I recently had the privilege of speaking at the XIX World Congress of the Fédération Internationale des Traducteurs/International Federation of Translators (FIT). FIT is an international organization made up of more than 100 translator, interpreter and terminologist associations, representing over 80,000 translators in 55 countries. My speech was on how translation theory applies to community interpreting.
It's always a pleasure to speak at something like this, but I'm especially flattered to read this review by attendee Maria Cristina de la Vega posted online:
[Terena Bell] offered an engaging presentation about problems in interpretation and how translation theory is a good framework for improving interpretation. As an illustration, Terena discussed the difficulties in interpreting the idiom “drink & drive”. When interpreting that phrase into other languages, one needs to use the technique of amplification to convey its meaning. (Target language employs more words than the source language to express the same idea). She stressed how important training is to avoid pitfalls for new interpreters, such as false friends, that the uninitiated may not recognize. Terena started out in the field of community interpreting and is very familiar with the challenges facing the standardization of our profession in that subspecialty.
Thanks, Cristina! I'm glad you enjoyed it!
Showing posts with label conferences. Show all posts
Showing posts with label conferences. Show all posts
Wednesday, August 10, 2011
Thursday, July 1, 2010
Translation's Triple Bottom Line
I have always considered In Every Language to be a social enterprise. The community nature of what we do is inherent. We take what one man is trying to say and make it so another man can understand it. Without us, information would be unable to correctly pass between entire cultures and countries. Being a translator automatically means being a helper. As language service providers (LSP’s), we do not have to integrate social cause into our business model, because, regardless of the message translated, the social benefit is in the act of translating the message itself.
I knew this when I started In Every Language. I had recently left a career in television and was looking for something to give purpose to my life—a way to help people. I started volunteering as an interpreter for Francophone Africans settling in Louisville. Somewhere along the line, I started getting paid. Any other job I had or took on seemed fruitless, without soul. It was only when I was interpreting that I felt like I was fully alive, like I was contributing, like I was using a gift God had given me to benefit others. When I interpreted, I disappeared and became a catalyst for change. The tremendous capability that translating and interpreting have to help others is why I got into this business. This focus on helping was always there—developing it into a business came later.
As I learned more and more about how to run a company it became, oddly enough, harder to help. Not everyone seemed grateful or even willing to receive what In Every Language had to offer. The director of a local refugee resettlement agency even accused me of trying to monopolize on “poor refugees” and of taking advantage of them for personal gain. Having started this company purely to provide a service to the community, these words stung and I searched my and my company’s behavior, trying to figure out what had led her to say such hurtful things. How could offering safe, professional, valued work to someone who deserves it be taking advantage?
It didn’t take long, though, for me to realize what she meant. She didn’t think I was taking advantage of them; she thought I was profiting from them. In Every Language is the first for-profit language service provider to contract members of Kentucky’s refugee population. I won’t go so far as to say that I was Kentucky’s first social entrepreneur, but I was definitely the first one she had ever met.
It’s been a weary road since then. Both I and In Every Language have had to prove ourselves over and over. The company will be five this August and I’m still trying to explain what social entrepreneurship is and why it’s important.
We’ve all heard of the bottom line, but many social enterprises have a triple bottom line. In the traditional model, for-profit companies focused on, well, profit. Then the double bottom line came around: people and profits. As our society rips itself apart with war and violence, people want healing. They want more. They are coming to expect both an economic and a social return on their money. As a global society, we no longer want to make only money; we want to make money and a difference.
But things are changing again. Just as the double bottom line was starting to catch on, we now face a triple one: people, profit, and planet. According to Bill Lockhart, author of Wal-Smart: What It Really Takes to Profit in a Wal-mart World, the for-profit world’s economic sustainability allows both social and environmental change to occur. And this makes sense. You may have the winning ticket to improving your world, but if you can’t afford to get to the store and cash it, those winnings are never going to help a soul.
I’m calling this blog “Translation’s Triple Line,” when really and truly, I’ve written more about that double line I mentioned and how I’ve staked myself out as a social entrepreneur. But I did say things were getting ready to change again. As soon as we’ve finally gotten people onto this people + profits idea, we’re going to start focusing on the planet, too. In Every Language is getting ready to move to the triple bottom line.
While the “people” side of translation is inherently clear, the “planet” side is going to take a little work. I recently attended Sustainable Brands, a conference for marketers of sustainable companies looking to learn how to better convey this idea of a triple bottom line to their customers. I have to admit, some people I met wondered why I was there. LSP’s don’t manufacture anything; the only thing we really have to recycle around here are the employees’ water cups, and in our case, we don’t even do that. We use reusable glasses instead. When people think sustainable industry, you’ve gotta admit, the first thing they think is not translation.
