Google Has Broken and the Dog Ate My Dictionary
Thread poster: Fiona Grace Peterson
Fiona Grace Peterson
Fiona Grace Peterson  Identity Verified
Italy
Local time: 13:19
Italian to English
Jan 30, 2013

Is it just me, or does term research seem to be a skill on the brink of extinction?
I always thought solid research skills were fundamental to the translation process, but some posters seem to have no idea how to research basic terminology.

Perhaps it is just my language pair (Italian to English) or have others noticed it too?
Why is this? Sheer laziness? Or has the greater availability of information brought with it a corresponding inability to actually find the term
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Is it just me, or does term research seem to be a skill on the brink of extinction?
I always thought solid research skills were fundamental to the translation process, but some posters seem to have no idea how to research basic terminology.

Perhaps it is just my language pair (Italian to English) or have others noticed it too?
Why is this? Sheer laziness? Or has the greater availability of information brought with it a corresponding inability to actually find the term needed?

For those who perhaps recognise themselves in this, what do you find most difficult about finding terminology? And does anyone have any good advice or tips to help those who struggle with this aspect of translation?
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Allison Wright (X)
Allison Wright (X)  Identity Verified
Portugal
Local time: 12:19
The dog vomited on my dictionary. Jan 30, 2013

I cannot speak for the English-Italian pair.

I do notice in Portuguese-English in particular (and also in Fr-En and De-En) that term questions quite often need not have been asked at all if online dictionaries or Google Search has been made use of. That, and not understanding the subject of the translation well enough seem to be the main reasons why some questions appear to have been asked out of laziness.

In fairness, though, we all have gaps in our knowledge, and it i
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I cannot speak for the English-Italian pair.

I do notice in Portuguese-English in particular (and also in Fr-En and De-En) that term questions quite often need not have been asked at all if online dictionaries or Google Search has been made use of. That, and not understanding the subject of the translation well enough seem to be the main reasons why some questions appear to have been asked out of laziness.

In fairness, though, we all have gaps in our knowledge, and it is becoming increasingly difficult when searching the Internet to identify reliable sources of information. Perhaps askers feel more secure knowing that some other translator (who speaks with authority, and does the research on their behalf, or has much more experience) confirms their hunches.

I think it is a symptom, too, of our "instant" society. Everything is supposed to be available at our fingertips. Solutions and gratification are expected to be immediate.

Before the internet, before e-mail, the translator had to engage in a lot more rigorous thought to achieve an accurate translation. Often, the only resources one had were to be found in the library - or in one's own collection of pamphlets, journals, and specialist glossaries and dictionarys after painstakingly breaking a sentence/term down - or by speaking to an expert in the field. This process helped to train us to think about *what* it was we were looking for; we we found the right term or expression, we recognised it immediately.

If you have no clue as to what you are actually looking for, it becomes that much harder to search for it, doesn't it?
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Fiona Grace Peterson
Fiona Grace Peterson  Identity Verified
Italy
Local time: 13:19
Italian to English
TOPIC STARTER
Common sense Jan 30, 2013

You make some very valid points.

Allison Wright wrote:
In fairness, though, we all have gaps in our knowledge, and it is becoming increasingly difficult when searching the Internet to identify reliable sources of information.


Knowledge gaps are one thing. It's happened to everyone to take on a translation they weren't entirely comfortable with, or a text in a sector you know well includes terminology from another. But some askers post questions that could easily be solved by applying common sense, searching other Internet sites on the same subject, or those of companies that make similar products.
Reliable sources of information... again it's common sense. If doing a medical translation, for example, I know I can trust PubMed or the Mayo Clinic; I would be more suspicious of Yahoo! Answers, or certain websites offering health "advice".

Allison Wright wrote:
If you have no clue as to what you are actually looking for, it becomes that much harder to search for it, doesn't it?


Again, true!!! But if you "haven't a clue" what you're searching for, it begs the question as to whether you should be doing that particular translation at all...


 
Kay Denney
Kay Denney  Identity Verified
France
Local time: 13:19
French to English
Well... Jan 30, 2013

I don't ever post questions, but...

I think partly it's because of how we're taught at school. You don't look words up in the dictionary, you ask the teacher. Who is much more reliable because they can have an idea of why you're asking and where you're coming from, and your level of understanding.

I also think that people haven't yet caught up with the technology.

In the days before Internet, translation often involved ferreting out a friendly specialist
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I don't ever post questions, but...

I think partly it's because of how we're taught at school. You don't look words up in the dictionary, you ask the teacher. Who is much more reliable because they can have an idea of why you're asking and where you're coming from, and your level of understanding.

I also think that people haven't yet caught up with the technology.

In the days before Internet, translation often involved ferreting out a friendly specialist. I remember talking with a classic music freak while translating stuff for a music museum. He then recommended I went to speak to a guy working in a music library the other side of Paris for the terms he couldn't help me with, which I duly did, crossing my fingers that it wouldn't be the guy's day off. Another time I called a company making a product similar to that of my client (and being told by an irate French secretary that I needed to find someone who could speak English!)

