| Pages in topic: < [1 2 3 4] > | Voting is inconsistent in English to Chinese and English to Portuguese Thread poster: Henry Dotterer
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axies 
Australia
Local time: 22:23
English
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| Your findings- PT(Br) versus PT (Eu) | Dec 12, 2008 |
Henry D wrote: Hi Henry Portuguese (Portugal) versus Portuguese (Brazil) I am glad that the issue above is being discussed and brought to the fore. I did spend quite some time analysing the English to Portuguese entries, as you asked, and could not help noticing how there was a sort of ‘Erradication process’ going on – Portuguese against Brazilian as in a soccer match to put it blatant. In all fairness to Brazilians and Portuguese, as an Australian Portuguese, I tried very hard to remain neutral when rating these tests, and I noticed the following: 1. Of the last 18 finalists, judging from the language variant, 12 came from a Brazilian background. 2. There is no doubt that there are two very clear variants in the Portuguese Language and that judging from above, either more Brazilians apply to do the tests or the other group has given up trying. 3. To me, re: ‘ Likes’ and ‘dislikes’ were very dependent on where the translator came from. I notice clear likes where grammatical sentences and mistranslations existed in both groups. 4. The context, I have no doubt, has gone against the minority in the group. Is this due to numbers? That I can’t answer. 5. Clearly there were many mistranslations that were allowed to pass, or missed in the finallists results because it sounded better to one group and not to the other. This would create antagonism and division on both sides and so I am not surprised to read what you consider to be an irregular pattern in the points system. 6. This pattern is also clearly visible in proZ.com Kudoz. More Brazilians help with questions than Portuguese but I have to say that more Brazilians ask questions as well. In conclusion, like José Henrique and Ligia Dias I also thought that Conventions existed between the two Countries; where Portuguese was One and the Only Language. Well I found out already in 1983 that it isn’t the case; Here is a good exemple: I had to sit and pass my NAATI exams in Brazilian Portuguese. There wasn’t an European Portuguese variant with NAATI, then. Now there is. So yes, it is time to have two distinct groups at www.proZ.com. I believe. Yours sincerely, Manuel Seixo Hi all, We are in the process of closing out the qualification round. Mostly, things are in order, with almost all pairs showing the type of voting pattern one would expect: a few entries that rose to the top having a bunch of relatively high ratings*, followed by a bunch of entries with mixed results, and then finally a few entries having received mostly lower scores. That is the case in all but 2 of the pairs that had qualification voting.** But there are two pairs in which a smooth continuum like that described above is not observed: English to Chinese, and English to Portuguese. In those pairs, results are mixed throughout the sorted list; the entries at the top have a good number of low ratings to go along with their high ones, and the ones at the bottom sometimes collect high ratings. (Chinese and Portuguese to English, in contrast, have more or less regular patterns.) Is the issue language variants? If so, what should be done? Shall we allow contestants to self-identify their language variant, and choose a winner for each variant? What would the variants be in Chinese? If the issue is not language variants, what would it be? Your input would be appreciated. Henry * There is sometimes an odd vote of 1 / 1, which in an otherwise highly rated entry stands out like a sore thumb. When we see that, we investigate. If a pattern of indiscriminate voting is found (ex. ratings of 1 for all of the entries in a pair), the results for that pair are recalculated with the offender's votes ignored. ** Well, a few pairs need more votes to firm up the patterns. We are leaving them open while dealing with this issue...
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I have been reading this forum and I believe almost everything has already been said. I am a native Eur PT and I confess I am unable to rate any text in the BR variant. My opinion is that the two variants should be considered as two different languages (or at least somehow separated) in this kind of contests. Yet, as far as I could read, this discussion covers only the pair English-Portuguese but what about other pairs with Portuguese as final language? I believe the same applies, or am I wrong?... See more I have been reading this forum and I believe almost everything has already been said. I am a native Eur PT and I confess I am unable to rate any text in the BR variant. My opinion is that the two variants should be considered as two different languages (or at least somehow separated) in this kind of contests. Yet, as far as I could read, this discussion covers only the pair English-Portuguese but what about other pairs with Portuguese as final language? I believe the same applies, or am I wrong?