The key, though, is that we all have to be responsible. Language Line Services recently came out with an environmental responsibility report of sorts, discussing its green initiatives. And while the document was pretty much 20 pdf pages full of greenwashing, at least folks there are trying and aware.
Here at In Every Language, we’ve abandoned our downtown office and are going virtual in order to become both commute and paper-free. We’re giving preferential treatment to interpreters who take public transit to appointments instead of driving. We’re vetting the sustainability of any product vendor before use them. We’re also taking on more environmentally-focused translation projects, such as green marketing and packaging, CSR reports, and groundwater testing, and have pledged not to work with clients who are socially irresponsible. We’re doing what we can when we can—just like we’ve been doing for the past five years.
We’re not perfect. No company or person is. Like the double bottom line before, this idea may take a while for some people to catch on. But we do have a clear head on our shoulders and a clear goal of where we want to be. We’re determined. And we’re not going to take a single bottom line for an answer.
I knew this when I started In Every Language. I had recently left a career in television and was looking for something to give purpose to my life—a way to help people. I started volunteering as an interpreter for Francophone Africans settling in Louisville. Somewhere along the line, I started getting paid. Any other job I had or took on seemed fruitless, without soul. It was only when I was interpreting that I felt like I was fully alive, like I was contributing, like I was using a gift God had given me to benefit others. When I interpreted, I disappeared and became a catalyst for change. The tremendous capability that translating and interpreting have to help others is why I got into this business. This focus on helping was always there—developing it into a business came later.
As I learned more and more about how to run a company it became, oddly enough, harder to help. Not everyone seemed grateful or even willing to receive what In Every Language had to offer. The director of a local refugee resettlement agency even accused me of trying to monopolize on “poor refugees” and of taking advantage of them for personal gain. Having started this company purely to provide a service to the community, these words stung and I searched my and my company’s behavior, trying to figure out what had led her to say such hurtful things. How could offering safe, professional, valued work to someone who deserves it be taking advantage?
It didn’t take long, though, for me to realize what she meant. She didn’t think I was taking advantage of them; she thought I was profiting from them. In Every Language is the first for-profit language service provider to contract members of Kentucky’s refugee population. I won’t go so far as to say that I was Kentucky’s first social entrepreneur, but I was definitely the first one she had ever met.
It’s been a weary road since then. Both I and In Every Language have had to prove ourselves over and over. The company will be five this August and I’m still trying to explain what social entrepreneurship is and why it’s important.
We’ve all heard of the bottom line, but many social enterprises have a triple bottom line. In the traditional model, for-profit companies focused on, well, profit. Then the double bottom line came around: people and profits. As our society rips itself apart with war and violence, people want healing. They want more. They are coming to expect both an economic and a social return on their money. As a global society, we no longer want to make only money; we want to make money and a difference.
But things are changing again. Just as the double bottom line was starting to catch on, we now face a triple one: people, profit, and planet. According to Bill Lockhart, author of Wal-Smart: What It Really Takes to Profit in a Wal-mart World, the for-profit world’s economic sustainability allows both social and environmental change to occur. And this makes sense. You may have the winning ticket to improving your world, but if you can’t afford to get to the store and cash it, those winnings are never going to help a soul.
I’m calling this blog “Translation’s Triple Line,” when really and truly, I’ve written more about that double line I mentioned and how I’ve staked myself out as a social entrepreneur. But I did say things were getting ready to change again. As soon as we’ve finally gotten people onto this people + profits idea, we’re going to start focusing on the planet, too. In Every Language is getting ready to move to the triple bottom line.
While the “people” side of translation is inherently clear, the “planet” side is going to take a little work. I recently attended Sustainable Brands, a conference for marketers of sustainable companies looking to learn how to better convey this idea of a triple bottom line to their customers. I have to admit, some people I met wondered why I was there. LSP’s don’t manufacture anything; the only thing we really have to recycle around here are the employees’ water cups, and in our case, we don’t even do that. We use reusable glasses instead. When people think sustainable industry, you’ve gotta admit, the first thing they think is not translation.
The key, though, is that we all have to be responsible. Language Line Services recently came out with an environmental responsibility report of sorts, discussing its green initiatives. And while the document was pretty much 20 pdf pages full of greenwashing, at least folks there are trying and aware.
