| Număr de pagini: < [1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50 51 52 53 54 55 56 57 58 59 60 61 62 63 64 65 66 67 68 69 70 71 72 73 74 75 76 77 78 79 80 81 82 83 84 85 86 87 88 89 90 91 92 93 94 95 96 97 98 99 100 101 102 103 104 105 106 107 108 109 110 111 112 113 114 115 116 117 118 119 120 121 122 123 124 125 126 127 128 129 130 131 132 133 134 135 136 137 138 139 140 141 142 143 144 145 146 147 148 149 150 151 152 153 154 155 156 157 158 159 160 161 162 163 164 165 166 167 168 169 170 171 172 173 174 175 176 177 178 179 180 181 182 183] > | Should “native language” claims be verified? Inițiatorul discuției: XXXphxxx (X)
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Kim Metzger 
Mexic
Local time: 17:45
din germană în engleză
DavidMTucker wrote:
The issue really, then, is the credibility of the site, i.e., overall professionalism, and not so much about what is considered to be a native language. This is good, because as demonstrated by the multitude of posts, there is no consensus on the criteria of what constitutes a "native" language, let alone how it would be verified.
But we do know what native language means, David.
A first language (also native language, mother tongue, arterial language, or L1) is the language(s) a person has learned from birth[1] or within the critical period.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_language
| | | | Sheila Wilson
Spania
Local time: 00:45
Membru (2007)
engleză
+ ...
| Maybe a poor choice of words | Jun 29, 2012 |
Rob Grayson wrote:
You seem to imply that marketing can only ever be dishonest, or, at the very least, that it must always involve exaggeration. I'm sure I'm not the only one who utterly eschews such an approach.
I don't think I implied any such thing, Rob. I certainly never intended to. All I meant is that you make the absolute best of everything you've got, by putting a certain slant on things. Very few things are totally black and white, and certainly a skill cannot be given as an absolute percentage of perfection. I'm only talking of turning (for example) "I'm not really experienced in..." into the much more positive "I have some experience in...". It isn't a lie, but it's certainly a much better phrasing for a CV or a profile.
I'm willing and able to defend everything I say in my texts, and I can state quite categorically that there are no lies there. But I'm also more willing to talk in private about the "yes, but"s than I am to put them in my marketing material. Why should I have to state everywhere that I only work part time (which can be seen as a negative point) when I don't have to.
Anyway, I think I'll shut up there before I dig myself a hole big enough to drown in!
Sheila
| | | | XXXphxxx (X)
Regatul Unit
Local time: 00:45
din portugheză în engleză
+ ...
INIŢIATORUL SUBIECTULUI | Even less work than that | Jun 29, 2012 |
DavidMTucker wrote:
And finally, with the controversial issue at hand --claiming of multiple native languages, can this be eliminated? Could it be replaced with something like "Working Languages?
The native languages wouldn't need replacing, just deleting, "Working Languages" are already there. My initial reaction is that would be fine since that's the way the CIoL works; we’re simply listed under the language pair we've "passed the test" in. However, the CIoL has a bar and for members or fellows it's pretty high. On a site that has no requirements for credentials I'm not sure if that would work, the CIoL doesn't have thousands upon thousands of members. Outsourcers looking for a translator on this site would have to wade through reams and reams of hits to find the right person - look on "native language" as a "Refine Search" option at present.
| | | | | Astounding ! | Jun 29, 2012 |
Hi,
This impressive thread - impressive because of the incredible number of posts - astounds me and I can't help repeating here what I already said in another thread, i.e.:
I think that all this fuss about native/non-native, verified/non verified, credible/not credible, and so on, is only the translation, the expression of the great concerns and fears generated by the economic crisis we are experiencing.
Since humankind exists, everytime there's a threat o... See more Hi,
This impressive thread - impressive because of the incredible number of posts - astounds me and I can't help repeating here what I already said in another thread, i.e.:
I think that all this fuss about native/non-native, verified/non verified, credible/not credible, and so on, is only the translation, the expression of the great concerns and fears generated by the economic crisis we are experiencing.
Since humankind exists, everytime there's a threat or uncertainty over the fate of a group, this group systematically tries to find ways of excluding as many people as possible from that group.
One could expect that History would have taught us that this kind of attitude is a big nonsense, which only reveals our deep animal nature, exactly like when a group of animals excludes the old, weak or injured ones from the group in an attempt to protect the rest of the pack.
A pity.
