English Translation and a Target Language
What is a Target Language?
Target language is the final language of a translation process. It is the language in which the end product will have.
A target language is different than the source text, which is the original text to be translated. The target language is language that the source text is translated into.
Should a Foreign Business Translate into English?
Many businesses wonder if they should translate their content into English. Since a lot of information about the world revolves around the U.S. for politics, media and globalization, a business would be leaving out a large market if they did not have English translation.
Legal translations demands a precise target language because of how different local laws and court systems can be from country to country, and even region to region.
On one hand, writing in English will offer a business exposure to a much larger audience. On the other hand, it will also put a company in competition with a much larger number of websites. This means that businesses must be prepared to enter a highly competitive market. If a business’ objective was to raise the amount of customer traffic they get, then professional English translation is an ideal option.
The Challenges of English Translation
English is difficult to translate; one reason being that it is full of idioms. An idiom is a fixed, distinctive, and often colorful expression whose meaning cannot be understood from the combined meanings of its individual words.
When translators whose native language is not English attempt to produce English as a target language, they may not be able to translate these texts into the difficult, idiomatic language. This is because their knowledge of English idioms is not as naturally good as that of a native speaker. This is mainly because a native speaker’s knowledge of idioms is greatly rooted in his or her own culture.
There may be thousands of translators in the world, but only a fraction of these are able to produce:
- Professional quality
- Pinpoint accuracy and
- Culturally sound translations
It is thought that no machine will ever be able to replace human reasoning. This means that machine translation will never be able to catch up to the evolution of human translation since language and communication will always remain complex.
The Demand for English Translation
Since English is so widely spoken and read, the demand for English translation is a natural outcome. English translation is especially picking up in the literary world. These days, most authors ensure that there is an English translation of their book so that it can be widely distributed and read. Although books today are written in many languages, English translation is thought to be a necessity for global success.
English translation is also climbing when it comes to foreign cinema. The majority of movies in different languages offer English subtitles so that the viewer understands the dialogue and actions in the movie.