Here at In Every Language, we’ve abandoned our downtown office and are going virtual in order to become both commute and paper-free. We’re giving preferential treatment to interpreters who take public transit to appointments instead of driving. We’re vetting the sustainability of any product vendor before use them. We’re also taking on more environmentally-focused translation projects, such as green marketing and packaging, CSR reports, and groundwater testing, and have pledged not to work with clients who are socially irresponsible. We’re doing what we can when we can—just like we’ve been doing for the past five years.
We’re not perfect. No company or person is. Like the double bottom line before, this idea may take a while for some people to catch on. But we do have a clear head on our shoulders and a clear goal of where we want to be. We’re determined. And we’re not going to take a single bottom line for an answer.
Saturday, April 10, 2010
Where the Disconnect Is Not
"We are building a bridge." This is the phrase I heard over and over again at the US Conference on African Immigrant Health (USCAIH) this week.
Last week, I blogged on the disconnect. I wrote about how our nation’s leaders were unaware of language’s vital role in healing, how people don’t heal if they don’t understand, how interpreting in of itself is a profession with ethics and rules. The disconnect is there.
But here, with community leaders from all throughout the African Diaspora, the disconnect is not. Instead, there is a concerted effort to bring together aspects of all industries that help people--especially Africans--heal.
I arrived here Wednesday. Our first event was a meet and greet where attendees stood and introduced themselves, explaining what their interest was in African health and what they expected to get from the conference. I identified myself as Terena Bell with In Every Language, said I was here to represent the medical interpreting industry, that I had seen this disconnect and I was here to learn how we could fix it. When I sat down, almost every person in the room said “thank you” and some even clapped. An Ethiopian man walked up to me and instantly started talking about the difficulty of getting trained interpreters in Minneapolis, the need for continued training for those entering the profession. A man from Ghana stood up in front of everyone and talked about how interpreters for Muslim patients need to be culturally aware of faith’s role in healing—and better paid. At Harvard, people wondered why I was even there, had never thought of language as a health-related issue. Here, at the USCAIH, attendees were willing to join with the language industry in its fight.
I am not writing this to compare one conference to the next, or the Alliance for Health in the African Diaspora (the conference organizers) to Harvard. What Harvard does not know is clearly to Harvard’s loss. But, just as I had to point out where the disconnect is, I have to point out where the disconnect is not.
So what makes the difference? Why were these two audiences so different?
I have long said that there are two types of doctors in the world: those who want to make sure their patients understand and those who do not. Perhaps there are similarly two types of people: those who want to help people understand and those who do not. I am not calling the other group cold or cruel. But there are people in this world whose drive and desire to improve their world is innate, unavoidable, a moving, liquid force. I saw that this week in the faces of everyone here. Representatives from all across the African diaspora came together to share, to commune, to--as they put it--build a bridge. They, too, talked about breaking down silos, but they took the time to find out what those silos held.
Friday, I presented on language access for African LEP's. Every single person who heard about my topic said thank you, whether they attended my session or not. Dozens of people said, “We need that.” Most had interpreter stories of their own. A keynote on African Americans living with HIV even had a medical interpreter working from French to English. There is clearly no disconnect here.
But there is a need. They need us. And we need them. After what happened at Harvard, and after the warm reception I received here, I completely changed my presentation. It had initially been on where to get materials, how to get professional translation when materials weren’t there already. But meeting these people and learning more about how active they want to be in every area impacting African American health, I changed it.
There are three factors in LEP patient healing: the patient, the provider, and the language professional. All three must be on top of their game for healing to happen. Like our government, they must be in checks and balances with one another—they must all play their role, but they must also listen. For the patient, I discussed Title VI and HIPAA, the need to know you have a right to a professional, medical interpreter. For the provider, I discussed the need for cross-cultural training in universities and from hospital associations as CME’s. For the language professional, I said we must listen. We must listen to the patient and the provider to learn their need before we can address it. I told the people there that we could not do it without them, that if we as a language profession are wrong, then they must make us stop and listen.
And that’s the difference. As a language industry, we have been speaking, but at Harvard, no one had yet listened. I still believe what I wrote and I stand beside my words. But I also feel cool water flowing from around the rock. We must continue client education, but we must also allow our clients to educate us, listening to each other. If we are truly to build a bridge, we must meet each other in the river with our tools.
Last week, I blogged on the disconnect. I wrote about how our nation’s leaders were unaware of language’s vital role in healing, how people don’t heal if they don’t understand, how interpreting in of itself is a profession with ethics and rules. The disconnect is there.
