Commenter Thread

Comments on A little language practice by wjca

Since this is a thread about language.....

It occurs to me to wonder. How many of the ultra-macho xenophobes in this administration have a clue that "macho" is of Spanish origin?

Can we get a Hegseth/Miller cage match? Preferably with weapons like brass knuckles, which are non-lethal enough to have both get seriously damaged before one strokes out.

Not all of our immigrants are people. A lot of words came here and settled, too.

It comes down to What are you trying to do? If your intention is to translate the message, then go with "three words." If your intention is to translate the words, "stick with "four words" like the translation we have here.

Or, as I learned it, are you doing a literal translation or a free translation? Back when I was in grad school, and looking to test out of German for the language requirement, I did a literal translation first**, and used that to do a free translation. Because what was wanted was to demonstrate understanding of the article being translated.

** It was a pretty trivial test. Time to look up (open dictionary!) every word that wasn't a cognate for the literal translation. And still plenty of time to do the free translation. Good thing, though, that they didn't require a translation going the other way!

What caught my eye was the obvious inconsistency of referring to a three-word phrase as four words. 

I read that and just assumed that the phrase in Spanish had four words. That kind of difference between languages being not at unusual.

See, in German (because you studied that), "von dem" ("from the") being rendered as "vom" -- two English words becoming one in German. Differences between English and Japanese can be even larger, as I'm sure lj can attest.

I will be pleasantly surprised if the administration is merely "disappointed.". What I expect is more like "outraged at the betrayal.".