Regards, ▲ Collapse
| | | | | A few comments | Dec 13, 2008 |
manuel seixo wrote:
I could not help noticing how there was a sort of ‘Erradication process’ going on – Portuguese against Brazilian as in a soccer match to put it blatant.
Manuel, I'd like to make things clear for the non-lusophone audience. There is NO such erradication process anywhere. People in Brazil and Portugal coexist happily in full awareness of the difference, and neither one is trying to make their variant prevail.
The imminent agreement covers spelling (hence writing) only, and will not change either variant's way of speaking, nor of otherwise using the language.
manuel seixo wrote:
1. Of the last 18 finalists, judging from the language variant, 12 came from a Brazilian background.
Simply compare the population of Brazil with the sum of all other lusophone countries' and you'll realize that Brazil was probably under-represented, numerically. Maybe Proz stats, disregarding lusophones living elsewhere, will show that there are more PT translators per inhabitant in Portugal than in Brazil.
manuel seixo wrote:
4. The context, I have no doubt, has gone against the minority in the group. Is this due to numbers? That I can’t answer.
Most likely. I'm guessing the figures, and might be grossly wrong, but I get the impression that 9 out of every 10 lusophones in the world speak Brazilian Portuguese. Nevertheless, European Portuguese is unwaveringly strong as always in the areas where it is spoken.
manuel seixo wrote:
6. This pattern is also clearly visible in proZ.com Kudoz. More Brazilians help with questions than Portuguese but I have to say that more Brazilians ask questions as well.
Again, it's a matter of proportion. Though it's a different phenomenon, UK English in no way is losing ground to US English.
manuel seixo wrote:
In conclusion, like José Henrique and Ligia Dias I also thought that Conventions existed between the two Countries; where Portuguese was One and the Only Language.
A minor confusion here, The convention, or agreement, is about spelling alone, as I said above.
What I meant by one and the same is:
The Brazilian Constitution says:
Art. 13. A língua portuguesa é o idioma oficial da República Federativa do Brasil.
The Portuguese language is the official language of the Federal Republic of Brazil.
The Portuguese Constitution says:
Artigo 11.º §3. A língua oficial é o Português.
The official language is Portuguese.
Neither mentions any variant.
manuel seixo wrote: Well I found out already in 1983 that it isn’t the case; Here is a good exemple: I had to sit and pass my NAATI exams in Brazilian Portuguese. There wasn’t an European Portuguese variant with NAATI, then. Now there is. So yes, it is time to have two distinct groups at www.proZ.com. I believe.
I wouldn't be so radical. I think PT-PT and PT-BR are one language as source, but should be treated as two languages as destination. So contest-wise there should be two contest from any language into Portuguese, however only one contest from Portuguese into any other language is perfectly possible. Of course there will be complaints if the text in Portuguese is too "typical" of either variant.
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Ligia Dias Costa
Portugal
Local time: 13:53
English to Portuguese
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SITE LOCALIZER | Thank you, José Henrique | Dec 13, 2008 |
[quote]José Henrique Lamensdorf wrote:
manuel seixo wrote:
I could not help noticing how there was a sort of ‘Erradication process’ going on – Portuguese against Brazilian as in a soccer match to put it blatant.
Manuel, I'd like to make things clear for the non-lusophone audience. There is NO such erradication process anywhere. People in Brazil and Portugal coexist happily in full awareness of the difference, and neither one is trying to make their variant prevail.
We DO coexist happily! And appreciate all the colleagues.
Thanks for bringing this up!
Ligia Dias Costa
| | | | Deolindo
Angola
English to Portuguese
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Out of the 7 contests that took place so far for English>Portuguese, 6 seem to have been won by Europeans (I dont know about other combinations). When the 7th contest was won by a Brazilian I was one of those who thought that the argument for separation was unfounded.