But here, with community leaders from all throughout the African Diaspora, the disconnect is not. Instead, there is a concerted effort to bring together aspects of all industries that help people--especially Africans--heal.
I arrived here Wednesday. Our first event was a meet and greet where attendees stood and introduced themselves, explaining what their interest was in African health and what they expected to get from the conference. I identified myself as Terena Bell with In Every Language, said I was here to represent the medical interpreting industry, that I had seen this disconnect and I was here to learn how we could fix it. When I sat down, almost every person in the room said “thank you” and some even clapped. An Ethiopian man walked up to me and instantly started talking about the difficulty of getting trained interpreters in Minneapolis, the need for continued training for those entering the profession. A man from Ghana stood up in front of everyone and talked about how interpreters for Muslim patients need to be culturally aware of faith’s role in healing—and better paid. At Harvard, people wondered why I was even there, had never thought of language as a health-related issue. Here, at the USCAIH, attendees were willing to join with the language industry in its fight.
I am not writing this to compare one conference to the next, or the Alliance for Health in the African Diaspora (the conference organizers) to Harvard. What Harvard does not know is clearly to Harvard’s loss. But, just as I had to point out where the disconnect is, I have to point out where the disconnect is not.
So what makes the difference? Why were these two audiences so different?
I have long said that there are two types of doctors in the world: those who want to make sure their patients understand and those who do not. Perhaps there are similarly two types of people: those who want to help people understand and those who do not. I am not calling the other group cold or cruel. But there are people in this world whose drive and desire to improve their world is innate, unavoidable, a moving, liquid force. I saw that this week in the faces of everyone here. Representatives from all across the African diaspora came together to share, to commune, to--as they put it--build a bridge. They, too, talked about breaking down silos, but they took the time to find out what those silos held.
Friday, I presented on language access for African LEP's. Every single person who heard about my topic said thank you, whether they attended my session or not. Dozens of people said, “We need that.” Most had interpreter stories of their own. A keynote on African Americans living with HIV even had a medical interpreter working from French to English. There is clearly no disconnect here.
But there is a need. They need us. And we need them. After what happened at Harvard, and after the warm reception I received here, I completely changed my presentation. It had initially been on where to get materials, how to get professional translation when materials weren’t there already. But meeting these people and learning more about how active they want to be in every area impacting African American health, I changed it.
There are three factors in LEP patient healing: the patient, the provider, and the language professional. All three must be on top of their game for healing to happen. Like our government, they must be in checks and balances with one another—they must all play their role, but they must also listen. For the patient, I discussed Title VI and HIPAA, the need to know you have a right to a professional, medical interpreter. For the provider, I discussed the need for cross-cultural training in universities and from hospital associations as CME’s. For the language professional, I said we must listen. We must listen to the patient and the provider to learn their need before we can address it. I told the people there that we could not do it without them, that if we as a language profession are wrong, then they must make us stop and listen.
And that’s the difference. As a language industry, we have been speaking, but at Harvard, no one had yet listened. I still believe what I wrote and I stand beside my words. But I also feel cool water flowing from around the rock. We must continue client education, but we must also allow our clients to educate us, listening to each other. If we are truly to build a bridge, we must meet each other in the river with our tools.
Wednesday, March 31, 2010
Is Our Industry Disconnected from Clients?
There is a disconnect--a divide. The difference between what we know and what our clients know is vast and the gulf that lies between us is insurmountable alone.
This is how I felt walking away from the Harvard Social Enterprise Conference. Held February 28th, its global health track featured leaders from international pharmaceutical companies, the Pentagon, the Obama administration--even George W’s daughter sat a panel under her Global Health Corps role. These, supposedly, were the world’s greatest minds on global health and social enterprise, with Harvard‘s reputation fully stacked behind them. But when it came to language services, they didn‘t know jack.
Here’s what made me realize this:
I was sitting in the back row listening to a panel made up of Barbara Bush, the director of the International Health Specialist Program for the Pentagon (Lt Col Mylene Huynh), Merck’s director of global affairs (Kris Natarajan), Management Services for Health‘s CEO (Jono Quick), and two professors from the Harvard School of Public Health (Drs Jessica Cohen and Till Barnighausen). The topic was “Breaking the Silos: Collaborations That Impact Complex Global Health Issues.” According to the program summary, the session’s goal was to bring together people and information from different fields, all with the goal of improving global health.
When it came time for Q&A, I raised my hand. “People don’t heal if they don’t understand,” I said. “The rest of the world does not speak English.” I then asked what we could do as a language industry to help connect with the global health one.
