TRANSLATORS WITHOUT BORDERS a Community Translating to Save Lives
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The Voice of Interpreters and Translators THE ATA Nov/Dec 2015 Volume XLIV Number 9 CHRONICLE TRANSLATORS WITHOUT BORDERS A Community Translating To Save Lives PEMT Yourself! Don't Leave Money You're Owed on the Table! Beyond Post-Editing: Advances in Interactive Translation Environments Switching from a Laptop to a Tablet: An Interpreter’s Experience A Publication of the American Translators Association CAREERS at the NATIONAL SECURITY AGENCY inspiredTHINKING When in the office, NSA language analysts develop new perspectives NSA has a critical need for individuals with the on the dialect and nuance of foreign language, on the context and following language capabilities: cultural overtones of language translation. • Arabic • Chinese We draw our inspiration from our work, our colleagues and our lives. • Farsi During downtime we create music and paintings. We run marathons • Korean and climb mountains, read academic journals and top 10 fiction. • Russian • Spanish Each of us expands our horizons in our own unique way and makes • And other less commonly taught languages connections between things never connected before. APPLY TODAY At the National Security Agency, we are inspired to create, inspired to invent, inspired to protect. U.S. citizenship is required for all applicants. NSA is an Equal Opportunity Employer and abides by applicable employment laws and regulations. All applicants for employment are considered without regard to age, color, disability, genetic information, national origin, race, religion, sex, sexual orientation, marital status, or status as a parent. Search NSA to Download WHERE INTELLIGENCE GOES TO WORK® 14CNS-10_8.5x11(live_8x10.5).indd 1 9/16/15 10:44 AM Nov/Dec 2015 Volume XLIV CONTENTS Number 9 FEATURES 19 Beyond Post-Editing: Advances in Interactive 9 Translation Environments Translators without Borders: Post-editing was never meant A Community Translating to be the future of machine to Save Lives translation. Neither was When communication brings aid, translation memory. translation matters. 23 13 Switching from a Laptop PEMT Yourself! to a Tablet: An Interpreter’s Getting ahead of machine Experience translation will help put your If you’re an interpreter thinking of career in the lead. how nice it would be not to have to carry that heavy laptop around to each assignment, you’ll be glad to learn that there’s very little that can’t be done efficiently on a tablet. 19 16 COLUMNS 16 4 From the President Don’t Leave Money You’re Owed 5 Letters to the Editor on the Table! Even if you’re not quite ready to 6 From the President-Elect retire, you should still be familiar 7 From the Executive Director with the procedure for claiming Social Security from other 8 Outreach Report countries while living in the U.S. 26 The Entrepreneurial Linguist 27 Interpreters Forum ON THE COVER: Translators without Borders chair Andrew 29 TechTalk Bredenkamp and program 23 31 Resource Review director Rebecca Petras in Kibera, Kenya (April 2012). 34 Member News www.facebook.com/ www.atanet.org Connect AmericanTranslatorsAssociation with ATA www.twitter.com/atanet www.linkedin.com American Translators Association 225 Reinekers Lane, Suite 590 Alexandria, VA 22314 USA Tel: +1.703.683.6100 Fax: +1.703.683.6122 E-mail: [email protected] Website: www.atanet.org FROM THE PRESIDENT CAITILIN WALSH Editorial Board [email protected] Corinne McKay (chair) Jeff Alfonso Chris Durban Geoffrey Koby Of Oatmeal and Legacies Michael Wahlster often start my columns with a few simplified access to voting, as well as the Publisher/Executive Director personal notes, and this last column CI—credentialed interpreter—marker of Walter Bacak, CAE I as your president is no exception. professionalism in our online directory. [email protected] The past year has been an exercise in letting go, with personal and professional It is not a platitude to say that I am Editor milestones and passages being marked at Jeff Sanfacon an alarming rate. In each instance, I take incredibly grateful to have had the [email protected] time to remind myself that it is a process, not a moment. opportunity to serve this Association Proofreader One vital step in the process is alongside such remarkable colleagues. Cathy Lada taking stock. When I stood before the membership four short years ago, I shared Advertising an admittedly ambitious vision: ATA as an Lauren Mendell umbrella organization that embraces the Along the way, it became clear that [email protected] diversity inherent in our industry, and a some things were not as important as I Tel: +1.703.683.6100, ext. 3001 place where a culture of professionalism imagined, and other issues emerged that Fax: +1.703.683.6122 pervades everything we