A sensible way of judging whether there is any merit to these claims for a separate status is for organizers to go back to those past contests and see whether any Brazilians have voted for the winning European entries or if a... See more Out of the 7 contests that took place so far for English>Portuguese, 6 seem to have been won by Europeans (I dont know about other combinations). When the 7th contest was won by a Brazilian I was one of those who thought that the argument for separation was unfounded.
A sensible way of judging whether there is any merit to these claims for a separate status is for organizers to go back to those past contests and see whether any Brazilians have voted for the winning European entries or if any Europeans have voted for the Brazilian winning text.
If winners were exclusively voted for by users of the same variant than the claim for a separate status should be entertained. Otherwise it is better to keep the Pandora's box shut before Argentines, Senegalese and South Africans also claim for a separate status. ▲ Collapse
| | | | Silvia Aquino
Brazil
Local time: 09:53
Member (2007)
English to Portuguese
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| I am not sure of this.... | Dec 16, 2008 |
[quote]Deolindo wrote:
Out of the 7 contests that took place so far for English>Portuguese, 6 seem to have been won by Europeans (I dont know about other combinations). When the 7th contest was won by a Brazilian I was one of those who thought that the argument for separation was unfounded.
Deolindo,
I do not know how many Brazilians were in each one of these 7 contests, but it is against the probability law that we won only one contest, don´t you think? I consider that separation is needed mainly because the Portuguese people do not consider that Brazilians and them share the same language. The refer to us as talking Brazilian, not Portuguese. Being so, we should be treated as a variant of the European Portuguese. So, if other countries ask for separation, and if they have strong reasons for this, why not?
Anyway, I saw that Proz decided to separate PT-PT from PT-BR and let´s see what will happen.
| | | | Ligia Dias Costa
Portugal
Local time: 13:53
English to Portuguese
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SITE LOCALIZER
Henry D wrote:
I'll make another post regarding what I think should be done in the current contest.
Thanks for listening, Henry!
Ligia Dias Costa
[Editado em 2008-12-16 15:15 GMT]
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RominaZ
Argentina
English to Spanish
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| Final voting in Spa>Por, Eng>Por is now underway. | Dec 16, 2008 |
Hi all,
You can view the latest announcement regarding this issue here http://www.proz.com/topic/123233
Thanks.
Romina
| | | | Deolindo
Angola
English to Portuguese
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| Two variants depending on source language? | Jan 8, 2009 |
RominaZ wrote:Contestants in those pairs were given the possibility to define the language variant of their entries and entries have been subsequently divided into two groups: Brazilian Portuguese and European Portuguese. This was feasible in language pairs (into Portuguese) with a sufficient number of entries to enable voting if divided.
Should Portuguese only be divided into two when the source language is English or Spanish, but seen as one and the same language when the source is German, French, or Italian?
I think separation should apply to all pairs, irrespective of the number of entries.
| | | | | Reviving the BRxPT Portuguese (language) ghost in 2009 | Oct 10, 2009 |
The PT-PT vs. PT-BR problem, AFAIK, is unique, for involving not only spelling, grammar and vocabulary, but also a cognitive issue as discussed before. I haven't heard of any other language whose variants go this far.
I was told once that there is a similar situation between Swedish and Norwegian, but I speak neither, and the late Scandinavian gentleman who told me about it never learned enough Portuguese to notice that there was any difference between its variants. Nevertheless, SV... See more The PT-PT vs. PT-BR problem, AFAIK, is unique, for involving not only spelling, grammar and vocabulary, but also a cognitive issue as discussed before. I haven't heard of any other language whose variants go this far.
I was told once that there is a similar situation between Swedish and Norwegian, but I speak neither, and the late Scandinavian gentleman who told me about it never learned enough Portuguese to notice that there was any difference between its variants. Nevertheless, SV-NO are two separate languages, no matter how similar, so actually translation should take care if this difference.
To make a long story short, I guess that an automatic translation contrivance could be enabled to effectively convert text between, say, EN-US and EN-UK, and maybe other sets of variants. However it wouldn't be effective for PT variants, as speakers of each readily understand the other's words, but often fail to glean the true intended meaning.
