By Letzen Maldonado 
Tuesday, December 22, 2003

This nation has seen a wave of immigration this past decade not seen since the last wave 150 years ago. Then, and now, we face language barriers. If you've ever tried to learn a new language as an adult, even a teenager, you will find that it takes years to learn, and even more years to master, especially in the written form. Let's face it. If a business wants to hire and sell to these new arrivals, it has to communicate with them or someone else will! But what business wants the additional expense of translating?

Most organizations simply don't want to pay much for a translator, and will pretty much hire or contract just anyone that claims to be fluent in other languages at less than prime. What most private and public institutions do not realize is that many people who claim to speak another language are not fluent in its written form. They also lack the knowledge of the nuances and variations that play on meaning.

Another assumption is that translation software will do the job. Wrong! I have seen programs costing tens of thousands of dollars put out the same junk that you could get from Babel Fish and other free translation programs. At most, these programs serve to give you an idea of what the document is about, and it could even be the wrong idea!

A slack approach to translations can actually cost more in correcting misunderstandings, in portraying poor corporate image and even in opening the company to liability. Literal translations, poor word choices and poor sentence structure can change the context of a message and even render a sentence illegible. I have witnessed some of the following translation faux pas:

• In a Human Resources Harassment Policy: The sentence "All complaints filed will be handled promptly" was translated into "All complaints will be archived promptly."
• On a window poster in Miami for a national retailer: The advertisement "Earrings for $2" translated into "Televisions for $2.00." The word "pantalla" used in the translation is a regionalism, meaning earrings to some and TV set or TV monitor to others.
• In a Procedures Manual for a grocery chain: "Do not leave knives in the sink" translated into "Do not leave knives in the batteries." The word "pila" used is a regional term for "sink" but it means batteries throughout most of the Spanish-speaking world.

For additional examples, see Public Notices and Advertisements at the end of this article. I have seen many similar translations into Spanish done by Blue Chip companies and public institutions.

The Spanish Language

Let's be clear: there are no dialects in Spanish. It has idioms, slangs, and regionalisms such as those found within the USA (do you say Pop or Soda? Is it a Hoagie, a Sub or a Grinder? Ya'll or You's Guys? Ain't or Isn't?); or between the USA, Australia and England (is it guy or bloke? Mate or friend? Lift or elevator?) You get the point.

Castillian Spanish is the base starting point for any communication with Hispanics / Latinos. Spanish television stations such as Univisión, Telemundo, and Galavisión follow this principle. Messages to specific sub-segments of the population are tailored as needed.

A note about "Spanglish" and "Anglicisms"

Spanglish is becoming the way to communicate for many Latinos in the US as they begin to lose touch with the Spanish language but try to hang on to it. Spanglish integrates Spanish words and phrases into English and vice-versa, or takes an English word and "Latinizes" it. Some examples of Spanglish are:

Translators who are not careful could integrate these "non-words" into a document.

Anglicisms can be the most dangerous. Anglicisms are words borrowed from the English language. The danger lies when the "anglicized" word turns out to be an authentic Spanish word that has a totally different meaning. See the following examples.

Literacy Levels and Translations

An overwhelming number of Hispanics / Latinos are recent arrivals. In addition to segmentation by country of origin, further segmentation exists within each cultural group such as social, economic, and educational backgrounds. These factors have an impact on the population's literacy levels. A good translator will tailor the message to an audience's reading level.

As a rule, documents should be written at a 6^th to 8^th grade reading level. This rule should be applied as well when writing in English. According to the National Assessment of Adult Literacy (NAAL), 40 to 43 percent of the labor force scores at the two lowest levels of literacy proficiency (at or below 8th grade level). Compare the reading levels of some common items:

• newspapers (9th - 12th grade reading levels)
• apartment lease (college level)
• insurance policy (12th grade level)
• aspirin bottle (10th grade level)
• tax forms (8th grade level)

Source: U.S. Congress, Office of Technology Assessment, Adult Literacy and New Technologies: Tools for a Lifetime, OTA-SET-550, 1993

Steps to take for a good translation

1. Hire an internal translator
2. Contract a translating agency
3. Have a translation review process - internal and external - for all documents, in particular those related to laws and corporate policies and processes.
4. Audit your agencies at least once a year. They grow, change, lose and add staff just like you do, and this impacts the quality of the translations being put forth.

Public Notices - Examples

Here are some real notices (originals in English) from around the world that appeared in a 1990 issue of Lodging magazine.

Advertisements - Examples

Roger Axtell's book, Do's and Taboos of Using English Around the World (John Wiley & Sons, 1995), is another good source of examples of mistranslation. He recounts, for example, how Parker set out to market SuperQuink bottled ink using the advertising slogan " To avoid embarrassment in your social correspondence, be sure to use Parker SuperQuink." When the ads were reproduced in Spanish for the Mexican market, they were translated as "para evitar embarazo" which translates as "to avoid pregnancy."

Many more stories are floating around the web.

• The Dairy Association's huge success with the campaign "Got Milk?" prompted them to expand advertising to Mexico with the Spanish translation reading "Are you lactating?"
• Coors' slogan, "Turn It Loose" was translated into Spanish, where it was read as "Suffer From Diarrhea."
• Scandinavian vacuum manufacturer Electrolux used the following in an American campaign: "Nothing sucks like an Electrolux."
• Clairol introduced the "Mist Stick," a curling iron, into Germany only to find out that "mist" is slang for manure.
• An American T-shirt maker in Miami printed shirts for the Spanish market which promoted the Pope's visit. Instead of "I saw the Pope" (el Papa), the shirts read "I Saw the Potato" (la papa).
• Pepsi's "Come Alive With the Pepsi Generation" translated into "Pepsi Brings Your Ancestors Back From the Grave" in Chinese.
• The Coca-Cola name in China was first read as "Kekoukela", meaning "Bite the wax tadpole" or "female horse stuffed with wax", depending on the dialect. Coke then researched 40,000 characters to find a phonetic equivalent "kokou kole", translating into "happiness in the mouth."
• Frank Perdue's chicken slogan, "It takes a strong man to make a tender chicken" was translated into Spanish as "it takes an aroused man to make a chicken affectionate."
• When American Airlines wanted to advertise its new leather first class seats in the Mexican market, it translated its "Fly In Leather" campaign literally, which meant "Fly Naked" (vuela en cuero) in Spanish.

-- This article is available for free reprint in exchange for credit to Letzen Maldonado and link to managementaides.com.