There was a long pause. Too long. Then Lt Col Huynh from the Pentagon spoke. Bilinguals and heritage speakers need to learn medical terminology. Sure, I thought, that’s a given. The military, she claimed, does not have systems in place to teach medical linguists medical language terms. Okay. Fair enough. She’s acknowledged their need and is speaking out. That, we can address; lessons, we can do.
But then Harvard’s Dr Barnighausen spoke up. And his response made me wonder what I’ve been doing with the last four years of my life, what our industry has been doing the last ten. He told a story about the one time he had worked with a “translator.” He asked the “translator” to ask the patient if his stomach hurt. The “translator” and the patient had a long back and forth conversation before the “translator” said, “No.” Dr Barnighausen’s reaction was to stop working with translators (which is good, as he needs interpreters instead) because “they’re all like that.”
I wanted to weep. I sincerely and utterly wanted to weep. The moderator went on to the next question while I sat there in shock. The camera Harvard was using to record it all (Harvard, conveniently enough, was unable to locate the video upon request) panned away from me and back toward the panel as they continued, but I didn‘t hear a word. I was too in shock. This “expert,” this Dr Barnighausen, wasn’t an expert on language‘s crucial role in health care at all.
This was Harvard. These people were supposed to know what they were doing.
After the session, I ran to the front to try and catch Dr Barnighausen. If, for some reason, our entire industry, the multiple associations that we have, the whole of both certification movements, had not been able to reach him, I would. But I didn‘t. The moderator carted him away before we had the chance to talk. I did get to speak with Lt Col Huynh, though. I told her how glad I was she articulated her answer so clearly, how much I appreciated the information. I told her how much Dr Barnighausen’s remarks had pained me, then what she said pained me even more. “But he’s right. They’re all like that.”
I immediately started gushing about the National Council on Interpreting in Health Care, its code of ethics, the certification for medical interpreters expected this fall. “You mean there are ethics?” she said, “This is a profession?”
This woman works for the Pentagon. She is in charge of our entire military’s medical efforts.
Clearly, there is a disconnect. It is wide and vast and sprawling.
As a language industry we are working hard--harder than ever before--to develop interpreting as a profession. We have more trade associations than ever before, more conferences than in years past, more training opportunities than before. But do they help? And, if so, whom?
There is a disconnect. When representatives of our own government, professors at the country’s purported top school--when our nation’s leaders have never heard of us--when they stand aghast at the sheer principle of our having ethics--when they think we’re all bilingual quacks who summarize--what are we doing wrong? Who are our efforts for?
Conference after conference, session after session, we talk, but to each other. We must talk to the client. We must talk to those who need to listen. Instead of teaching Bridging the Gap, we should be bridging the gap between us and our clients.
But how? In the past, this has fallen on the freelancer, on the LSP, on the person selling the services. That’s why we call it client education. But the LSP can not tackle this great gap by itself. The language industry is being squeezed. Rates are falling, client demands are going up. If the LSP refocuses its effort to focus on client education, the burning of resources will mean there is no LSP left. We need our associations to help us. Clients do not always believe freelancers or LSP’s because they assume we have something to sell. But if the associations would work together to sell clients on our industry, there’s no telling who or how many people we could help.
We must close the disconnect. We must stop thinking intrinsically and think externally. Educational PSA’s on YouTube, an NCIHC booth at global health conferences. Our associations must market this industry just as we LSP’s market our services. There should be no excuse for our nation’s leaders to know so little. Again, there should be no excuse for our nation’s leaders to know so little!
Where are we going wrong? How can we take this talking together and make it working together to educate the client? How do we bridge the disconnect?
This is how I felt walking away from the Harvard Social Enterprise Conference. Held February 28th, its global health track featured leaders from international pharmaceutical companies, the Pentagon, the Obama administration--even George W’s daughter sat a panel under her Global Health Corps role. These, supposedly, were the world’s greatest minds on global health and social enterprise, with Harvard‘s reputation fully stacked behind them. But when it came to language services, they didn‘t know jack.
Here’s what made me realize this:
I was sitting in the back row listening to a panel made up of Barbara Bush, the director of the International Health Specialist Program for the Pentagon (Lt Col Mylene Huynh), Merck’s director of global affairs (Kris Natarajan), Management Services for Health‘s CEO (Jono Quick), and two professors from the Harvard School of Public Health (Drs Jessica Cohen and Till Barnighausen). The topic was “Breaking the Silos: Collaborations That Impact Complex Global Health Issues.” According to the program summary, the session’s goal was to bring together people and information from different fields, all with the goal of improving global health.
When it came time for Q&A, I raised my hand. “People don’t heal if they don’t understand,” I said. “The rest of the world does not speak English.” I then asked what we could do as a language industry to help connect with the global health one.
There was a long pause. Too long. Then Lt Col Huynh from the Pentagon spoke. Bilinguals and heritage speakers need to learn medical terminology. Sure, I thought, that’s a given. The military, she claimed, does not have systems in place to teach medical linguists medical language terms. Okay. Fair enough. She’s acknowledged their need and is speaking out. That, we can address; lessons, we can do.
But then Harvard’s Dr Barnighausen spoke up. And his response made me wonder what I’ve been doing with the last four years of my life, what our industry has been doing the last ten. He told a story about the one time he had worked with a “translator.” He asked the “translator” to ask the patient if his stomach hurt. The “translator” and the patient had a long back and forth conversation before the “translator” said, “No.” Dr Barnighausen’s reaction was to stop working with translators (which is good, as he needs interpreters instead) because “they’re all like that.”
I wanted to weep. I sincerely and utterly wanted to weep. The moderator went on to the next question while I sat there in shock. The camera Harvard was using to record it all (Harvard, conveniently enough, was unable to locate the video upon request) panned away from me and back toward the panel as they continued, but I didn‘t hear a word. I was too in shock. This “expert,” this Dr Barnighausen, wasn’t an expert on language‘s crucial role in health care at all.
This was Harvard. These people were supposed to know what they were doing.
After the session, I ran to the front to try and catch Dr Barnighausen. If, for some reason, our entire industry, the multiple associations that we have, the whole of both certification movements, had not been able to reach him, I would. But I didn‘t. The moderator carted him away before we had the chance to talk. I did get to speak with Lt Col Huynh, though. I told her how glad I was she articulated her answer so clearly, how much I appreciated the information. I told her how much Dr Barnighausen’s remarks had pained me, then what she said pained me even more. “But he’s right. They’re all like that.”
I immediately started gushing about the National Council on Interpreting in Health Care, its code of ethics, the certification for medical interpreters expected this fall. “You mean there are ethics?” she said, “This is a profession?”
This woman works for the Pentagon. She is in charge of our entire military’s medical efforts.
Clearly, there is a disconnect. It is wide and vast and sprawling.
As a language industry we are working hard--harder than ever before--to develop interpreting as a profession. We have more trade associations than ever before, more conferences than in years past, more training opportunities than before. But do they help? And, if so, whom?
There is a disconnect. When representatives of our own government, professors at the country’s purported top school--when our nation’s leaders have never heard of us--when they stand aghast at the sheer principle of our having ethics--when they think we’re all bilingual quacks who summarize--what are we doing wrong? Who are our efforts for?
Conference after conference, session after session, we talk, but to each other. We must talk to the client. We must talk to those who need to listen. Instead of teaching Bridging the Gap, we should be bridging the gap between us and our clients.
But how? In the past, this has fallen on the freelancer, on the LSP, on the person selling the services. That’s why we call it client education. But the LSP can not tackle this great gap by itself. The language industry is being squeezed. Rates are falling, client demands are going up. If the LSP refocuses its effort to focus on client education, the burning of resources will mean there is no LSP left. We need our associations to help us. Clients do not always believe freelancers or LSP’s because they assume we have something to sell. But if the associations would work together to sell clients on our industry, there’s no telling who or how many people we could help.
We must close the disconnect. We must stop thinking intrinsically and think externally. Educational PSA’s on YouTube, an NCIHC booth at global health conferences. Our associations must market this industry just as we LSP’s market our services. There should be no excuse for our nation’s leaders to know so little. Again, there should be no excuse for our nation’s leaders to know so little!
Where are we going wrong? How can we take this talking together and make it working together to educate the client? How do we bridge the disconnect?
Tuesday, March 23, 2010
Jost Zetzsche on MT vs TM
I recently had the privilege of attending (and speaking at) this year's TCD conference. While there, Jost Zetzsche spoke on the (non-)threat machine translation poses to the translation industry. Here are some of his thoughts:
Wednesday, August 26, 2009
ATA, TCD, & Conferences in General
Today my translation project manager and I spent a lot of time pouring over the schedule of seminars for the upcoming American Translators Association (ATA) conference in New York City. After attending the conference last year, I wasn't really overwhelmed with a great need to go again this year, but after attending the Translation Company Division (TCD) conference in Quebec this summer, I'm reconsidering. One of the reasons I had elected not to go to this year's ATA was that the sessions just aren't built for language service provider (LSP) owners. And that's okay. The ATA's purpose isn't really to help us, no matter how hard the TCD may try. The ATA is for the freelancer. I agree with Ted Wozniack, German translator and active ATA member, when he says that the ATA should drop corporate memberships all together--that the Association of Language Companies (ALC) should represent LSPs while the ATA represents freelancers, and that the ALC and the ATA should represent the profession as a whole. But I meander.