Stating it once again, any Brazilian translator is expected to work from the European variant, however not into it, and vice-versa, i.e. an European Portuguese translator regarding Brazilian Portuguese.
In the 2009 contest, I cast my opinions (likes/dislikes) and votes for PT-BR. Of course I could see some obvious mistranslations into PT-PT. To illustrate with a fabricated example, if the EN text says "ten", and it is translated into PT as "cem" (100), it's an unquestionable mistake into any variant.
Now my vote for the best translation into PT-PT is requested. On ethical grounds, I feel incompetent to do it. As said before, though as a Brazilian I can translate from PT-PT into EN, I am unable to translate from EN into PT-PT, only PT-BR. So how should I be expected to judge such attempts?
Quite frankly, I'd feel more qualified judging translations from FR or IT (languages that I speak, but don't translate professionally) into PT-BR than into PT-PT.
The same should apply to PT-PT translators judging PT-BR contest entries.
My suggestion to Proz, before announcing the winners, is to test the results in each PT variant, to see whether removing the votes from speakers of the "other" one will confirm them, or change the outcomes. Otherwise the solution to the problem that occurred last year will only have shifted it from the initial contest phase to the final one. ▲ Collapse
| | | | Imam Lajjam
Morocco
Local time: 13:53
Spanish to Arabic
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| What about Arabic? | Oct 10, 2009 |
Hi Henry,
What about Arabic?
Thanks!
Henry D wrote:
Hi all,
We are in the process of closing out the qualification round. Mostly, things are in order, with almost all pairs showing the type of voting pattern one would expect: a few entries that rose to the top having a bunch of relatively high ratings*, followed by a bunch of entries with mixed results, and then finally a few entries having received mostly lower scores.
That is the case in all but 2 of the pairs that had qualification voting.** But there are two pairs in which a smooth continuum like that described above is not observed: English to Chinese, and English to Portuguese. In those pairs, results are mixed throughout the sorted list; the entries at the top have a good number of low ratings to go along with their high ones, and the ones at the bottom sometimes collect high ratings. (Chinese and Portuguese to English, in contrast, have more or less regular patterns.)
Is the issue language variants? If so, what should be done? Shall we allow contestants to self-identify their language variant, and choose a winner for each variant? What would the variants be in Chinese?
If the issue is not language variants, what would it be?
Your input would be appreciated.
Henry
* There is sometimes an odd vote of 1 / 1, which in an otherwise highly rated entry stands out like a sore thumb. When we see that, we investigate. If a pattern of indiscriminate voting is found (ex. ratings of 1 for all of the entries in a pair), the results for that pair are recalculated with the offender's votes ignored.
** Well, a few pairs need more votes to firm up the patterns. We are leaving them open while dealing with this issue...
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| Good question! | Oct 10, 2009 |
Imam Lajjam wrote:
What about Arabic?
Once I was giving an end-client guidance on PT-EN translation, and they told me they'd need translation into Arabic too. I intended to use Proz to put them in contact with some suitable Portuguese-Arabic translator.
So I asked a colleague who works in my pair and has Syrio-Lebanese ancestry but doesn't speak Arabic, if there were variants in Arabic.
Somewhat hesitatingly he told me that - as far as he knew - Arabic was always one and the same language, regardless of geographic location; no variants.
Can you either elaborate on this, or provide links (in some Western language, please) that do so?
| | | | Samuel Murray
Netherlands
Local time: 14:53
Member (2006)
English to Afrikaans
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| As far as I know | Oct 10, 2009 |
José Henrique Lamensdorf wrote:
So I asked a colleague who works in my pair and has Syrio-Lebanese ancestry but doesn't speak Arabic, if there were variants in Arabic.
Somewhat hesitatingly he told me that - as far as he knew - Arabic was always one and the same language, regardless of geographic location; no variants.
As far as I know there are variants, most of which are mutually intelligible. However, for someone who wants to have a translation that is to be published, mere intelligibility isn't enough -- the readers of his text must not feel as if they're reading foreign material.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Varieties_of_Arabic
Don't most multinational companies use Egyptian Arabic for their software and user manuals, though?
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