Skip to content

Koine-Greek

Studies in Greek Language & Linguistics
Main navigation
  • Koine-Greek.com
  • Reviews
  • Linguistics
    • Greek Constituent Order
    • Greek Noun Phrases
    • Greek Diathesis, Voice, & Transitivity
    • Greek Tense & Aspect Resources
    • Greek Linguistic Historiography
    • Greek Phonology
    • Hebrew Bible & Linguistics
  • The grammar
    • Parts-of-speech & morphosyntax
    • Syntax, semantics, & discourse
  • Interviews
  • Categories
  • About
Mike Aubrey October 7, 2009 Language, Translation

Truths about Translation #1-3

  1. Language is complicated.
  2. Two languages together are twice as complicated squared.
  3. Translation only accentuates #2.

Rate this:

Share this:

  • Reddit
  • Twitter
  • Facebook
  • Email

Like this:

Like Loading...

Related

Posted in Language, Translation. Bookmark the permalink.

6Comments

Add yours
  1. 1
    judithweingarten on October 8, 2009 at 2:14 am
    Reply

    An old friend of mine (quite literally: she had been a librarian for the League of Nations)once defined a bilingual person as ‘someone who made mistakes in two languages’.

    LikeLike

  2. 2
    Carl W. Conrad on October 8, 2009 at 3:57 am
    Reply

    True about translation, no doubt; not so sure about “transation.”

    LikeLike

    • 3
      Mike Aubrey on October 8, 2009 at 7:48 am
      Reply

      Ah, but had you noticed that “translations” didn’t agree with “accentuates”?

      It was a game: see how many of my typos can you notice.

      LikeLike

      • 4
        Scripture Zealot on October 8, 2009 at 2:54 pm
        Reply

        I’m addicted to that game. It’s internet-wide for me.
        Jeff

        LikeLike

  3. 5
    Nathan Smith on October 8, 2009 at 7:51 am
    Reply

    I think we need a more nuanced approach than “twice.” Perhaps some friends in the comparative or statistical linguistics fields can work up a formula for determining difficulty of translation which takes into consideration degree of cognate relation, etc. 🙂

    LikeLike

    • 6
      Mike Aubrey on October 8, 2009 at 8:11 am
      Reply

      How about we use the same method used for quick and dirty conversions from Celsius to Fahrenheit: double and add 30?

      LikeLike

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Fill in your details below or click an icon to log in:

Gravatar
WordPress.com Logo

You are commenting using your WordPress.com account. ( Log Out /  Change )

Twitter picture

You are commenting using your Twitter account. ( Log Out /  Change )

Facebook photo

You are commenting using your Facebook account. ( Log Out /  Change )

Cancel

Connecting to %s

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.

Website Powered by WordPress.com.
Footer navigation
  • Facebook
  • Twitter
  • RSS Feed
  • Follow via Email
  • This site uses Amazon Affiliate Links.
Secondary navigation
  • Facebook
  • Twitter
  • RSS Feed
  • Follow via Email
  • This site uses Amazon Affiliate Links.
  • Search

Post navigation

Translation Fallacy of the Day
Poll on Translation & Hermeneutics

Begin typing your search above and press return to search. Press Esc to cancel.

  • Follow Following
    • Koine-Greek
      • Join 4,481 other followers
    • Already have a WordPress.com account? Log in now.
    • Koine-Greek
    • Customize
    • Follow Following
    • Sign up
    • Log in
    • Copy shortlink
    • Report this content
    • View post in Reader
    • Manage subscriptions
    • Collapse this bar
%d bloggers like this: