Luke Spear

Europe’s identity is in question, but in which language? In Sweden and France consternation is abound as journalists pick up on this phenomenon and convey the zeitgeist as it is to their respective countrymen.

In an article in the Svenska Dagbladet, Olle Josephson writes of a Scandinavian political convention bringing together Norwegian, Danish and Swedish youth movements for an exchange of ideas earlier in 2008. That exchange, reports Olle, now takes place in English. This is in part due to the way that the Scandinavian languages have now diverged further than ever, while still being easily understood on paper, the linguistically closer Swedish and Norwegian speakers can now have difficulty understanding spoken Danish. One solution, as proposed by Olle, would be to spend “10–12 hours of Danish teaching per school year, that should quickly allow students to reach a reading and comprehension level high above their second language choices such as German or French“.

And the French, seeking their own solutions to what they see as a threat to their culture, discussed the point in Le Monde this week as the French music festival Francopholies brought down the curtain on 130 French artists, 17 of whom sang exclusively in English. The internationally renowned Sebastien Téllier admitted, “I choose the language that emphasises my music best. If I’m in doubt, I google the expression to see if it exists or not… I want people to own my music themselves and give their own meaning to it“.

However the appeal of English may go beyond its simple artistic merits, as J.B. from the band Nelson explains, “on the European market, we’re equal and on a par with the Anglo-Saxons and Scandinavians“ in a tone more akin to an international group based in France than a mere French group. But with France’s strict quotas for French language music to be broadcast through the media networks, English language French music is largely being censored - although a loophole is occasionally exploited when a song adds a few lines of French in order to be classed as French culture, such as Camille’s album release Gospel With No Lord.

A movement in political and cultural terms is taking place throughout Europe, globalisation and culture exchanges are taking place in a tongue that has made no efforts to impose itself, yet has somehow become aspired to. The transatlantic expression, “two nations separated by a common language” may soon have to be adapted to something rather less elegant in order to keep up with the times.

Luke Spear

This article cited text that was translated from Swedish and French in the following publications:
SvD
Le Monde 

Pieter Francberg here, author of future international bestsellers “Freedom isn’t free” and “Once for my baby”, published in any language you like.

I’m actually just writing from your future, I’ve chosen this guy’s webpage to post to as he seems like he wouldn’t start running around claiming to be a “messiah” like that other guy did when I accidentally dialled in the wrong date. Seems to have caused a little confusion for you back there, but it’ll soon work out.

This all might seem a little unusual for you, dear reader, but it’s quite simple from here. I just fire up my retinal display, open a post page and start thinking out my message. Once done, I select the language I want - in this case English, British standard 2008 version - and the date I’d like to post to. See, science has recently discovered how to travel through time but only for sub-atomic and quantum sized particles. That led to some pretty interesting developments, this transtime mail for one, but I digress.

What I wanted to tell you about, not as a bleak apocalyptic message of destruction but as a gentle warning to human translators, was that things are going to change quite soon and you may suddenly find a lot less work being sent your way, for translation, at least. Computing and technology are gradually changing your lifestyle in imperceptible stages at the moment, (your moment, that is) so small that the change is almost undetectable. But due to the lowering cost of computer components there will soon be a surge in people connected and trading globally. A critical mass of people requiring just-enough-to-understand translations will be reached in a short time and machine translation will be in vogue.

Human translators will gradually be replaced by proof-readers who check machine text as it comes onscreen. They are paid by the hour at a minimum wage. The job will require editing a stream of text as it is piped onscreen as fast as the proof-reader can go, the slowest readers being replaced daily in the online network of millions. But what about the people who need legal contracts or mission critical texts translating? How can they trust a machine? I hear you cry. Well, AI improvements and processing power have come a long way in a short time and you wouldn’t believe what wonders await you. There’ll be plenty of opportunities for you to retrain, but it may be better to start thinking about your future now. Concentrate on your writing skills because your potential market is about to grow like you wouldn’t believe.

Don’t be disheartened, make the most of the opportunities coming your way, harness the power of your imagination because you people are going to need it when the information exchange really begins.

P. Francberg,
EuroNation,
2047 AD
(4,540,000,0047 ABB)

As you may have heard, Ernest Hemingway was particularly proud of his six word story,

“For Sale: Baby shoes, never worn.”

And rightly so. A concise work with protagonist, scenario and resolution punctuated and wrapped neatly into a oneliner that can justly be called a story. However a slew of copycat sixworders have hit blogs around the web, each as weak as the next with often pithy headlines that aspire to the American author’s genius only to consistently fall somewhat short.

Thankfully, in late 2006 Wired ran the scifi version and the Guardian the ‘contemporary authors’ version shortly thereafter. It’s a very interesting phenomenon and well worth exploring but far from suggesting additional asassinations be added to the messy fray; what could also be of interest in the eye of a language enthusiast is the challenge that translating these stories presents.

The additional problem of word limit may have been artificially created through people latching on to the fact that the Hemingway story is just six words long and deemed this to be its true mark of excellence. However he perhaps wasn’t counting when he wrote, aiming for concision while retaining his meaning. In translating, then, how concerned should the translator be with the quantity of text?

“A vendre : chaussures bébé, jamais portées”

At least in French, this doesn’t seem to be too much of a concern.