Catherine ▲ Collapse
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Lancashireman
Regatul Unit
Local time: 00:45
din germană în engleză
Fuss…big nonsense…animal nature. You have ’it ze nail on ze ’ead !
| | | | Andy Watkinson
Spania
Local time: 01:45
Utilizator
din catalană în engleză
+ ...
| Astounding Stories | Jun 29, 2012 |
"One could expect that History would have taught us that this
kind of attitude is a big nonsense, ..."
Catherine,
A "big nonsense" is to attribute this whole debate to some pseudo-Darwinian struggle for survival.
I "know" many of the most active participants in this thread and believe they're probably in the same situation as me.
Never bid on a single job. Not one in eleven years.
OK, nice to receive the odd private mail ... See more "One could expect that History would have taught us that this
kind of attitude is a big nonsense, ..."
Catherine,
A "big nonsense" is to attribute this whole debate to some pseudo-Darwinian struggle for survival.
I "know" many of the most active participants in this thread and believe they're probably in the same situation as me.
Never bid on a single job. Not one in eleven years.
OK, nice to receive the odd private mail from an outsourcer based on profile, but no big deal.
While you're at it, could you explain why the same concern was raised in 2001, 2002, 2003...you get the idea? ▲ Collapse
| | | | Samuel Murray
Ţările de Jos
Local time: 01:45
Membru (2006)
din engleză în afrikaans
+ ...
| @Kim -- did you read this thread? | Jun 29, 2012 |
Kim Metzger wrote: DavidMTucker wrote:
...there is no consensus on the criteria of what constitutes a "native" language, let alone how it would be verified. But we do know what native language means, David. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_language
Read this thread again and you'll notice that although many participants here "know what it means", they don't all agree with what the Wikipedia "knows" it means. In particular there are some very vocal posters here who reject the Wikipedia definition unless it is qualified. It is interesting that those here who are confident that everyone knows how "native language" is defined are also confident that everyone who are honest and truthful will naturally agree with their opinion of how "native language" is defined.
==
Added the next day: I got some angry mails about this post. Please, only the first sentence of my post refers to Kim and David. The rest of it refers to other people, not to Kim or David. Sorry for any confusion. And sorry that I did not use smileys to indicate the muscular hydrostat in my buccal cavity.
[Edited at 2012-06-30 07:31 GMT]
| | | | Robert Forstag
Statele Unite
Local time: 19:45
din spaniolă în engleză
+ ...
Andy Watkinson wrote:
"One could expect that History would have taught us that this
kind of attitude is a big nonsense, ..."
Catherine,
A "big nonsense" is to attribute this whole debate to some pseudo-Darwinian struggle for survival.
I "know" many of the most active participants in this thread and believe they're probably in the same situation as me.
Never bid on a single job. Not one in eleven years.
OK, nice to receive the odd private mail from an outsourcer based on profile, but no big deal.
While you're at it, could you explain why the same concern was raised in 2001, 2002, 2003...you get the idea?
If one doesn't accept that a demand to curb willful misrepresentation by translators regarding something as fundamentally important to their professional identity as their native language(s) is a legitimate issue of concern, then one is implicitly supporting the position that members or users of this site need not be held accountable for any claims they make here.
Like Andy, I tend to see that as the untenable position....
[Edited at 2012-06-30 00:01 GMT]
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Olly Pekelharing wrote:
Of course I was aware there was a directory, I'd just never looked at it before. Now I have, I see that the current system works quite well for me. I'm ranked about 20 out of 809 (search restricted to only NL-EN, top (or only pair), native En), while I don't have a large amount of kudoz points by any means (193, compared with the leader's 2009). I am sure that there are way more than 20 NL-EN translators with more points than me, so this means that all these other translators have 'done the right thing' and not claimed English as a native language if this is not the case (contrary to other suggestions in this thread as to the trustworthiness of Dutch translators in this respect) - right?. So assuming serious clients are searching with the same settings, then I'm not too hard to find. (Only strange thing is that, though this has been the situation for some time - I haven't been active on proz at all this year - I only started getting regular requests via proz a few months ago.)
Looking at page 1 of the list of (paying) members at the top of the Nl-En Kudoz leader board, I see several people whose first (native) language isn't English but who are listing English anyway. Page 2 is more of same. Tip of the iceberg, so to speak.
| | | | Ty Kendall
Regatul Unit
Local time: 00:45
din ebraică în engleză
| Agreement about what 'native language' is isn't necessary.... | Jun 29, 2012 |
We don't need to agree on a definition for "native language". Whichever way you look at it, whatever you consider it be, there is clear abuse going on with the listing of native languages when the person listing it is neither truly native nor competent enough to be translating into it.
