ワニ

17:38 Jan 27, 2011 

Don't ya love it. One thing that elite educational institutions can never teach is proper judgment. I know...I went to one. lol

14:34 Jan 27, 2011 

Sheeeeesh! What's this world coming to! :-D

'Tis a very sad state of affairs, I do declare...I think we, as translators, have to guard against instigating the dummification of the populace....I'm not saying use ten-syllable words and get esoteric and all...But "crocodilian reptiles" means pretty much how it sounds.

Just adding another $.22 to the till. :-)

10:47 Jan 27, 2011 

"Crocodilians" and "crocodilian reptiles" are terms only Harvard graduates would know.

13:24 Jan 24, 2011 

I agree with your sentiments; indeed, I would be the last person on earth to deny the benefits of cultivating a colorful and variegated vocabulary. ^^

I just think that this time, in this context, it's less about vocabulary and more about concepts. Particularly when it comes to animals, Japanese and English often focus on different taxonomic ranks for different creatures.

Some common animal names, like "tiger," point to species, others, like "bluebird," point to genera, others, like "crocodile," refer to families, and still others, like "cetaceans," point to orders. On the other hand, there are words/phrases within each of these taxonomic ranks that would sound foreign and scientific to the lay reader, even in the vernacular form, like "elephantidae" (a family), "Mus nitidulus" (a species), or "even-toed ungulates" (an order). 「ワニ」in Japanese is more like "tiger" than "elephantidae" in English.

I think zoos and such should certainly educate their patrons on the scientific details of such creatures on those little signs outside their pens, but I think the same words would be a bit much for a little tourist blurb. As they love to say in Japan, it's all about TPO!

Just my $.22 ^^

07:15 Jan 24, 2011 

Err. Pardon my grammar errors on my prior posting ...

07:12 Jan 24, 2011 

Hi, there! I was at Oniyama Jigoku years ago...They supposedly had the biggest crocodile in the WORLD! (at that time). Hope he didn't turn into a handbag....Oh well.

Anyhow, I'm of a different opinion on the use of word such as "crocodilian" in travel brochures. ( As long as one doesn't get carried away and just use lots of hard words just for the sake of using hard words....Now, that's hokey and you don't want to be hokey.)

I think words are beautiful, fantastic and descriptive and we shouldn't hide or shy away from using words like crocodilian because we feel they may be too difficult or inappropriate for others. Certain words, or combinations of words, actually can grab people's attentions. I credit comic books for building my vocabulary as a child. I mean they had big wonderful words! My vocab would probably be peanut-sized if I hadn't read those gazillions of comic books! :-)

17:13 Jan 23, 2011 

If we're searching for the direct translation/English equivalent, then of course I would agree with options like "crocodilian" or "crocodilian reptile." However, as a contextualized translation question, I think the most natural and audience-appropriate wording should look somewhat different.

In my opinion, this sentence is a good candidate for rewording to avoid that forced sense of 直訳. I imagine we're talking about Oniyama Jigoku (鬼山地獄) in Beppu, where if memory serves there are crocodiles, alligators, and caiman. Given that many English speakers probably don't know that "crocodilians" and "crocodilian reptiles" are terms that cover all of these reptile families, and because this text is presumably aimed at tourists, I'd avoid getting too encyclopedic and just change the whole phrase to something like "more than 88 crocodiles, alligators, and caiman." Of course I'd check with the client to see which crocodilian family reptiles they actually have on-site, but my basic point is that English readers will be more familiar with the these creatures at the scientific family level than at the scientific order level.