Simply put, while the ATA conference might be fun, it's not at all educational for LSP execs. This year's schedule, for example, is packed full of such money-making thrillers as "U.S. and European Union Translation Quality International Standards" and "The Translation Service Market in China as Seen from Local Language Services Providers." Utterly enthralling and very applicable to running a more profitable business, I know. (Please note the sarcasm in my tone.)
So then why am I even thinking about going? Because I've finally learned what a conference is all about. Call me a silly girl, but when I went to my first translating & interpreting conference in 2006, I went to learn. Did I learn there, and have I learned at others since? Yes. Lesson one? You don't go to conferences to learn. You go to network.
Networking is a historically ugly word, conjuring up images of chiropractors and realtors huddling around the cheese table at your local chamber of commerce event, pushing off glossy business cards with their photos printed on them, pronouncing your name wrong as they say, "Call me," and shove the rectangular piece of paper stock in your hand. But networking at a conference--when done right--is entirely different than at chamber mixers, 100% of which I now make a forcible effort to avoid. At a conference, you can spend one-on-one time with people who actually do what you do (rare in our profession) and openly discuss ideas to help you both grow and learn. If you do it right, as I finally learned how to do at this year's TCD, then a freeflow of ideas is created, leading to the innovation that will see translating & interpreting through the crowdsourcing panic and beyond the fear and doubt caused by the continuing improvement of machine translation. These conferences then become the place where you can individually assure yourself and collectively improve. If there are truly any new thought leaders being born in our profession, then conferences are the places where they are grown.
So, all that said, will I be at ATA? I think we both know, if I am, it sure won't be for the sessions.
Simply put, while the ATA conference might be fun, it's not at all educational for LSP execs. This year's schedule, for example, is packed full of such money-making thrillers as "U.S. and European Union Translation Quality International Standards" and "The Translation Service Market in China as Seen from Local Language Services Providers." Utterly enthralling and very applicable to running a more profitable business, I know. (Please note the sarcasm in my tone.)
So then why am I even thinking about going? Because I've finally learned what a conference is all about. Call me a silly girl, but when I went to my first translating & interpreting conference in 2006, I went to learn. Did I learn there, and have I learned at others since? Yes. Lesson one? You don't go to conferences to learn. You go to network.
Networking is a historically ugly word, conjuring up images of chiropractors and realtors huddling around the cheese table at your local chamber of commerce event, pushing off glossy business cards with their photos printed on them, pronouncing your name wrong as they say, "Call me," and shove the rectangular piece of paper stock in your hand. But networking at a conference--when done right--is entirely different than at chamber mixers, 100% of which I now make a forcible effort to avoid. At a conference, you can spend one-on-one time with people who actually do what you do (rare in our profession) and openly discuss ideas to help you both grow and learn. If you do it right, as I finally learned how to do at this year's TCD, then a freeflow of ideas is created, leading to the innovation that will see translating & interpreting through the crowdsourcing panic and beyond the fear and doubt caused by the continuing improvement of machine translation. These conferences then become the place where you can individually assure yourself and collectively improve. If there are truly any new thought leaders being born in our profession, then conferences are the places where they are grown.
So, all that said, will I be at ATA? I think we both know, if I am, it sure won't be for the sessions.
Friday, August 14, 2009
The Vendor-Client Relationship
Thanks go to Rina Ne'eman with Rina Ne’eman Hebrew Language Services for finding this video and showing it at this year's TCD conference:
Thursday, August 13, 2009
Who Do Amateurs Practice On?
No long post today, just a couple of ideas for thought:
We've all seen bilinguals looking to get their "start" as interpreters. But my question is, who are they starting on? And what are they starting with?
All these thoughts tonight got started when I found where I'd written down a Cynthia Roat quote after hearing her speak at a medical interpreters' conference in Lexington, Ky. I put it here below, then leave you with that:
"The emergency room, the courtroom, these are not the places to be practicing!"
We've all seen bilinguals looking to get their "start" as interpreters. But my question is, who are they starting on? And what are they starting with?
