2010 JAT Election

February 9th, 2010 | Posted in General

Fellow JAT members,

As you have just heard from our President, the 2010 election is
now underway. With JAT’s 25th anniversary this year and
the momentum the current Board has built up, it is an exciting
time for JAT. We hope that this translates into a hotly
contested election.

As mandated by JAT’s new bylaws, the Election Committee
consists of three people. This year, we are Wendy McBride, Yoko
Kawabe and Gary Roberts.

Four director positions and one auditor position are to be
filled in this election. Following is an update on the
composition of the Board.

The current Board comprises Helen Iwata, Charles Aschmann, Fred
Uleman, Phil Robertson, James Phillips, Chris Blakeslee, Peter
Durfee and Manako Ihaya. The auditors are Emily Shibata-Sato and
Wolfgang Bechstein.
Of these, Helen Iwata, Charles Aschmann, Fred Uleman, Phil
Robertson (directors) and Emily Shibata-Sato (auditor) are
incumbents and not up for election.

James Phillips, Chris Blakeslee and Peter Durfee have reached
the end of their first terms and are able to run again. Manako
Ihaya and Wolfgang Bechstein have served four out of the last
six years and are not able to run again in this election.

The election schedule is as follows. Be aware that the timeframe
has changed from previous years. Please refer to the latest JAT
bylaws concerning elections at http://jat.org/about/bylaws/#a3.

*March 1 (00:00 JST)—March 7 (23:59:59 JST): Submission of
candidate statements
Members seeking to stand for election should fill in the form at
the following URL:
https://jat.wufoo.com/forms/jat-2010-board-candidacy/ in English
or Japanese (up to 300 words or 600 characters).

In addition to the usual personal info on background etc., the
statement should provide some indication of how the candidate
envisions JAT evolving (or standing pat) toward the future. A
digest of the candidate statements will be sent to the JAT mail
list and posted on the JAT website at the start of the polling
in the second week of March.

Per the bylaws, candidates will need to supply full name,
gender, nationality, address of current residence, home
telephone number, and e-mail address. Candidates must have been
JAT members for the entire year preceding the deadline for
submitting candidacy statements. For further info, again, we
recommend taking a look at Section III of the JAT bylaws at the
link above.

*March 9 (00:00 JST)—March 19 (23:59:59 JST): Voting
period
Votes will be cast at a Wufoo site to be announced shortly. Each
member may cast five votes in this election; that is, one vote
for or against four candidates for director and one vote for or
against one candidate for auditor. This is a change from the
last election (again, please refer to the latest bylaws).

As soon as possible after the close of the election, but no
later than March 31 (20:00 JST), the net votes for each
candidate (sum of positive and negative votes) will be posted to
the mailing list. Complete ballot breakdown info for each
candidate will be available on the website for those interested.

Active candidacy participation in this election is vital for
JAT’s continuing evolution and greater effectiveness in
serving you, the members. More importantly, PLEASE VOTE.
There’s no reason not to! JAT is here for you.

Wendy McBride
Yoko Kawabe
Gary Roberts
2010 JAT Election Committee

First Meeting of JATLAW

January 31st, 2010 | Posted in Events

Details of the first meeting of JAT’s newest special interest
group - JATLAW - are below.

Time and date: 18:30-20:30 on Tuesday, February 2
Place: Conference Room 1, 49F, Roppongi Academy Hills, Tokyo.
Presentation: “Japanese Tort Law - Understanding it; Translating
it” (followed by discussion of future content and schedule for
JATLAW meetings)
Presenter: Timothy Marrable
Cost: Zero
Participants: Anyone interested in legal translation - please
register by e-mail to Helen Iwata by Monday,
February 1 since space is limited.

Thank you, Timothy Marrable, for organising this meeting!

