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 EastSouthWestNorth has translated an excellent story on the translation crisis in China that first appeared in Phoenix Weekly. It talks about the more than 1,000 foreign literary works that are translated and published in China each year (and we assume that number is still growing). The story laments over the "awfulness of the translations, the crudeness of the translators and the absence of critical reflection on what is happening". It then looks into why translation quality has fallen and why China has such a great lack for good translators.
Much of the blame, as it turns out, falls in part on the shoulders of the short-sighted publishers that are out to seek quick profits and their unwillingness to pay their translators more: Over the past twenty years, the salaries for most professions have increased by twenty fold. But the salary for translators has only doubled. In the early 1980's, the basic fee for translation was 30 yuan per 1,000 words. At the moment, the basic fee for translation is only 60 yuan per 1,000 words.
To actually make a proper living then, translators are forced to rely on quantity (a familiar refrain across many industries here, it would seem). Shanghaiist knows this all too well, because in one of our many past lives, Chinese-English translations were a major source of our income. Fortunately for us, Chinese-English translations pay more than English-Chinese translations (but not much more). Oftentimes we were also asked to help proofread and edit translations that were done by native Chinese translators and then passed on to us. Needless to say, the translations were all crap (and hence returned by the client). Since the payment for proofreading was much, much lower than for translation, and editing the work of the Chinese translators proved too much of a fucking headache to be worth it at all, Shanghaiist would often reject the "proofreading" work and ask to redo the translation instead. The result: Higher eventual costs for the cheapo translation agencies that thought they could actually get away with Chinese translators for Chinese-English work.
Many late nights and white hairs later, and countless refusals by clients to pay more for QUALITY translations, we decided enough was enough, and it was time to reinvent ourselves and move on to greater things in life, such as blogging, but we digress. Of course, the day we decided to quit, China's translation industry lost a kickass translator (*ahem*), but alas, nobody shed a single tear, and the industry continued to crank along.
But why do publishers give their translators such shitty pay, you ask? The devil, ladies and gentlemen, is all in the economics of Chinese publishing: Jin Hao is the general manager of the Ten Thousand Languages Cultural Company which publishes the Famous New Ideas Books series. He made the following accounting for the reporter: To publish a translated work, the royalty is between USD 1,000 to USD 2,000, or around 10,000 yuan; the translation fee is over 10,000 yuan; the cover design and printing costs are around 60,000 yuan. Suppose the book is sold at 20 yuan with a print run of 10,000 copies. If every copy is sold, the total income is 200,000 yuan. The cost of royalties, translation and printing is 40% of the gross revenue. It must be pointed out that the publishing industry is in the doldrums right now. Many bookstores require that the books be provided at 50% to 60% of the listed price, and Internet bookstores even want just 40%. The profit for a translated book is therefore low, and only a book with sales of 7,000 to 8,000 copies can reap profits. The reality is that except for a few bestselling novels and financial management books, very few contemporary foreign books sell more than 10,000 copies. Jin Hao told the reporter that their company lost more than 2 million yuan in total in publishing the Famous New Ideas Books series.
The writer also asserts that China "once had excellent translators such as Fu Lei, Cao Ying, Wang Daogan and others" and that "since the 1990's, there have not been enough successors in the ranks of translators... with such sterling reputations". Allow us to add our two cents worth: The world is much more complex today than it was two or three decades ago. With new industries constantly being born, and new social phenomena that is changing the face of our society, new words and new concepts are being invented every single day, many of which can be totally foreign to your Chinese translator. For instance, there is currently no consensus on the Chinese word for "metrosexual". Second example: the gay community in China has only just begun to step out of the closet, so your average Chinese translator will not know what on earth a "*** hag" or "*** mike" is supposed to be, much less a "potato queen". These are cultural concepts that just can't be "translated". Third case in point: China can be said to be a nation of first-generation car buyers, so your really clueless Chinese translator will take two hours to understand what a "designated drunk" is, and will need the space of three lines (instead of a word or two) to explain to the reader. We can give you an endless list of examples across a million industries and cultural contexts, but at the end of the day, no matter how fast Chinese society is evolving, the average Chinese translator will need to take another decade or so to be more similar in cultural outlook with her international counterpart.
Translation is all for the sake of helping the people of the world come together. It is about China understanding the world and the world coming to understand China. For the Chinese translation industry to move ahead, agencies and clients will need to realise that translation is really a profession in itself, and not just a job for anyone. Till the day they do, poor translators in China will be hiding away in their little dingy sweatshops hacking away on their keyboards for peanuts (did we forget to mention that international translation agencies are now outsourcing a huge chunk of their work to their Chinese counterparts?), and the quality of the translation that arrives in the client's inbox will remain, at best, little better than what Google Translate can offer them.