It's not just in Kudoz either. You see it in fora everywhere, people asking a casual question when all they had to do is key a word into a search engine. They feel some rapport with the person they are asking, or sense that the person knows what they're talking about, and they prefer a human being's answer to one generated by a computer.

When you think about it, it's rather sweet actually, that we still prefer human interaction than interacting with machines.
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Audrey Pate
Audrey Pate
Italy
Local time: 13:19
Italian to English
Laziness Jan 30, 2013

In my view, it's just sheer laziness.

Sometimes it can take me ages to find the right word: numerous searches in online dictionaries, search engines, my trusty thesaurus, the proz.com term search, various glossaries, wikipedia, image searches etc. etc.

In the end it's usually out there somewhere, and in my opinion, since knowing how to find terms and how to perform this kind of research is an important part of our profession, I really believe that posting a question on
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In my view, it's just sheer laziness.

Sometimes it can take me ages to find the right word: numerous searches in online dictionaries, search engines, my trusty thesaurus, the proz.com term search, various glossaries, wikipedia, image searches etc. etc.

In the end it's usually out there somewhere, and in my opinion, since knowing how to find terms and how to perform this kind of research is an important part of our profession, I really believe that posting a question on a term search page, should only be our very last resort.

Then again, we are all different and if our mothers used to wash their clothes by hand and think nothing of it, maybe expecting others to do our dirty work for us is just the way things are going!
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Josephine Gardiner
Josephine Gardiner  Identity Verified
United Kingdom
Local time: 12:19
Spanish to English
+ ...
Reassurance? Jan 31, 2013

I'm fairly new here, but I've often wondered why so many people ask so many questions in KudoZ. I look at the questions occasionally, and think well, why didn't you look in WordRef/Wikipedia/IATE/Linguee/dusty old dictionary - whatever? Unless they have already more or less decided on the answer, and are looking for reassurance, perhaps.

I don't answer questions either, because even when people give context, it is never really enough - I find I need the context of the whole document
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I'm fairly new here, but I've often wondered why so many people ask so many questions in KudoZ. I look at the questions occasionally, and think well, why didn't you look in WordRef/Wikipedia/IATE/Linguee/dusty old dictionary - whatever? Unless they have already more or less decided on the answer, and are looking for reassurance, perhaps.

I don't answer questions either, because even when people give context, it is never really enough - I find I need the context of the whole document, including background, style, purpose, subject etc to decide on the right word. Actually I think term searches are one of the easier aspects of translation - I'm more wary of words or expressions that seem familiar initially, but may be being used in an unusual way. On the other hand, when you're faced with odd regional usages (quite common in Spanish) it can be helpful to ask someone with local knowledge.
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Stephen Gagne
Stephen Gagne  Identity Verified
United States
Local time: 08:19
Spanish to English
+ ...
Term lookup requests are okay Jan 31, 2013

I dunno.

Though Collins Online comes in real handy for my own lookup needs, I read the term searches often for curiosity's sake, and if I learn something new, I feel it's a blessing; if I post an answer, I would hope there would be others who would feel the same.

I guess it's just my own personal belief in the free flow of information being the basis of a free society.

(Of course it really makes it a bear to index and access the content of older posts.)


 
Triston Goodwin
Triston Goodwin  Identity Verified
United States
Local time: 06:19
Spanish to English
+ ...
One observation Jan 31, 2013

I get email notifications for a few different translation portals, groups and forums, mostly when people need help with a word or phrase. Some of them are really simple basic words that even google translate can get right, but the proz ones are usually a lot more complicated or specific. I like answering questions when I have free time, just for the challenge of it, but I'm running out of free time haha.

 
Samuel Murray
Samuel Murray  Identity Verified
Netherlands
Local time: 13:19
Member (2006)
English to Afrikaans
+ ...
Everyone is a beginner at first Jan 31, 2013

Fiona Peterson wrote:
Is it just me, or does term research seem to be a skill on the brink of extinction?


Nope, but term research is something that must be learnt. And... the techniques that worked five years ago don't work today, because search engines change and the way information is provided changes. Some of my really cool moves from five years ago yield no useful results today, and some of the things I do today when doing term research would have been pretty useless five years ago.

I also find it interesting that two term researchers can use the same search engine and discover different resources because they zoom in on different things or use slightly different search terms.

Also don't forget that search engines are now bubbled (i.e. the results that you get and the results that I get from the exact same search query may be completely different from each other, based on the search engine's assumptions about who we are and what we are likely to want to find).


 
Giles Watson
Giles Watson  Identity Verified
Italy
Local time: 13:19
Italian to English
In memoriam
There's always the phone Jan 31, 2013

Texte Style wrote:

When you think about it, it's rather sweet actually, that we still prefer human interaction than interacting with machines.