February Kansai Meeting

January 31st, 2010 | Posted in Events

Date: Saturday, February 27, 2010
Time: 14:00-16:30
Place: Grand Hankyu Building 26F Room 7, Osaka
Speaker: Carol Lawson
Presentation: Japanese law
Please register at: JAT KANSAI

Upcoming Tokyo Events

January 31st, 2010 | Posted in Events

Saturday February 20: Lee Seaman, ‘An Overview of Pharma Translation and Strategies’ (details below)

Saturday March 20: Carol Lawson, ‘Translating the Japanese Law Translation Website’ (repeat of the February presentation in Osaka)

———————————————-
Date: Saturday, February 20, 2010
Time: 14:00-17:00
Place: Forum 8 (Shibuya)
Address: Dogenzaka 2-10-17, Shibuya, Tokyo
Phone: 03-3780-0008
Speaker: Lee Seaman
Presentation: An Overview of Pharma Translation and Strategies for Developing End-User Relationships
Cost: JAT members free, non-members 1,000 yen (pre-registration not required)
Nijikai: from 17:15, venue to be announced
Inquiries: tac@jat.org

Presentation outline
1) Introduction: Past developments and current trends in pharma translation
2) Body: Getting from “translation unit producer” to “value-added services provider”
(a) Getting qualified as a high-end pharma translator
Knowing your subject area
Knowing what the market needs
Developing field-specific writing skills
(b) Positioning yourself in the market
Establishing Japanese language and administrative support
Getting an introduction
Earning a good reputation
Knowing who your boss is, and what problems may come up in-house
Being clear with the client
(c) Making your client successful
Being easy to work with
Providing helpful resources
Making the client look good
Selling the next project
3) Conclusion: Not a road everyone will want to take, and as soon as you get something that works, your competition will increase. But it can be rewarding and quite a lot of fun.

Speaker profile
Lee has been translating pharma-related materials from Japanese since 1985, and has been a JAT member since 1988. She first began working with direct clients in the 1990s, and has recently branched out into consultation for Japanese pharmaceutical clients and academics and for American law firms. She has translated a series of six books for the lay reader on medicinal applications of yoga, and co-translated two books with Steve Sherman (Valvular Heart Disease: Its Clinical and Pathological Aspects, Hisao Manabe ed., and Proceedings for the JSIF workshop on Varicella and Its Treatment in Japan, published by the Japan Herpesvirus Infections Forum) and three with Noriko Hill (the ABO-Incompatible Kidney Transplantation series by Kota Takahashi, published by Elsevier. Lee lives in Bellingham in the state of Washington,USA.

January Tokyo Meeting

January 4th, 2010 | Posted in Events

Date: Saturday, January 23 2010
Time: 14:00-17:00
Place: Forum 8 (Shibuya)
Address: Dogenzaka 2-10-17, Shibuya, Tokyo
Phone: 03-3780-0008
Cost: JAT members free, non-members \1000
Nijikai: from 17:15, venue to be announced
Inquiries: tac@jat.org

Editing (and/or translating) Scientific Research Manuscripts for
Meaning: Part II
Speaker: Rick Weisburd

Japanese scientists publish about 70,000 indexed research
manuscripts every year, most of them in English; together with
the general insufficiency of Englishproficiency among Japanese
scientists, this makes for a huge market foreditors and
translators. In this lecture I will explain the
fundamentalcharacteristics of science, research writing, and
what is needed foreditors to help Japanese scientists to
effectively communicate theirresearch to the international
scientific community. I will also touch onlevels of edit,
qualifications for research editing, the business ofediting, the
structure of research papers, research journals, and thepeer
review process. Many aspects of scientific editing are also
usefuland relevant for translators of scientific content. Part I
of this talk was presented to the May 2009 JAT meeting. Part
IIwill briefly review the first part of the talk and spend more
time onspecific examples of common writing problems. Please send
Rick (inEnglish to rickweisburd at gmail.com) specific questions
you have aboutresearch writing; he’ll try to work some of these
into the meeting. Discussion will be encouraged.

