English is often referred to as the “lingua franca” or the common language- of the modern times because it is so widely spoken.  Among the top three most spoken languages in the world, English is spoken by over 300 million people as a first language, and by another 300 million or so as a second language. English has status as an official language in approximately seventy five countries.  In populations of the world where English is not often spoken, demand for competency in the language is on the rise.

JR Language Translations joins the United Nations in celebrating English Language Day.  With the English language increasing in demand for a wide variety of translating needs, high quality translation and interpretation work is a necessity for our clients.  We take this opportunity to acknowledge and extend our heartfelt thanks to our translators and interpreters for their hard work and quality services.

The Spanish language is celebrated on International Spanish Language Day, which takes place annually on April 23^rd.  The day was chosen to pay homage to the great Spanish novelist, poet and playwright Don Miguel Cervantes Saavedra, who passed away on April 23^rd, 1616.  In Spanish speaking regions throughout the world, events and activities are held in celebration of the Spanish language and culture.  Readings of one of Saavedra’s most acclaimed novels, Don Quixote, are a common staple of honoring classic Spanish literature on this date.      

With approximately 400 million speakers to date, the Spanish language is among the top three of the most widely spoken languages in the world.  It is an official language in up to twenty countries.  As one of the most phonetic languages, Spanish is one of the more accessible languages to learn due to the fact that much of Spanish vocabulary is pronounced the way it ‘looks’ or is spelled.  This has contributed to the steady 8% annual growth in Spanish speakers/learners, especially among younger people.     

JR Language is delighted to join Spanish speakers worldwide in celebration of the Spanish language.  With the steadily growing popularity of Spanish language, the need for high quality Spanish translation/interpretation services grows as well.  We are thankful to our Spanish translators and interpreters for their hard work and consistent delivery of high quality services to our clients.              

This date was chosen as the date for the Chinese language to pay tribute to Cangjie, which corresponds to Guyu in the Chinese calendar. According to a legend when Cangjie invented Chinese characters, the deities and ghosts cried and it rained millet; the word Guyu literally means “rain of millet”.

JR Language joins the celebration and takes this week of April to acknowledge the amazing job that our Chinese translatorsand interpreters carry out for us every day. Thank you for your loyalty and work ethic. Without your effort and knowledge we will not be able to provide high quality Chinese translation for our clients.

To Celebrate Chinese day we offer 15% discount for Chinese Translation this week.

Happy Chinese Day!

Each year Pan American Day and Pan American Week set the moment when Americans of all ages and nationalities can strengthen the bonds of friendship. Americans from one end of the continent to the other, come to know each other better through special observances, classroom projects, club programs, plays and pageants, parades and social events.

As part of both, Latin America and the United States, JR Language Translations joins the Pan American Day and Week celebrations. We proudly and diligently provide, day after day, high-quality translation, localization and interpretation services to hundreds of clients along the Americas in Spanish, Portuguese, French, and many other languages, allowing effective communication that enables business, social, and diplomatic relations.

Let’s celebrate the cultural richness of the Americas and sing together the Pan American hymn!

This is the problem the health insurance industry is facing now. As if choosing a health insurance wasn’t difficult enough, for those whose English or Spanish is not their native language, this process becomes exponentially more dreadful. Starting October 1, the Affordable Care Act will come into effect allowing people to compare multiple health care plans in one place. Until know the applications have been traditionally translated into Spanish, due to the ever-increasing amount of Spanish speakers in the United States but, it completely leaves out the 4 million Asian American and Pacific Islander communities in the U.S. who speak other language than English.

The solution? Translating the application forms into the main foreign languages spoken in the United States among them Chinese, Arabic, Portuguese, French, Russian, Korean, and Farsi. Translation is the only way in which people who speak different languages can accurately communicate and get the right message across. We all know how important health care is so, the translation of these forms is not something insurance companies can “think about” or “do later on”, it is a vital necessity that should be addressed and solved immediately for the benefit of their potential insured people.

Let’s work together so everyone can have access to the same information, and therefore, access to the same benefits. We must push for better legislation and more comprehensive and affordable health care option that are accessible for everyone alike. Health care should not be an option, a luxury only those who can pay for it have, it is a right and we need to do whatever it is in our hands to make sure everyone enjoys it.

A style guide sets the parameters for a translator’s work.  In short, it lets the translator know what to do and what to avoid.  In further detail, these parameters address the grammatical and technical requirements of the translation work.  Rules of grammar vary depending on cultures, and are discussed in the style guide.  The following questions are addressed, among many others:

-          What words should be avoided for a particular company?

-          When should certain words be capitalized?

-          What types of abbreviations are appropriate to use?

-          How should honorary/professional titles be displayed?

-          Are there words that ought not to be translated?

Most importantly, the style guide addresses the cultural considerations and required tone of the translation.  The translator must deliver a translated document/service that is perfectly suited to the culture of both the client and associated organization.  The tone of the translation must accurately reflect the environment/character of the client (and associated organization), and goes in hand with its culture.

Preparation of a proper style guide involves strong team work.  Often, professional translators are completely unfamiliar with the corporation or organization that they are working for.  They must work closely with the client in developing an appropriate style guide.  All parties must be equally satisfied with and approve of the final version.  Only then, will the translator be able to deliver professional, high quality work that meets the requirements of the client’s party, and respects the client’s unique culture.

Following traditions and customs different countries start their week on different days, some do on Monday other on Sunday, due to that variance the festivity starts on March 8 and ends on March 24. Additionally, the International French Day is celebrated on March 20^th. Furthermore, UNESCO also set this day as the UN French Language Day because it coincided, in 2010, with the 40th anniversary of the International Organization of La Francophonie.