I can't remember how many Italian wineries I've rung up over the years to find out whether the owner's "nipote" was a "nipote di nonno" (grandchild) or "nipote di zio" (nephew/niece).


 
Tatty
Tatty  Identity Verified
Local time: 13:19
Spanish to English
+ ...
The advent of the Internet Jan 31, 2013

I bet people translate much better nowadays thanks to the Internet, than in the past when they had to rely on specialists and libraries. They must have had a bit more time to do them in too if they had time to go to a library to look up a term. I couldn't have been a translator before the Internet...

 
Christine Andersen
Christine Andersen  Identity Verified
Denmark
Local time: 13:19
Member (2003)
Danish to English
+ ...
Alta Vista is dead and Google is too clever by half! Jan 31, 2013

I had searches on Alta Vista down to a fine art. I could get a handful of really briliant hits on many occasions, within a couple of minutes. End of search.

Even after several years of trying to crack Google, I know I am on shifting sand.

I can't even persuade it to change languages - I have several identities on my favourites bar as a desperate measure, because no matter what I do, Google asks 'did you mean... ?' and offers me a billion hits on something else.
<
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I had searches on Alta Vista down to a fine art. I could get a handful of really briliant hits on many occasions, within a couple of minutes. End of search.

Even after several years of trying to crack Google, I know I am on shifting sand.

I can't even persuade it to change languages - I have several identities on my favourites bar as a desperate measure, because no matter what I do, Google asks 'did you mean... ?' and offers me a billion hits on something else.

Neat tricks that used to work on Alta Vista by juggling with the advanced search options take a week to find settings for on Google...

I trained as a technical librarian for pity's sake. I know how you find things in rational dictionaries and databases, but the eternal guessing game with Google drives me mad.

I can understand why people prefer Kudoz!
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Orrin Cummins
Orrin Cummins  Identity Verified
Japan
Local time: 21:19
Japanese to English
+ ...
It depends on the source language Feb 8, 2013

The argument to look something up in a dictionary makes sense, although I think it depends a lot on your source language.

Being able to copy/paste into a browser is a huge advantage for me going from Japanese to English, because I often come across characters I've never seen before, and have no idea how to pronounce them, so it's not so easy to look them up in a paper dictionary or other reference. Or, a character will have an unusual/rare reading in a particular compound, which cau
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The argument to look something up in a dictionary makes sense, although I think it depends a lot on your source language.

Being able to copy/paste into a browser is a huge advantage for me going from Japanese to English, because I often come across characters I've never seen before, and have no idea how to pronounce them, so it's not so easy to look them up in a paper dictionary or other reference. Or, a character will have an unusual/rare reading in a particular compound, which causes the same problems.

As far as people asking simple questions, I don't think this is a translator problem, but rather a human one. Technology has made people (more?) lazy, which is ironic because it actually empowers them with the ability to accomplish more on their own in many cases, without the help of others. Just look at some of the questions people ask on Yahoo! Answers or similar sites - it probably took them more than twice as long to type the question than it would have to enter the relevant search query into an engine and find the answer to their question at the top of the list, or at least above the fold.

As someone else said, I think a lot of the time these simple questions are more an attempt to interact with people rather than a genuine quest for knowledge. Although I suppose they could serve both roles to some extent.
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Jessie LN
Jessie LN  Identity Verified
United Kingdom
Local time: 12:19
Spanish to English
+ ...
It's not just terminology Feb 8, 2013



Neat tricks that used to work on Alta Vista by juggling with the advanced search options take a week to find settings for on Google...

I trained as a technical librarian for pity's sake. I know how you find things in rational dictionaries and databases, but the eternal guessing game with Google drives me mad.

I can understand why people prefer Kudoz!


I also trained as a librarian and through working in educational libraries have found that most students go straight to Google to find information (on pretty much anything!). Anywhere else is seen as unnecessary or too complex. Too many clicks, too many passwords, too many search form variations, etc. Many students who rely on Google also lack quality-control filters.

As for advanced searching with Google, this may be of help:
http://support.google.com/websearch/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=136861

There is a lot of useful, high-quality information online but I think many people just don't know how to find it or how to interact with search engines to obtain quality answers.

Instead of typing "what does X mean in English" into a search engine, why aren't people searching for "online dictionary of X language" and finding a dictionary of that language that is available in print and online? Because they are prioritising convenience over quality.

The ways in which users are now expected to interact with the internet have really been dumbed down a lot recently, too. The aim seems to be to increase ease and convenience without having to actually learn anything new, e.g. TV adverts tell you to "search CompanyName" online instead of posting their URL on the screen. People type "hotmail" into the search bar of their browser instead of just entering hotmail.com into the URL bar. Why do things the more direct and efficient way when you can do it the easy way?

Sorry, I may have gone off on a tangent...


 


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Google Has Broken and the Dog Ate My Dictionary






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