=============================================

Rick Weisburd grew up in New York and earned his B.S. in biology
(minor in chemistry) from the State University of New York at
Albany. His PhD is in oceanography (University of Hawaii at
Manoa). Since moving to Japan in 1990, Rick did research for 6
years at the National Institute for Environmental Studies and
then taught and did research at the University of Tsukuba
biology department for 9 years. In 2006 he resigned from the
university to assume the presidency of ELSS, Inc. Rick is
certified by the Board of Editors in the Life Sciences and has
taught research writing at various research institutions every
year since 1996.

SIXTH ANNUAL JAT CONTEST FOR NEW AND ASPIRING TRANSLATORS FINAL RESULTS

December 25th, 2009 | Posted in General

第6回新人翻訳者コンテスト 結果発表(英日部門)

英日部門には 37 人の応募がありました。応募して下さった皆様には心からお礼を申し上げます。厳正な審査の結果、以下の5人が最終選考に残りました(敬称略)。

No. 91 Naoko Kagiya
No.114 Fumiko Uchiyama
No.140 Ichiro Shirakawa
No.141 Kim Younghee
No.161 Yukiko Oda

さらに最終審査の結果、入賞者が次のように決定しました。

第1位 No.140 Ichiro Shirakawa
第2位 No.141 Kim Younghee

選ばれた方も、惜しくも選外となられた方も、ぜひ原文とご自分の翻訳をもう一度見直して、翻訳力向上の一助にしていただければ幸いです。

なお、講評はこちら

コンテスト実行委員
井隼 眞奈子
チャールズ・アッシュマン

SIXTH ANNUAL JAT CONTEST FOR NEW AND ASPIRING TRANSLATORS FINAL RESULTS (Japanese to English)

The judges of the 6th annual JAT translation contest for new and aspiring translators (Japanese to English) have made their final decision, and the results are as follows:

There were 39 entrants and the semi-finalists in the Japanese to English division, in order of the numbers assigned to their entries, were:

99. Monica Kassab
108. Jillian Nonaka
120. Jason Morgan
123. Stephen Jensen
162. Elise Kavanagh

After much deliberation, the judges awarded prizes as follows:

First place: No. 162, Elise Kavanagh
Second place: No. 108, Jillian Nonaka

Many thanks to everyone who applied. Choosing the winners was a difficult task, given the number of entries and their level. Even if you did not win, we hope you found the contest to be a challenging and worthwhile exercise, and we hope that some of you will try again next year.

Click here for the judges’ comments.

Charles Aschmann
Manako Ihaya
Contest Liaison

e-Juku Documents

December 22nd, 2009 | Posted in General

Links to the source text and write-up from Helen Iwata’s translation workshop at PROJECT Osaka in November 2009, based on the October session of e-Juku are below. If you are interested in participating in e-Juku, please contact president1@jat.org with “e-Juku” in the subject line.

Helen Iwata E-Juku Source Text

PO Write-up from Helen Iwata

IJET-22 (2011)

December 19th, 2009 | Posted in Board

The JAT Board is delighted to announce that the venue for IJET-22 will be Seattle, Washington. This event will take place in 2011. Further details will be announced as they become available.
Seattle edged out a very strong bid from Monterey, California, and this reflects well on the willingness of far-flung JAT members to step forward and host JAT events. The Board would like to extend its sincere thanks to both bid committees.

IJET-21 Registration

December 16th, 2009 | Posted in Events

Registration for IJET-21 is now open. Early-bird registration is 23,000 yen for JAT members and 28,000 yen for non-JAT members. Early-bird registration ends on February 28, 2010 JST. Normal registration (from March 1 to April 11, 2010) is 25,000 yen for JAT members and 30,000 yen for non-JAT members

Click here to begin the registration process.

Recent JAT Event Photos

December 14th, 2009 | Posted in Events

Links to recent JAT event photos

Project Osaka

Osaka Bonenkai