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Poll: What is the most serious mistake one can make when translating? Thread poster: ProZ.com Staff
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This forum topic is for the discussion of the poll question "What is the most serious mistake one can make when translating?".
This poll was originally submitted by Linh Hoang. View the poll results »
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Amandine Added 
United Kingdom
Local time: 08:24
Member (2010)
English to French
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| omitting key words | Mar 30, 2012 |
In my field (legal and financial) omitting one word can be a killer....I had an example in one of my proofreading yesterday.
the term "reasonable" was missing from the translation which transformed an obligation of best efforts into an obligation of results, which legally speaking is very different....but I've also seen some additions to the text that were pretty bad...
[Edited at 2012-03-30 08:23 GMT]
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monica.m
Italy
Local time: 09:24
Member (2011)
German to Italian
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adding information is terrible.
As a customer I could accept a mistake in omitting, but not in ADDING something that could be anything.....
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Nicole Schnell
United States
Local time: 00:24
English to German
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In memoriam | Translating word for word | Mar 30, 2012 |
Spelling errors, accidentally omitted information, even going overboard by adding information - all this can be fixed during the QA process.
Translating word for word however indicates that you shouldn't work as a translator in the first place.
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Isabelle F. BRUCHER (X)
Belgium
Local time: 09:24
English to French
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Anything that changes the meaning of the original.
I wouldn't split it at the asker has done.
For example, why not translate word by word if it's OK in the target language? It would even be silly to change that...
What's the purpose of this poll? A translation teacher trying to know how many points to deduct for each type of mistake?...
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neilmac
Spain
Local time: 09:24
Spanish to English
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I suppose it must be "omitting" really, but in principle I go for "all of the above".
I am usually mortified if I make even the most excusable spelling mistake - for example, I once spelt "negotiate" with a "c" (negociate) - probably because of Spanish influence - and I still think about it sometimes, years later.
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neilmac
Spain
Local time: 09:24
Spanish to English
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| Dotting the "i" | Mar 30, 2012 |
Mamande wrote: In my field (legal and financial) omitting one word can be a killer....I had an example in one of my proofreading yesterday. the term "reasonable" was missing from the translation which transformed an obligation of best efforts into an obligation of results, which legally speaking is very different....but I've also seen some additions to the text that were pretty bad... [Edited at 2012-03-30 08:23 GMT]
Best example I saw of this was a contract where omission of one comma changed the meaning or interpretation of the whole clause...
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Jack Doughty
United Kingdom
Local time: 08:24
Russian to English
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In memoriam | Simply getting it WRONG! | Mar 30, 2012 |
There is no option for wrongly translating a word or sentence. If there had been, I would have voted for it.
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Ty Kendall
United Kingdom
Local time: 08:24
Hebrew to English
Isabelle Brucher wrote:
Anything that changes the meaning of the original.
I wouldn't split it at the asker has done.
For example, why not translate word by word if it's OK in the target language? It would even be silly to change that...
What's the purpose of this poll? A translation teacher trying to know how many points to deduct for each type of mistake?...
I also fundamentally disagree with the breakdown of the answers. For those who are 'lucky' enough to work with more closely related source and target languages probably don't need to omit/add words/information very often, but I can tell you that the more divergence that exists between source and target languages, the more omission/addition is needed to convey/produce an accurate and idiomatic translation.
(...but then how do you define "key" information?)
I think the worst 'mistake' a translator can make is to project their own prejudice/bias/beliefs onto a text.
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| All of the above | Mar 30, 2012 |
In fact, all potential translation errors contained in the list, except spelling, are critical. But I chose "word for word" because such translations are 100% useless.
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| why not "mistranslation"? | Mar 30, 2012 |
This poll somehow misses "mistranslation" among options, which I suppose equals omitting information. I know we often bear word-to-word, "literal", translation especially when the source text reads rather complicated, involving unfamiliar terminology, redundant structure and so forth.
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I can't single out just one!
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| I agree with Jack | Mar 30, 2012 |
Jack Doughty wrote:
There is no option for wrongly translating a word or sentence. If there had been, I would have voted for it.
Recently I've been doing a series of back-translations, to make sure that the foreign-language translation matches the original. I found a couple of whoppers. One of them could have led to fatal consequences.
We've had this poll before, too! In my previous answer, I cited the famous mistake of "frozen semen" translated into Spanish as 'marineros congelados'. It really happened. Another one: Spanish "tuberculosis miliar" translated as 'military tuberculosis' (instead of 'miliary tuberculosis)--I've seen that one more than once!
Everything else pales in comparison to getting the meaning wrong.
[Edited at 2012-03-30 09:04 GMT]
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Ty Kendall
United Kingdom
Local time: 08:24
Hebrew to English
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John Cutler
Spain
Local time: 09:24
Spanish to English
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| Apparently not useless for some people | Mar 30, 2012 |
Alexander Kondorsky wrote:
But I chose "word for word" because such translations are 100% useless.
I totally agree with you Alexander but you'd be surprised how many clients I've had over the years who didn't like my translations because they weren't word for word translations.
They were irritated because they couldn't just read along easily word for word and line by line.
They wanted a dumbed-down translation that any grammar school kid could do and when they didn't get it they thought I was a bad translator.
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