JR Language team joins the celebration with a special recognition to our French translators from France, Canada, Africa, and from all over the world. We thank them for their hard work, professionalism, and expertise, which allow us to deliver high-quality French translations to our clients every day of the year! Their wide range of subject matter expertise make us the first translation option for business clients and individuals for their legal, marketing, and technical translation needs.

Let’s celebrate together with the 200 million French speakers worldwide. Let’s promote the francophone culture and the beautiful language of Camus, Voltaire, Hugo, Dumas and many others great writers, artists and, of course our outstanding, professional French Translators!

As we all know, women are from Venus and men are from Mars; two different planets with very distinct characteristics. Humans are the same; gender somehow predisposes us and provides us with a set of skills and characteristics that makes us more inclined for certain tasks.  According to statistics from studentscholarships.org, 71% of translators, interpreters and terminologists in Canada are women. Unfortunately, we couldn’t find gender-related information for the United States or other nations but, we are convinced that this is the rule around the world given the proportion of women that we find in our team and the colleagues that we have met within the localization world.

There are many organizations dedicated to help and empower women. In the language industry we could mention Found in Translation, a Massachusetts-based program which helps low-income and homeless multilingual women become professional medical interpreters. This program was also founded by a woman, Nobel Prize nominee Kip Tiernan, a fierce advocate for social justice and we can’t stress enough about the amazing and noble job they are doing and the enormous difference they represent in the lives of all the women they have helped.

Whether it is because we are natural multitaskers or because we like to communicate (aka talk, now accredited to a gene), the truth is we love and enjoy helping others (and apparently language-related careers) and we excel at it!

Happy International Women’s Day to all our friends and colleagues!

We are looking forward to this conference after the fantastic experience we had last year. From Monaco 2012 we got new partners and providers, as well as a myriad of new ideas for the growth and development of JR Language in 2012. Overall we came back energized, and with new technologies to improve quality and the specialization of our translation services.

After checking the conference schedule, we are looking forward to get more insight on the maturity and new developments in Machine Translation; we have big plans for this technology in 2013. We are especially interested in post-editing techniques and measurements for TM.

GALA brings together a diverse and interesting group of people from all areas of the translation industry, among them: language technology developers, translation agencies, localization providers, consultants, and clients. Presentations will continue to focus on the tag line of the organization: “The language of business and the business of language”. This year the keynote speaker is stressing the importance of embracing technology, in general but, particularly in localization and translation services.

We are also interest in the updates on localization standards and connectivity between applications and translation tools.

Stay tuned for JRL’s summary of this important conference, which gathers representatives and players from all industries and countries of the world.

The Internet has single-handedly ushered in a new era of globally accessible information. Before its invention, communities around the world operated largely in isolation. People turned to books, government-maintained archives, and periodicals to learn about other cultures and access information about happenings in other countries.

Sure, the public had television and radio to get the news, and people were perfectly capable of staying abreast of the latest world events. However, they viewed passively – there was no real way to interact with (or react to) a story as a unified global community.

Now, all that’s changed. Thanks to the ever-growing World Wide Web, humans have an unprecedented opportunity to connect with one another from pole to pole. We can join virtual communities based on our interests – regardless of our location. Most importantly, however, we can interact with media outlets and hold newsmakers accountable in ways never before thought possible.

Over the past five years in particular, the web’s growth has exploded. In fact, according to Internet World Stats, by mid-2012, 2.4 billion people were online – and almost half of them logged in from Asia:

Countless countries have joined the ranks of the interconnected, and new cultural problems have begun to emerge in tandem with the influx. The Internet was originally built as an English-based network, so when new countries arrived online, the need for translations services suddenly became a critical issue.

Online Language Barriers and the Global Economy

Today’s Internet serves a completely different population than the overwhelmingly English-speaking web of the ‘90s. As noted above, almost half of the world’s current Internet users are located in Asia. Latin America comes in strong at 10.4%, and Arabic speakers in the Middle East hold steady and climbing at 3.7%. Other languages in the graph now vastly outweigh the English-speaking slivers. On the outside, this would appear to be a good thing – the increased language diversity ushered in by globalization solves the whole “English-dominated Internet” problem, right?

The answer, unfortunately, is no. Globalization has gone online, but a large number of webmasters have yet to get with the program and adjust their website translation capabilities accordingly. Many businesses are missing out on a massive chunk of worldwide traffic simply because they aren’t aware of their options – a management misstep that directly impacts the global economy.

Why?  Simply put, when business websites continue utilizing outdated machine-based translation tools and website translation software for visitors, they’re essentially capping their customer base and hurting their bottom line. Major services such as Google website translation may be improving, but it’s no substitute for a solution tailored to your audience’s needs. Effective communication is vital for attracting and retaining customers, and a good website translation service serves as the foundation for that dialogue.

Three Elements of Professional Translation Service

Machines simply won’t cut it anymore. If you’re serious about your online brand, then proper language translation should be at the tip-top of your website to-do list.

Enlisting the help of a professional translation service is the only way to go if you want to compete in today’s high-competition Internet environment. However, it can be tough deciding which service to choose.

Here’s a good rule of thumb: opt for services that offer a three-pronged approach to website translation.

• First, seek out companies that employ techs with the software engineering know-how to integrate translation software seamlessly into your site.

• Then, ensure the website translation services on your short list staff their company with professionally trained, certified translators who are also native speakers.

• Finally, check out the translation tools themselves to determine whether they’re legit.

* If you want bonus points, find out whether your chosen company uses a project management to coordinate the combination of the three elements.

Without a doubt, this global society of ours has a long way to go before we solve the problem of website translation lag. In the meantime, professional website translation services are the single best tool to overcome online language barriers today.