Last week, we provided general criteria for all of the members of your nonprofit translation team. Today, we will look at how to choose the translators that you need.
The most obvious criteria is that your translators must be bilingual, knowing both the language you are translating from, and the language you are translating into. Along with that, they need to be familiar with the culture of both languages, as this affects their understanding.
Regarding the language you are translating from (often called the “source language”), your translators should have advanced comprehension. They do not necessarily need incredible writing skills in that language, but they must be able to understand the documents they will be translating from.
For the language you are translating into (often called the “target language”), at this beginning stage of your translation team, it is strongly recommended that your translators be native speakers of that language. This will enable them to produce translations that flow nicely and are pleasant to read, and will reduce revision time.
Remember, it is not enough for your translators to SPEAK the target language; they must be able to WRITE it well. Someone who is a great interpreter (oral) may not necessarily be a good fit for translation (written). (For more information about this, read: https://www.lianergrant.com/myth-3/ )
“Ready to Translate” is a self-assessment tool you can give potential translators to see if they would be right for your team: https://www.lianergrant.com/translate/
In the next two weeks, we will explore the criteria for your bilingual reviser and for your formatter/proofreader. Stay tuned!
Have a great day!
Liane 🙂
