SOUTH AMERICA July/August 2007 GGETTINGETTING SSTARTEDTARTED: Guide Is It Time for a ® South American Strategy? Localization Outsourcing ® and Export in Brazil Doing Business ® in Argentina The Tricky Business ® of Spanish Translation Training Translators ® in South America 0011 GGuideuide SSoAmerica.inddoAmerica.indd 1 66/27/07/27/07 44:13:40:13:40 PPMM SOUTH AMERICA Guide: GGETTINGETTING SSTARTEDTARTED Getting Started: Have you seen the maps where the Southern Hemisphere is at South America the top? “South-up” maps quite often are — incorrectly — referred to as “upside-down,” and it’s easy to be captivated by them. They Editor-in-Chief, Publisher Donna Parrish remind us in the Northern Hemisphere how region-centric we are. Managing Editor Laurel Wagers In this Guide to South America, we focus on doing business and work in Translation Department Editor Jim Healey South America. Greg Churilov and Florencia Paolillo address common trans- Copy Editor Cecilia Spence News Kendra Gray lation misconceptions in dealing with Spanish in South America. Jorgelina Illustrator Doug Jones Vacchino, Nicolás Bravo and Eugenia Conti describe how South American Production Sandy Compton translators are trained. Charles Campbell looks at companies that have Editorial Board entered the South American market with different degrees of success. Jeff Allen, Julieta Coirini, Teddy Bengtsson recounts setting up a company in Argentina. And Bill Hall, Aki Ito, Nancy A. Locke, Fabiano Cid explores Brazil, both as an outsourcing option and an Ultan Ó Broin, Angelika Zerfaß opportunity for exporting. Advertising Director Jennifer Del Carlo CONTENTS All in all, the cases are strong for considering the opportunities Advertising Kevin Watson, Bonnie Merrell and resources at the south-up top of the map! — The Editors Webmaster Aric Spence Assistant Shannon Abromeit Intern Callie Welch Is It Time for a South American Strategy? Circulation Terri Jadick page 3 Charles Campbell Advertising: [email protected] Charles Campbell is president of spanishbackoffi ce SA, a provider of www.multilingual.com/advertising project management, translation and localization services in Córdoba, Argentina. 208-263-8178 Localization Outsourcing and Export in Brazil Subscriptions, customer service, back issues: [email protected] page 10 Fabiano Cid www.multilingual.com/subscribe Fabiano Cid is managing director of Ccaps Submissions: [email protected] Translation and Localization in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. Editorial guidelines are available at Doing Business in Argentina www.multilingual.com/editorialWriter page 14 Teddy Bengtsson Reprints: [email protected] Teddy Bengtsson is founding partner and CEO of Idea Factory Languages, This guide is published as a supplement to which has its main production center in Buenos Aires, Argentina. MultiLingual, the magazine about language technology, localization, web globalization and The Tricky Business of Spanish Translation international software development. It may be page 16 Greg Churilov and Florencia Paolillo downloaded at www.multilingual.com/gsg Greg Churilov is founder of Effective Translations, which specializes in Spanish and Portuguese. Florencia Paolillo is quality assurance manager at Effective Translations. Training Translators in South America page 18 Jorgelina Vacchino, Nicolás Bravo & Eugenia Conti Jorgelina Vacchino is junior team leader; Nicolás Bravo is engineering lead; and Eugenia Conti is a junior in-house translator, all at Ushuaia Solutions in Rosario, Argentina. page 2 The Guide From MultiLingual 0022 ##89GSG89GSG TOC.inddTOC.indd 2 66/27/07/27/07 44:14:37:14:37 PMPM SOUTH AMERICA GGETTINGETTING SSTARTEDTARTED:GuideSOUTH AMERICA Is It Time for a South American Strategy? CHARLES CAMPBELL outh America is often thought of as a television soap operas (telenovelas), lit- Linguistic unity has undoubtedly con- “Spanish-speaking region.” Indeed, erature and internet content can reach tributed to South America’s achieving Seleven of the twelve independent continent-wide popularity and be almost a certain degree of political unity and countries in the continent speak Spanish. universally understood without requir- finding a cultural common ground, help- The odd country out is Brazil, where Por- ing translation — something impossible ing avoid continent-wide conflicts on the tuguese is spoken. But Brazil is quite an on every other continent in the world. scale of the World Wars. While frictions exception, with just under half the territory Unless gringos are involved, South Ameri- remain over some unresolved territorial and half the population of the continent. cans will invariably conduct international issues, there are few, if any, true deeply For an in-depth look into the complexities business