By JASON STRAZIUSO (AP) – 3 hours ago
NAWA, Afghanistan — Josh Habib lay in a dirt field, gasping for air. Two days of hiking with Marines through southern Afghanistan’s 115-degree heat had exhausted him. This was not what he signed up for.
Habib is not a Marine. He is a 53-year-old engineer from California hired by a contracting company as a military translator. When he applied for the lucrative linguist job, Habib said his recruiter gave no hint he would join a ground assault in Taliban land. He carried 40 pounds of food, water and gear on his back, and kept pace — barely — with Marines half his age.
U.S. troops say companies that recruit military translators are sending linguists to southern Afghanistan who are unprepared to serve in combat, even as hundreds more are needed to support the growing number of troops.
Some translators are in their 60s and 70s and in poor physical condition — and some don’t even speak the right language.
“I’ve met guys off the planes and have immediately sent them back because they weren’t in the proper physical shape,” said Gunnery Sgt. James Spangler, who is in charge of linguists at Camp Leatherneck, the largest U.S. base in Helmand province.
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Tags: Translation
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Tom Gara
Last Updated: July 01. 2009 7:40PM UAE / July 1. 2009 3:40PM GMT
A Kuwaiti company is on the verge of a huge technological breakthrough in the field of automated language translation after acquiring a Silicon Valley start-up specialising in mobile voice applications.
Sakhr Software, which has designed an advanced suite of software and hardware that lets computers understand, translate and process the Arabic language, announced yesterday the acquisition of Mobile Directions, an American company that has developed applications for mobile phone users that allow them to speak requests into their phone and receive the answers via text.
The acquisition is one of just a handful of cases where American technology companies have been acquired by their peers in the Middle East.
Sakhr, which has been active in the Arabic computing field for more than two decades, will use the technical talent and intellectual property gained with its American purchase to develop mobile phone applications that will allow Arabic and English speakers to talk into their mobile phones and have the device translate and speak back their words in the other language.
The company already has a working version of the software for the Apple iPhone.
Hythem el Nazer, a senior vice president at TA Associates, a private equity investor in technology, media and telecommunications companies, said the software could change the industry. “I’ve seen Sakhr’s speech-to-speech mobile translator on the iPhone in action, and it could be a game changer,” he said.
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Tags: Arabic, Translation
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Jun 29 2009 by Martin Shipton, Western Mail
BILINGUALISM is killing the Welsh language in its own heartlands, an academic has claimed.
Instead of helping Welsh to survive, the increasing prevalence of simultaneous translation facilities is having the opposite effect, says Dr Richard Glyn Roberts, a lecturer in the School of Gaelic and Celtic Studies at University College Dublin.
In a thought-provoking chapter in a new book about Wales published by the University of West Brittany, Dr Roberts – writing in French – argues that bilingualism amounts to little more than a gesture which paradoxically confirms the predominance of English.
Dr Roberts states: “The reality is that in a great number of meetings, the interpreter has nothing to do because Welsh speakers insist on speaking English in the presence of non-Welsh speakers – a fact that surprises no-one in view of the socio-cultural weight of the English language.
“One example will suffice to illustrate the growing cost of bilingualism.
“In December 2006 at Caernarfon, I was present as the translator at a meeting of 18 health professionals, of whom nine were Welsh speakers and nine non-Welsh speakers.
“In spite of the equality of numbers, everyone spoke English. Numerical equality; linguistic inequality. That is easily understood, because the Welsh speakers speak English as fluently, or nearly as fluently, as the non-Welsh speakers, and they feel frustrated at being obliged to speak via an interpreter.
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Tags: Bilinguism, English, Translation, Welsh
Posted in Book review, Language diversity | No Comments »
APRIL 28, 2009, 9:34 A.M. ET
By AMY PALANJIAN
From an early age, Paula Shannon was taught the importance of language from her mother and grandmother. After using her college education to combine her interest in linguistics with her computer science skills, she moved up the ranks at language firm Berlitz International. Now, Ms. Shannon, 49, is the top female executive at Lionbridge Technologies, a global firm based in Waltham, Mass., that provides international companies with translation services in over 100 languages, where she works with over 4,600 employees across 26 countries.
Full Name: Paula Shannon
Age: 49
Hometown: Baie d’Urfe, Quebec
First Job: A little shop on the water in Massachusetts that sold antiques and maritime curios in the front and lobsters in the back. I started when I was 15.
Favorite job: Current job.
Education: B.A. in Russian and German, minor in linguistics from McGill University
Years in current industry: 23
How I got here in 10 words or less: Never worried about taking detours and accepting lateral moves.
Q: You became interested in language at an early age. How did that happen?
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Tags: Translation
Posted in Language market, People | No Comments »
