By Wendy Uchimura, a Japanese-to-English translator and proofreader specializing in Intellectual Property and NGO-based work
It is rather daunting to give a report on the event Writing Skills in Translation by the esteemed Lynne Riggs. As I write this, I recall all the useful information we learnt during the workshop and I wonder am I using the proper syntax; is a sentence too wobbly; have I repeated a word too often; or have I not trimmed enough phatic? We shall see... (Read more)
The handout from the Robin Britle presentation on "Ebooks and the Opportunites for Translators" made at the July 2012 Tokyo meeting is available to download from this link:
Participants can download the "homework" for the workshop from the link below. We encourage you to think about possible translations for the highlighted sentences, and we will discuss these at the workshop itself.
Call for (very) Short Essays
There is such a wealth of experience and good sense among JAT members that the JAT Board would like to commemorate International Translation Day (September 30) by publishing an anthology of short essays written by all of you.
By Eric Selland, legal, financial, and literary translator, poet and editor of an anthology of Japanese modernist and avant-garde poetry
Robin Birtle gave a very detailed presentation covering the history of e-books and the devices used for reading them, as well as the current condition of the e-book markets in the U.S. and Japan. Most of the presentation dealt with the ins and outs of the e-book market as well as various technical issues, then in the last section Birtle suggested a model by which translators might take advantage of new opportunities presented by e-books... (Read more)
The slides from Masashi Ishikawa's and George Tokikuni's presentation on "Does Translation Pay the Bills" at the May, 2012 Tokyo meeting, can be downloaded.
By Joji Matsuo, Japanese to English translator, consecutive interpreter, and active JAT speaker
“Translation is no longer a viable profession if you expect to support a family.” This could very well have been the message that translators would take home from the first 90 minutes of the JAT’s May Meeting in Tokyo. Fortunately, the second half provided some valuable survival tips that will help translators improve their situation in the current market.... (Read more)
Last year, we held the Eighth Annual Contest for New and Aspiring Translators. Every year, a group of screeners and judges help to narrow the entries and decide the winners. We would like to establish a committee similar to those we have for other JAT activities.
Well known in manufacturing, the International Organization for Standardization (ISO) is looking to draw up standards for translation and the translation industry. Because these may well directly affect JAT members, we think JAT should be part of the effort.
The handout from Yuji Yamamoto's presentation on “Turbo-boosting your translation productivity today!" made at the April 2012 Tokyo meeting is available for download from the following link: 2012JATTokyo_Yuji Yamamoto_Handout.pdf
JAT’s Tokyo Activities Committee’s April seminar was presented by Yuji Yamamoto, a leading light in Japanese translation circles, to around 50 E-J and J-E translators, about half of whom were non-JAT members... (Read more)