meetings or political gatherings held long-term animosities between of Brazil, see Fabiano Cid’s article on page entirely in Spanish. Indeed, the theme of neighboring countries. Indeed, South 10 in this guide. the recent 4th International Congress of Americans feel a certain collective identity Indigenous languages remain strong the Spanish Language that I attended in — and, on a wider level, a Latin American and are in everyday use in many parts Cartagena, Colombia, was “Unity in Diver- identity — based on common geographi- of the continent, particularly Quechua, sity.” More than 1,500 Spanish speak- cal, historical and cultural factors. This Aymara and Guaraní. Although Microsoft ers attended from all around the world, unity only goes so far and does not nec- and some other companies have had some and everyone understood one another essarily translate into common govern- of their products localized into indigenous (almost) perfectly. ment policies. US fears of South American languages, the main focus of this article will be on the Spanish-speaking countries of South America. Moreover, the former South America: A Few Definitions British colony and current member of the Commonwealth, Guyana (population to Get Things Straight 751,000), the former Dutch colony of Suri- name (pop. 438,000), and French Guiana South America is often confused with Latin America, a region that includes all countries in the Americas where Spanish, Portuguese and French are spoken. In contrast to Latin America is Anglo (pop. 202,000), an “overseas department” America, where English is spoken (principally the United States and Canada, but also Jamaica, Belize of Metropolitan France that uses the euro, and so on). Many people in the United States and Canada mistakenly presume, however, that Latin will not be covered in any detail either. America refers to “everything south of the Rio Grande” and that everyone speaks Spanish, wears huge hats, eats spicy food and physically resembles Antonio Banderas (who is actually from Spain). Unity in diversity? A special case Many Europeans, meanwhile, are piqued when they find paella is not on the menu in Bolivia, Peru This article will exclusively refer to or Venezuela. South America, the fourth largest and fifth In reality, Latin America is a highly diverse and complex region that confounds generalization, most populous continent in the world that and, although it may appear to be constantly on the economic, political and cultural boil, “Latin stretches all the way from the dense jun- music,” “Latin culture,” “Latin lovers” and even “Latin weather” are not nearly as hot and homo- gle border between Colombia and Panama geneous as Hollywood is telling us. Spanish is, in fact, not even the universal language of Latin in the north to the windswept and frigid America. 180 million people in Brazil speak Portuguese, and French is the official language of Haiti, French Guiana, Martinique and elsewhere. Chilly Québec is even technically considered part of island of Tierra del Fuego, shared by Chile Latin America. and Argentina, in the south. It will not cover Latino is another term that requires definition for the purposes of moving forward coherently Latin America or Latinos in any detail. in this guide. While almost certainly derived from Latin American, Latino means something quite What sets Spanish-speaking South different. For many Americans, Latino basically refers to everyone and everything from Latin America apart from all other continents America, although it is not normally understood to include Brazilians. The US Census Bureau in the world is its linguistic and cultural deems Latinos to be people who classify themselves as “Spanish, Hispanic, or Latino. Origin can unity. Business people, tourists and poli- be considered as the heritage, nationality group, lineage, or country of birth of the person or ticians alike can cross borders among 11 the person’s parents or ancestors before their arrival in the United States. People who identify different countries without even having their origin as Spanish, Hispanic, or Latino may be of any race.” Latino is thus a cultural term and to change languages. In Europe or Asia may include second, third or fourth generation descendents of Latin American immigrants, as compared to “Latin Americans” who actually live in Latin America. An example can be found in that the language of international communica- some Latinos in the United States actually speak English as their primary language rather than tion is English. In South America, on the Spanish. Well-known cases are Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, who was born in East other hand, Spanish is the lingua franca of Los Angeles and whose Spanish is at best considered “patchy,” and Cruz Bustamante,