Related links
EastSouthWestNorth: The translation crisis in China
Phoenix Weekly: 大陆翻译危局
Photo from xiaming: Are you going to trust this translation agency with your translations?
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English teaching is big business in China, and everyone seems to be trying to cashing in on it — everyone from big global names such as Berlitz to local players with less than orthodox methods. Just look around you, students are literally devouring their English language textbooks (and dictionaries) — on the bus, in the fast-food restaurants and just about anywhere. One of the companies that has benefited greatly in the rising interest in English courses is English First, or EF which has been named as the Official Language Training Services Supplier of the Beijing 2008 Olympic Games.
We were therefore surprised to find this Youtube clip of an advertisement for EF's Mandarin Chinese courses, and it is really well made, if we might add. One wonders if the company is trying to break out of English language instruction, as its main business. It would be a wise move, but it may mean they'll eventually have to dump their English First name in favour of the acronym EF (as they have done in this ad).
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 Li Yang (李阳) of the Shanghai-based Crazy English movement has been getting a lot of bad press lately, and Shanghai Daily's Wang Yanlin is the latest to chime in, with a hard-hitting piece slamming the self-styled English guru who believes that getting his students to yell out phrases after him combined with hand gestures is the best way to learn English. The media-savvy Li Yang is also a dynamic speaker on stage who clearly understands what makes Chinese audiences tick. He mixes in motivational concepts and humour together with a dose of nationalism into each of his power-packed sessions. Since he founded Crazy English, Li has been going around China "emphasizing self-confidence and saying that speaking English will help people better represent China". But as Shanghai Daily suggests, the word "crazy" comes to mind, rather than "English" whenever Li's on stage.
Wang Yanlin elucidates: Last month, 40-year-old Li directed a spectacle in Baotou, Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region, in which 3,000 middle school students went down on their knees to show their gratitude to him.
A few days later in Wuhan, Hubei Province, Li declared that any female students who shave their heads like Buddhist nuns - to show a determination to learn English - can become his disciples.
On his blog, Li said such actions, absurd and crazy in the eyes of many, can stimulate people's learning potential. The outlandish actions, in Li's mind, are consistent with his ambition to "help 300 million Chinese speak good English."
Shanghai Morning Post has also reported that for a 10-day intensive English training course starting in February, Li is charging students 12,000 yuan for a "platinum seat" and 18,000 yuan for a "diamond seat".
Just how crazy is this man? We dug out two videos that will help you decide for yourself. On the left, you have a typical Crazy English seminar which has Li Yang throwing in jibes at ethnic Chinese in Hong Kong, Taiwan and elsewhere who "look down upon the mainland Chinese" but are "unable to speak proper Mandarin", and on the right, hundreds of students at the Hunan University of Science and Engineering chanting "I want to speak perfect English" at the top of their longs at 6.30am in the morning on 20 May 2007.
Related links:
Ce.cn: 品牌危机:森马说着"疯狂英语"
Xinhua: “疯狂”李阳，你凭什么安享学生们的跪拜？
Shanghai Daily: 'Crazy English' guru a bit crazed
Photo of students kowtowing to Li Yang which he apparently first stuck on his blog and has since spread around the Internet.
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 This latest ad from the British Council (h/t to Danwei) should appeal to the scores of English teachers in Shanghai who are looking for a change in environment, and the pay looks good too! --
The British Council/Foreign and Commonwealth Office English language project in the DPRK aims to deliver quality programmes in teacher/trainer training and to develop the curriculum and related materials as well as assessment systems at leading institutions in Pyongyang. This high-profile project has been running since 2000, and we are now seeking three experienced English language teaching professionals to fill the above posts, which will be based at these institutions.
Alas, only UK passport holders can be considered for the posts (and you have until 20 September to send in those applications!). Now we're not totally sure if it's British Council's standard policy of hiring only UK natives (ie., no Americans, Australians, New Zealanders?) but even if that weren't the case, Americans likely won't be welcome there anytime soon to teach English, as the above propaganda poster shows, which depicts President Bush getting crushed by his own missiles.
Photo from deckwalker
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Lost Laowai brings our attention to the following soundbyte of a conversation between an Air China pilot and the control tower of the JFK Airport in New York. In it, the pilot fails to understand anything that the traffic controller was saying and his English was so garbled that he might as well have been speaking in Esperanto -- a language that is deemed so important that China Radio International has a version in it!
