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Translation work while travelling

  • 11-05-2007 8:45pm
    #1
    hoey
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 19 ✭


    Hi,
    I am just wondering if there is anyone out there who might be able to give me some guidance/advice.
    Basically I am getting very fed up in my current (office based) work...getting itchy feet and would like to go travelling for a few months. I would need to be able to have some income while abroad and so was wondering if there would be opportunity for doing translation work while travelling.
    I have legal qualifications and am trying to find out about getting some qualifications to translate legal documents from English into Irish. I have a pretty good standard of Irish, but am not a native speaker and am under no illusions but that I will have to make a major effort to get my target language up to standard, but with a lot of hard work I am confident that I could do it...
    But before I undertake all that study I have a few questions:

    Is this a realistic way to support oneself while travelling - ie is there sufficient volume of work out there, is it possible to do this type of work on a free lance basis, and is it relatively well paid?
    Are there any course that would be recommended to get language skills up to standard?
    Is there any standard exam/qualification which I should be working towards?

    I would be most grateful for any advice at all!

    Thanks,
    Hoey


Comments

  • #2
    thesteve
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 902 ✭✭✭thesteve


    Is this a realistic way to support oneself while travelling - ie is there sufficient volume of work out there, is it possible to do this type of work on a free lance basis, and is it relatively well paid?

    I am not sure of the volume of work from English into Irish but the pay usually depends on a number of factors, urgency, how complicated the text is, etc
    Is there any standard exam/qualification which I should be working towards?

    As far as I know one of the only Translation qualifications in Ireland is a Masters of Arts in DCU...

    You have also not addressed the technical questions. Translators do not just use a dictionary a pencil and a notepad. Expensive translation memory software is usually used (which is hard to use on a small screen, as in a laptop if you were travelling). You will have to invoice customers, etc...

    In theory it would be a good idea, but you would prob need clients before you start travelling, and then you'll find that depending on the amount of work, you could end up translating more than travelling! You also wouldn't want to deliver sub standard material to customers or they won't be customers for long.

    And getting your language up to a standard to be able to translate is nothing a course will do for you. Anybody expecting a good quality translation would not hire someone to translate a text into a language that is not their mother tongue...

    - S


  • #3
    nesf
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 27,644 ✭✭✭✭nesf


    hoey wrote:
    I have legal qualifications and am trying to find out about getting some qualifications to translate legal documents from English into Irish. I have a pretty good standard of Irish, but am not a native speaker and am under no illusions but that I will have to make a major effort to get my target language up to standard, but with a lot of hard work I am confident that I could do it...

    Right, honestly if you are going to be translating legal documents you're going to need a very high standard of Irish (or any language you're planning to translate into). You probably know yourself how complicate legal documents are and the importance of semantics in them and so on. I don't think it's a matter of being a native speaker in this since, again as you probably know yourself, legalese is not standard spoken language and if you pulled a few average people in off the street they probably couldn't fully grasp the nuances of a complicated legal document.

    I think if you are focussing on a specific area of translation (versus generally translating stuff) you could probably work at it to get to a high enough standard if you've a fairly good ability to pick up languages. I'd say that a degree in Irish plus a translation qualification would be fairly relevant to this kind of thing (ideally a joint degree in Law & Irish).

    thesteve wrote:
    As far as I know one of the only Translation qualifications in Ireland is a Masters of Arts in DCU...

    There some state certification course for Irish Translations also.


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