Free Dutch Translation Guide: Meet a Dutch Translator

In this Free Dutch Translation Guide interview, Lindsay, a Dutch translator, offers an insider's view of her craft. At the bottom of the page, you'll find typical translator prices, as well as other useful resources for Dutch translation. (Looking for a free Dutch translation online?)

Conversation with Lindsay Gasser, Dutch Translator

Q: Why did you decide to become a translator?

A: I was at an age and a stage in my career when I needed a change for a lot of reasons. I actually started out life as a linguist -- I worked as an interpreter for a number of years. Then I went into software, and now I'm back to translation.

A big advantage is it's portable. You can work anywhere in the world, and I was looking to move to the Caribbean to be in the sun. Previously, when I worked as a linguist, I was an interpreter. An interpreter has to go where the clients are. A translator can go anywhere where there's Internet.

When I was a student thirty plus years ago, it was before the Internet became big. The Internet has totally changed the translation profession. It has made it much more interesting. Before, I had to carry a lot of books around with me. With the Internet, I have access to just about every bit of information in the world within minutes. There's also the community aspect: I can always go to one of the translation forums and put up a question or read the archives and find out stuff.

One of the things I love about translating is the variety of things that come my way. Each week, I'm working with something totally different, even if I'm staying within my specialty of software and finance.

In the last few weeks, I did a translation for a website about translating Eastern European books (a translation about translation, which was interesting!), a catalogue of parts for model airplanes, a translation about teeth whitening, and one about dolls for autistic children. I also translated aircraft maintenance manuals, bids for a mobile telephone carrier and literature for a rock festival.

A: Of all the languages I translate, Dutch is probably the easiest because it's the closest to English.

There are two issues that I tend to have. In Dutch, like in English, one word can have several meanings, and you have to figure out which one to translate. Also, Dutch is full of little words that get slipped into the sentence and change the meaning or the nuance, so you have to pay attention to them. These little words can change a sentence from being a very strong statement to, "Yes, you could sometimes say this."

Also -- and this is true across all languages – abbreviations, acronyms, and typing errors. Sometimes, it's absolutely impossible to figure them out. If it’s an acronym you use in your company, you know what it means because you’re using it every day. But for an outsider, it can be absolutely impossible.

And typing errors can cause a lot of trouble. As a translator, sometimes you don't know -- is this a typing error, or just a word I've never heard of? And you can waste thirty minutes hunting on Google to try to figure it out. I've noticed on translator forums, where there are discussions about a translation problems -- a lot of times, they decide that it was just a typing error in the original.

So it's important to proofread and spell-check the original document before sending it to the translator, and watch out for typos. And if you use an abbreviation or an acronym, please add a comment for the translators to tell them what it means.

A: If there are abbreviations, spell them out for the translator. And if you can provide a glossary -- technical glossaries are invaluable. Or it doesn't have to be a formal glossary: you could just provide a similar document that has already been translated. Recently, I had to translate a catalogue, and the client provided the catalogue from the previous year. This was really helpful. Of course, the sentences weren't the same, but I could see what things were called. That saved me a huge amount of time. If something like that's available, I for one am prepared to work for a lower price than if I had to do all that research myself.

Plan ahead. Everyone always wants everything for yesterday. But if you can give the translator a week for the translation, then your translator can work when she's fresh, when she's interested.

And write a decent text in whatever it is. Try to be clear. If I'm writing for myself, I try reading out loud and ask myself, "Could someone understand this without reading it on the page?" If the answer's yes, the document is probably easy to understand and to translate. (I realize that this doesn't apply to a technical document.)

There is a favorite phrase we used in the software industry: GIGO. Garbage in, garbage out. The translator can't improve the original text. In fact, it will probably get slightly worse in translation just because of the inherent problems that come with translating from one language to another.

One of the risks in translation is mistranslation. One of the reasons for mistranslation is ambiguity. If the text is absolutely clear in the original version, there's a greater probability that in the translated text, the translator will say what you wanted to say.

The text can only be translated one way, so if it's ambiguous, there's a fifty-fifty chance that the translation will mean what you wanted to say. Make it as clear as you possibly can. Otherwise, the translator might say something completely different, and if you don't speak the target language, you might not even know.

Also, the longer it takes the translator to understand your text, the longer it will take to translate it.

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