Honestly: speaking as a self-employed translator since 2008, right now the industry is changing in ways I never could have anticipated. The advent of ever-increasingly powerful and sophisticated AI just leaves me with too many unidentified questions, never mind unanswered ones. I guess I’m baring my soul here as I nevertheless seek to prioritise continuing to comment about language in a way that might prove enlightening and entertaining alike, possibly to people I’ve never heard of. That’s what I do to promote myself.

Https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/p0jbjgtc I would say that the thing most evident about the BBC Radio 4 Thought For The Day article dated 15 July 2024 is its dignified approach in its challenging of political dogma. Donald Trump very nearly lost his life in an assassination attack; while I had nothing to do with it, it would be irresponsible of me not to acknowledge the widespread social division and disquiet that this has brought about in the United States and, more than likely, beyond. I wonder how Vladimir Putin and Xi Jinping have responded to this one.

I think of the article “Expressions I really do wish I was taught at school”, which I published online on 11 January 2019. The entry “I don’t blame you” in the list really should be acknowledged as bereft of some otherwise unmentioned element of castigating accusation or judgement when you consider the context in which this phrase is typically applied. And, today, I just may feel much the same way when it comes to “ignorance”, depending on the context.

That said, there has been a bad English translation of a sign in a French hotel, reading “Persons ignorant of the manoeuvres of the ascenseur [i.e. the lift / elevator] are prayed instantly to address themselves to the concierge.” Speaking as a man with a degree in French, my best guess of the original would be: “Les personnes qui sont ignorantes des manoeuvres de l’ascenseur sont priées de s’adresser au concierge.” Let me provide a more sensible representation of it in English: “Persons who don’t know how the lift functions should consult the concierge.”

Like, in truth, it would seem that a person who is legitimately definable as “ignorant” in English is not necessarily one to be held in contempt, or to be known for such negative qualities as arrogance or cowardice. Likewise, it’s not uncommon for the French to use “ignorant” in a less judgemental – if no less meaningful – way.

It’s the same in German – in a way. Having recently realised that I had forgotten what the German word for “patronise” is, I looked it up on Google Translate – it gave me literally only one suggestion: “bevormunden”. This left me somewhat perplexed, as you don’t have to be a genius to realise that patronising behaviour is by no means necessarily elicited through unthoughtful and unwise words i.e. the “mund” bit in “bevormunden” – that is the German word for “mouth”. And there I was thinking that it might have been “unterhalten” – a literal translation: “hold under” – if not for the fact that I already knew that this does in fact mean “entertain” in English. But I also thought of “erniedrigen” – but not without challenging my own interpretation of it before I asked Google Translate. I thought “tease” or “deride” – “something like that”. And only then did I proceed to have Google Translate translate this word into English for me; what it gave me was “humiliate”, “degrade”, “humble” and “abase”. Not too far from my own honest thoughts, actually; but I hope you understand the point that I’m trying to make here. Of course, whether or not a derision attack, or a humiliation attack, is “successful” lies mostly with the victim, as no words or actions (or thoughts) of someone else on the matter can substitute their own. I guess the same implications are carried in the old adage “keep your friends close and your enemies closer”.

Some more examples:

In German, I have not forgotten that “Sarge” is “coffin” – not to be confused with “Zarge”, which means “frame”. That said, it can be argued that a coffin is in itself a “frame” encasing a deceased person! How do I remember these words at all, for all the improbability that I will end up using them at some random occasion? Who knows?

I remember not only that the German word for “tree” is “Baum” but also that the German word for “maple” is “Ahorn”… for some reason. Maybe it has something to do with the fact that the maple leaf is very much “the Canadian one” – it is featured on the Canadian flag, after all. At the end of the day, it invites exploration, an appreciation, of my own psyche, you know?

At university I was taught the difference between “gebessert” and “verbessert” in German. The former means merely improve a bit while the latter means to change dramatically – turn over a new leaf, as it were.

I can still remember the first French adjectives I learned, indicating personal qualities. Like “travailleur” – only with no idea of the word “ travail”. But back to German – German verbs in particular, I find, often have a whole array of meanings, which can make pinpointing their actual intended meaning in a given case more of a challenge. Not least because it’s so common for verbs in German to come with a prefix that is a preposition – typically “an” or “aus” or “um”.

But I’ve learned to appreciate that, for all the rhetoric that we shouldn’t take things for granted, it’s just human nature to look for things we can afford to take for granted, nay strive for them. Even if this were through means purely moral, this does not necessarily rule out one engaging in such action as being “ignorant” – I urge you to Google this word and find out if your appreciation of the meaning of this word really is as full as it should be. This doesn’t mean that I don’t appreciate that people might confuse such pursuits with dreams worth honouring and commemorating whatever develops. That said, I’m only human, and I’m at a juncture in my life where the only prevailing question is that of what I should do to acclimate myself to the translation industry today for how much it has changed. No-one should ever “have to” be afraid of discovery. But, for what it’s worth, this is probably the most important blog article I’ve ever written…

Time for me to fight for peace of mind and just “better overall” in my career as a professional translator…