Now, like it or not, English is the international language of air traffic control, and pilots are required to have at least a basic mastery of the language. We are told by a friend who is a pilot with Singapore Airlines that whenever he flies to destinations in China, air traffic controllers here are always "trying their luck" by speaking to him in Mandarin, but Singapore Airlines pilots have been given clear instructions to answer back only in English to avoid any possible miscommunication and to prevent Chinese air traffic controllers from making a habit of "trying their luck". Imagine what sort of disasters could otherwise happen during takeoff/landing and even on the runway.
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 An innovative Chinese couple seeking a unique and distinctive name for their baby have arrived at the "@" sign, which in Chinese sounds like "love him" (爱他). Naturally, language officials (yes, those guys have struck again) were not amused.
The unidentified couple were cited by Li Yuming, Vice-Chairman of the National Language Commission (国家语委) as an example of bizarre names that Chinese people were trying to give their children.
In the Report on the Use of the Chinese Language 2006 《2006年中国语言生活状况报告》 jointly announced by the Ministry of Educaiton and the National Language Commission, it was revealed that major changes were happening in the naming of Chinese kids, and one of the key changes was the use of four-character Chinese names.
Of the 23,000 officially recognised Chinese names available, 129 of them account for 87% of the entire population. Other bizarre examples cited by the council were 赵一A (Zhao Yi-A) and 奥斯锐娜王 (Osreena Wang??!).
Also, families of minority ethnic origins also often gave their children non-standardised or totally unrecognised Chinese names. In response, certain autonomous regions such as Xinjiang have come up with standard Chinese names for common Uyghur names. A Naming Law may be announced soon, but some Chinese citizens believe it is their right to name their children however they may wish.
Related links
AP: China Couple Tries Naming Baby 'At' Sign
China News: 中国人姓名结构现极端个性化 给孩子取名叫"@"
Photo from crankymama.
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 Not so long after its crackdown on foreign-language only signs in Xintiandi, the language police are now on to their next target -- the Shanghai Metro! They have objected to plans by the subway operator to train its staff to learn basic phrases in five major Chinese dialects -- a plan that is not without controversy -- so as to help domestic tourists and visitors when they ask for fares and directions.
As can be expected, Zhu Lei, director of the Shanghai Language Works Commission, came back with the same cookie cutter response:
"We have contacted the Metro management today, stating that the program could violate the country's language policy to promote the use of Putonghua."
"There are at least 1,000 regional dialects in China, not including more branch dialects in different regions. The right way to solve communication barrier is to speak Putonghua."
"What about passengers who speak other dialects? Using only the five dialects would not solve the problem."
Shanghai Metro seems unimpressed and has shown its middle finger to the language watchdog (we love it!) by continuing with its plans to train staff in Cantonese, Wenzhou-hua (Zhejiang), Wuhan-hua (Hubei), Changsha-hua (Hunan Province) and Fujian-hua (otherwise known as hokkien). In addition, they are considering extending the service to Shanghai South Railway Station Metro stop.
However, in an online poll conducted by Sina.com asking netizens if they supported the move by Shanghai Metro to provide dialect services that we found here, 75.33% of the 11,495 people polled (as of press time) objected to the plan, 23.18% were supportive, and another 1.49% were undecided. We surmise though, that most of these people who volunteered to vote were local Shanghainese. One wonders if they would also object to a ban of the use of the Shanghainese dialect at all metro stations.
Related links
Shanghaiist: No foreign language only signs please, this is China!
Sina.com: 上海地铁拟用多种方言服务引发争议
Shanghai Daily: Metro service snubs language watchdog
Photo from spinsean.
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 Sinosplice brought our attention to the following ChinesePod (click here to download full episode) which we think is one of the most practical lessons they've ever taught us. Well, this time, Ken and Jenny have decided we need to learn how to get our own condoms! The following blurb is found on the pod:
Drug stores are full of potentially embarrassing items. Embarrassment is exponentially heightened when it involves the acting out of said item to drug store clerk, gesturing to specific body parts and drawing pictures. Thankfully, we at ChinesePod do not shy away from these topics (to wit: lesson on buying tampons), and wouldn't want to see you acting out the word for "condom." Thus, this podcast, where you will learn how to discreetly ask for your contraceptive of choice, in Mandarin Chinese.
Sinosplice also brings our attention to 牛X语言, which is possibly the largest online repository of Chinese sexual vocabulary and slang (with English and Swedish translations) around.
Now that ChinesePod has taught us how to get our condoms, we really wonder if they will teach us how to make out next!
Image from Matthew J. Stinson.
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