do. My ambition were clearly higher priority. I had shared Design & Production was to make my legacy more than just a vision of international recognition of Blue House Design oatmeal on the breakfast buffet. our Certification Program, but the Board www.bluehouse.us I envisioned a certification exam that quite rightly felt that there was more candidates completed in their own offices. benefit to diverting our resources and The ATA Chronicle (ISSN 1078-6457) is published We are not there—yet—but the wheels energies into re-establishing a sustainable six times per year by the American Translators are in motion, with the Board authorizing public relations program, revamping our Association, 225 Reinekers Lane, Suite 590, testing of a secure online system that flagship publication, and systematically Alexandria, VA 22314 USA. Periodicals postage shows great promise. adjusting budgetary structures to poise paid at Alexandria, Virginia, and additional I pictured an association that welcomes ATA for its next round of growth. mailing offices.POSTMASTER: Send address all, and spent a great deal of time learning Volunteer-driven initiatives quite rightly changes to The ATA Chronicle, 225 Reinekers about and connecting with our interpreter drive much of the agenda. Lane, Suite 590, Alexandria, VA 22314 USA. colleagues in particular. I have emerged It is not a platitude to say that I am more convinced than ever that we can incredibly grateful to have had the The American Translators Association (ATA) both benefit a great deal from each other, opportunity to serve this Association was established in 1959 as a not-for-profit and am encouraged by the progress alongside such remarkable colleagues, professional society to foster and support the we have made to welcome and provide and have no doubt that future Boards will professional development of translators and professional parity to our “speaking” build on the tradition of advancing our interpreters and to promote the translation and colleagues in terms of providing profession in a dynamic fashion. interpreting professions. The subscription rate for a member is $49 (included in the dues payment). The U.S. subscription rate for a nonmember is $65. ADVERTISING DIRECTORY Subscribers in Canada and Mexico add $25; 8 Across Systems GmbH ................... www.across.net 12 InterpreterEd ....www.InterpreterEd.com/professional all other non-U.S. subscribers add $45. 24 Cross-Cultural Communications, LLC .................... 2 NSA (CACI) .............................www.NSA.gov/Careers Single copies are available for $7 per issue. www.cultureandlanguage.net 40 SDL ..................................................... www.sdl.com 18 Kilgray ...........................................www.kilgray.com 35 Translate.com .................... www.translate.com/ata ©2015 American Translators Association 14 Landmark Audio Technologies ................................ 5 University of Illinois .................................................. http://www.landmarkfm.com http://ma.translationandinterpreting.illinois.edu Reprint Permission 15 Lighthouse Translations ... www.lighthouseonline.com Requests for permission to reprint articles should be sent to the editor of The ATA Chronicle 4 The ATA Chronicle | Nov/Dec 2015 at [email protected]. THE CENTER FOR ATA SOCIAL MEDIA FROM OUR MEMBERS translation studies FACEBOOK20,663 LIKES 8,945 3,725 FACEBOOK FANS TWITTER FOLLOWERS LINKEDIN MEMBERS MA in FEATURED POST TOP TWEETS Translation It’s the words, stupid. and American Translators Understanding the Kremlin— Association or why we need to teach Russian in Interpreting October 26 at 5:15 AM schools. http://gu.com/p/4dhv8/stw Specialization Tracks: Reasons to Avoid Cheap #xl8 #1nt Translation http://wordsboutique. OCT 26 / @ATANET • Translation for the Professions com/cheap-translation/ #xl8 • Literary and Applied #translation Common International Payment Literary Translation Options for #Translators @atanet • Conference and http://skribo-agency.blogspot.com/ Community Interpreting 2015/10/international-payment- options-for.html #xl8 #1nt online OR OCT 27 / @ATANET LETTERS TO THE EDITOR ON CAMPUS The program can support students working CHARGING BY THE HOUR? THE IMPORTANCE OF KEEPING MEMBERS INFORMED from any of the 37 languages currently Judy Jenner’s suggestion in her September-October I was very interested to read Ted Wozniak and Evelyn taught at the University of Illinois at column that we charge by the hour appears to me to Yang Garland’s report in the July-August issue on the Urbana-Champaign School of Literatures, be premature at this point. financial considerations behind decisions made by Cultures and Linguistics. Text translation In addition to the fact that only experienced the Board (“Money Matters: The Story Behind Numbers students will