All these thoughts tonight got started when I found where I'd written down a Cynthia Roat quote after hearing her speak at a medical interpreters' conference in Lexington, Ky. I put it here below, then leave you with that:
"The emergency room, the courtroom, these are not the places to be practicing!"
Sunday, July 5, 2009
Monday, June 15, 2009
Grant Awarded for Medical Interpreting
The following article written from staff reports is being reprinted from the June 15, 2009 issue of the Citizen-Times, a newspaper in Ashville, Nc:
"Buncombe medical society receives grant to expand interpreter network"
Buncombe County Medical Society Foundation has received a $7,000 grant from the Community Foundation of Henderson County to expand the WNC Interpreter Network into Henderson County.
WIN provides qualified and trained interpretation and translation services to medical practices and other agencies. WIN has provided interpretation services for 1,300 patients at 4,000 appointments in Buncombe County since its inception in 2005.
WIN will partner with the Blue Ridge Community Health Services to expand the availability of interpreters to physician practices at low cost.
“The expansion of WIN services into Henderson County will have a significant impact on our limited English proficient community,” said Jennifer Henderson, CEO of BRCHS. “We are excited to partner with BCMS and its innovative WIN program. Qualified interpreters through WIN will allow BRCHS to direct its own resources back to the community health center to address the significant health disparities of our patients and the community.”
(Blogger's note: Althea Gonzalez with the Buncombe County Medical Society will be speaking at the Second Annual Southeast Regional Medical Interpreter Conference this week at the University of Kentucky. More information available at http://bit.ly/RmR5O.)
"Buncombe medical society receives grant to expand interpreter network"
Buncombe County Medical Society Foundation has received a $7,000 grant from the Community Foundation of Henderson County to expand the WNC Interpreter Network into Henderson County.
WIN provides qualified and trained interpretation and translation services to medical practices and other agencies. WIN has provided interpretation services for 1,300 patients at 4,000 appointments in Buncombe County since its inception in 2005.
WIN will partner with the Blue Ridge Community Health Services to expand the availability of interpreters to physician practices at low cost.
“The expansion of WIN services into Henderson County will have a significant impact on our limited English proficient community,” said Jennifer Henderson, CEO of BRCHS. “We are excited to partner with BCMS and its innovative WIN program. Qualified interpreters through WIN will allow BRCHS to direct its own resources back to the community health center to address the significant health disparities of our patients and the community.”
(Blogger's note: Althea Gonzalez with the Buncombe County Medical Society will be speaking at the Second Annual Southeast Regional Medical Interpreter Conference this week at the University of Kentucky. More information available at http://bit.ly/RmR5O.)
Wednesday, April 29, 2009
Death Threats, Interfering Daughters, & Other Worst Case Scenarios
I found out today that my presentation proposal to the Southeast Regional Medical Interpreter Conference was accepted. Entitled "Death Threats, Interfering Daughters, & Other Worst Case Scenarios," the presentation goes over some of the absolute worst things that can happen to you while interpreting, then highlights the portions of the National Council on Interpreting in Health Care Code of Ethics designed to help interpreters deal with these and other situations.
Of course, to do this, I'm going to need loads of worst case scenarios. And while I've heard some doozies already, I'm willing to bet some of you reading this have had some really interesting things happen to you. So, feel free to email your worst-case scenarios to me (terenabell [at] ineverylanguage [dot] com) or post them here as comments and I'll do my best to include them. I'll leave whether you want credit on those up to you!
The Conference itself will be in Lexington at the University of Kentucky June 18-19. It's co-sponsored by the South Eastern Medical Interpreter's Association (SEMIA), the Medical Interpreter Network of Georgia (MING), the Tennessee Association of Professional Interpreters and Translators (TAPIT), and the Tennessee Association of Medical Interpreters (TAMIT). If you'd like to attend, registration information is available by clicking here.
Of course, to do this, I'm going to need loads of worst case scenarios. And while I've heard some doozies already, I'm willing to bet some of you reading this have had some really interesting things happen to you. So, feel free to email your worst-case scenarios to me (terenabell [at] ineverylanguage [dot] com) or post them here as comments and I'll do my best to include them. I'll leave whether you want credit on those up to you!
The Conference itself will be in Lexington at the University of Kentucky June 18-19. It's co-sponsored by the South Eastern Medical Interpreter's Association (SEMIA), the Medical Interpreter Network of Georgia (MING), the Tennessee Association of Professional Interpreters and Translators (TAPIT), and the Tennessee Association of Medical Interpreters (TAMIT). If you'd like to attend, registration information is available by clicking here.
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