcreation. But that\u2019s a topic that would need a blog to itself.<\/p>\n\n\n\n If you\u2019re up for a Christmas localization challenge, how would you translate the following into English: \u201cWas hat dir der Nikolaus gebracht?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Clue: Ask yourself why all those chocolate \u201cSantas\u201d we mentioned above disappear from German supermarket shelves around December 6.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The team at Lexsys would like to wish all our customers, partners, and visitors to this website a peaceful \u2013 and safe \u2013 holiday season. We\u2019ll be taking a break from blogging for a few weeks and will publish our first post of 2021 toward the end of January. Until then, we wish you all the very best. See you next year.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Over the years, we\u2019ve heard people say that translating is basically about getting all the words from the source language into the target. While not totally wrong, if applied uncritically, this ultra-literal approach is a sure-fire recipe for unnatural, if not downright weird, translations. And the results will be even worse if the translator\u2019s task is to localize a text. In our final blog post of 2020, we look at the localization challenges posed by an apparently innocuous seasonal sentence.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1882,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[32],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1881","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-content-creation-en"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lexsys.de\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1881","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lexsys.de\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lexsys.de\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lexsys.de\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lexsys.de\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1881"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/lexsys.de\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1881\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1884,"href":"https:\/\/lexsys.de\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1881\/revisions\/1884"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lexsys.de\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1882"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lexsys.de\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1881"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lexsys.de\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1881"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lexsys.de\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1881"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}Bonus Round<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
Season’s Greetings<\/h2>\n\n\n\n