The problem with the whole "what is a native language" tangent is that some people have a vested interest in muddying the waters where this is concerned.
| | | | XXXphxxx (X)
Regatul Unit
Local time: 00:45
din portugheză în engleză
+ ...
INIŢIATORUL SUBIECTULUI
Ty Kendall wrote:
The problem with the whole "what is a native language" tangent is that some people have a vested interest in muddying the waters where this is concerned.
As stated above - filibustering.
| | | | Ty Kendall
Regatul Unit
Local time: 00:45
din ebraică în engleză
| Nice, useful word | Jun 29, 2012 |
[Edited at 2012-06-29 21:22 GMT]
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| Some numbers | Jun 29, 2012 |
I was wondering how many here in ProZ declare to have two or more native languages. To get an estimate, I ran some “experiments” using the directory. I asked for translators for three different hypothetical translations:
A. ES>EN, top 8 pairs, Spanish native language (against recommended practice),
B. ES>EN, top 8 pairs, English native language (according to recommended practice), and
C. DE>EN, top 8 pairs, German native language.
This last hypothetical ... See more I was wondering how many here in ProZ declare to have two or more native languages. To get an estimate, I ran some “experiments” using the directory. I asked for translators for three different hypothetical translations:
A. ES>EN, top 8 pairs, Spanish native language (against recommended practice),
B. ES>EN, top 8 pairs, English native language (according to recommended practice), and
C. DE>EN, top 8 pairs, German native language.
This last hypothetical case was run to reduce the effect on the estimate of the large Spanish-speaking population in the US.
The system returns a list of available professionals for each of the three cases, showing who has declared a single native language (e.g., “Spanish”) or more than one (e.g., “ESL/ENG”). Each page lists 25 professionals. For each of the three cases, I counted the number of professionals on the first four pages (100 professionals) who listed two or more native languages. These are the results:
Case A (ES>EN, ES native):
Total: 14,453 Prozian professionals
ProZ members: 1,156
ProZ non-members (users): 13,297
ProZ members who listed two or more native languages: 45 out of 100
ProZ users who listed two or more native languages: 38 out of 100
Case B (ES>EN, EN native):
Total: 11,348 Prozian professionals
ProZ members: 1,500
ProZ non-members (users): 9,848
ProZ members who listed two or more native languages: 33 out of 100
ProZ users who listed two or more native languages: 32 out of 100
Case C (DE>EN, DE native):
Total: 4,603 Prozian professionals
ProZ members: 695
ProZ non-members (users): 3,908
ProZ members who listed two or more native languages: 39 out of 100
ProZ users who listed two or more native languages: 33 out of 100
If those samples are representative of the entire universe of ProZ members and users, then, 32% to 45% of that universe declare to have two or more native languages. Then,
a) We are among a large number of extraordinarily gifted people who have two or more native languages,
b) We are among a large number of fraudsters,
c) The “standard” definition of native language is either misunderstood or rejected by a large segment of our colleagues.
In any event, it is clear why ProZ has not been able to come up with a verification procedure in all these years.
Of course, this only indicates how difficult will be to reach a community-wide agreement on what should be done, how significant is “nativeness” and, even more difficult, what measures can be implemented to correct any misrepresentation. Clearly, for many or most of the clients, “nativeness” is a significant factor. Even if one disagrees with that, that fact does not allow anyone to declare him or herself to be something he or she is not. For example, many consider that only T&I graduates should be translating. This is particularly so in countries where T&I studies at the university level are standard. I strongly disagree with that concept, but I cannot declare that I am a T&I graduate when in fact I am not.
Best,
Luis ▲ Collapse
| | | | | Agree completely | Jun 29, 2012 |
Ty Kendall wrote:
We don't need to agree on a definition for "native language". Whichever way you look at it, whatever you consider it be, there is clear abuse going on with the listing of native languages when the person listing it is neither truly native nor competent enough to be translating into it.
The problem with the whole "what is a native language" tangent is that some people have a vested interest in muddying the waters where this is concerned.
Yup. Side discussions about 'what is a native language' are definitely just muddying the waters. The Wiki definition quoted by Kim Metzger and others does provide a valid explanation. Unfortunately for some, a native language is not a concept that varies according to the eyes of the beholder.
| | | | XXXphxxx (X)
Regatul Unit
Local time: 00:45
din portugheză în engleză
+ ...
INIŢIATORUL SUBIECTULUI
Very interesting. Thanks very much for the "hard facts".
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