Retail translation services gone wrong?

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The increasingly popular supermarket retailer Aldi have been doing a lot right in terms of muscling in on the ‘big four’ supermarkets in the UK and successfully creating a brand identity for value for money but they have caused a bit of commotion recently. There are claims from some that the German budget chain has been insensitive and ‘racist’ towards Scottish people in one of their new advertisements. This is well and truly a case of retail translation services gone bad.

The advert in question was a radio advert that aired on Australian radio to promote Aldi’s whiskey range. The advert features a Scotsman who announces himself as the head distiller for Aldi’s own-brand whisky accompanied by the unmistakable sound of bagpipes whilst an Englishwoman supplies a voiceover for the Scotsman for a fast translation into ‘English’ despite the Scot’s objections that he is already speaking English.

The advert received a complaint of racism from an expat Scottish national which prompted the Australian Advertising Board to investigate. The complainant who was not impressed, explained how the advert depicts the stereotype that Scots are hard to understand and insisted if it were an aboriginal who received a translation service there would be an ‘uproar’ and question why it was ok to be ‘racist’ towards the Scottish.

The complaint however was rejected by the board who stipulated that the promotion was intended to be more humorous rather than racist. The board ruled that the advert suggest that the Scottish man’s accent is likely to be harder to understand to the average person but is in fact completely clear and the use of a translator adds to the humour of the advert. They also state it is not acceptable to make fun of a person’s accent regardless of nationality but in this case it is the translator that is the one that looks ‘silly’ because there is no need for her translation whilst the Scotsman is not presented with a negative stereotype at all.

Aldi had commented to the board saying that this is just one of a series of light-hearted advertisements which will see other accents such as the French and New Zealand accents used in the same way.

Photo credit: Mike Mozart

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Why your business needs localisation services

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In the world of language translations and translation services you would think that a translation from one language into another would be sufficient and enough to pass as a ‘complete’ translation. You would think that you could get by on Google, Skype or some other third party translator software but that is not the case. The word ‘translation’ is defined by the Oxford dictionary as “The process of translating words or text from one language into another” and that is exactly what these said software’s achieve, but that is where the issue lies as a translation from one language to another word for word is just going to be a bunch of nonsense in the target language. This is where professional translation agencies come in as they provide professional translation services or in other words human translations carried out by actual qualified human translators.

These translators would more often than not be fluent in the source language as well as being a native speaker of the target language. This is so that the text could be translated into another language so that it makes complete sense rather than just random words put together. It is majorly important to have a readable translation but there is another step that can be taken specifically if the translation were to be aimed at different markets where it may need to be made as though one is speaking to the “locales”. This process is a vital one and is known as localisation or localisation services.

The localisation of a language is something businesses would use in order to target their products to ‘local’ markets where the general language may differ slightly such as French Canadian, Brazilian Portuguese and Mexican Spanish, to name a few. Localisation services are generally used for websites, software, videos games, audio voiceovers and other forms of multimedia. In addition to a translation from one language to another (making sense, grammar, correct spelling etc.) localisation will adapt the translation for the local market they intend to target, taking into account the proper formatting of letters and numbers, currencies, times, dates, as well as other details such as local customs and sensitivities towards certain images, phrases, graphics and colour schemes.

This is why your business needs to take into account localisation when looking to expand overseas, do not assume you can take a ‘one size fits all’ approach when marketing to different countries. One thing that works in Spain may not necessarily be successful in Spanish-speaking Argentina.

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Photo Credit: Nick Richards

What unexpected language has got a German translation?

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Languages, translations and globalisation are truly wonderful things because without these key factors we would not be able to communicate with the rest of the world, we would not be able to know the things we know now or learn new things from different cultures. Professional translation services are great in aiding this as it has allowed even the most obscure language to be understood all over the world.

A language such as the Ho-Chunk language of the Winnebago tribe of Wisconsin and Nebraska which is only spoken by a total of 11 people in the world or the Tinigua language of Colombia which is said to derive from no other language and is only fluently spoken by 2 people! Yes only 2 people left are known to speak Tinigua. Although these languages are translatable I highly doubt you would require a service such as Tinigua financial translation services, but you get the point.

Now one other obscure language has finally been given a translation, this time a German translation service. Is it a rare Amazonian tribal language from a tribe that has only just made contact with the modern world; a lost African language only spoken by the elders; or something with an exotic back-story along those lines? Nope! Not even close.

The language in question is none other than the Merseyside dialect of the Scouse community. Yes that’s right you can now finally get a Scouse to German translation service. All our prayers have been answered! We could thank God but it was German football team FC Augsburg who rather comically provided their traveling fans with a German translation of known Scouse sayings ahead of their trip to Anfield for the first leg of the Europa League’s last 32 round. The Scouse phrases included “Lad” (Boy/Man) which translated into “Alter” and “Mi head’s chocka” (???) in German “Ich kann nicht klar denken”. FC Augsburg eventually lost 1-0 to Liverpool over two legs to end their cup run, but at least the Germans can now feel comfortable knowing what a “Bevvie” is.

See the full list of translations below.

How an eight year old with the help of social media invented a new word

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Ever wondered how to create a new word? Ever thought how difficult it would be to actually get that ‘created’ word officiated? Ever thought if the translation to another language would make sense at all? Well an eight year old primary school student named Matteo has done just that. The story reported on BBC trending is of an Italian primary school teacher Margherita Aurora who is from the small commune Copparo of Emilia-Romagna. Margherita notices a word that has no official meaning written in Matteo’s school assignment.

The word in question used by the eight year old was “petaloso” which is a word he uses to describe a blooming flower. Petaloso would be the Italian translation of explaining that the flower is “full of petals” which actually makes complete grammatical sense as it is the combination of the Italian word for petal “petalo” with the suffix “-oso” which is translated into “full of”. Although the word is functional there was no official meaning to it in the Italian dictionary.

There does exist a direct English translation for the word “petaloso”, “petalous” is the direct and fast translation, a word that has been used from the 18th century. The absence of this word from the Italian dictionary gave Margherita the idea that her student Matteo had invented a new word. With the help and encouragement of Margherita, Matteo wrote to the Accademia della Crusca, an Italian language institute created in 1583, to get their opinion about the word.

They got a positive reply from one of the Crusca’s top language experts who replied, “The word you invented is well formed and could be used in the Italian language,” and “It is beautiful and clear.” But also warned that in order to be considered an official word of the Italian language, a number of the population must first need to understand it and use the word “petaloso”, the word must be spread and only then could it be considered and official Italian word.

Margherita was so moved by the Crusca’s linguist replay that she shared the images of the letter accompanied with the caption “this is worth more than a thousand Italian lessons” on Facebook which rather unexpectedly triggered a campaign to make “petaloso” an official word. This post has been shared more than 80,000 times on Facebook and on Twitter #petaloso has been used more than 40,000 times which saw it become a trending topic in Italy and briefly made an appearance in the top worldwide trend.

The Crusca joined the campaign by retweeting the word as well as the Zanichelli publishing house who are the publishers of Italy’s most used dictionaries, they even talked about the possibility of “petaloso” being included in the next edition. Also Rome’s tourist authorities advertised the city’s rose garden as the “petaloso” rose garden. Even the Italian Prime Minister recognised Matteo’s efforts and congratulated him.

This story just goes to show the importance of social media, that one eight year olds imaginative word could now be close to being considered as an official word.

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