EU hiring Irish translators

Riskymove · 01-07-2016 10:20AM

LeinsterDub wrote: »

Irish MEPs are entitled to speak in Irish. The translators will translate the Irish for the rest of the MEPs . It's not just translating English to Irish or Spanish to Irish

actually we are nowhere near having Irish interpretation at debates/meetings

the translators are being hired to translate (i.e. documents) not interpret (i.e. verbal translation)

biko · 01-07-2016 12:24PM

We should just be proactive and nominate German as the official language of all EU countries.

Your president Jean-Claude Juncker speaks German.

Riskymove · 01-07-2016 12:36PM

biko wrote: »

Your president

He is not President of the EU

ohnonotgmail · 01-07-2016 01:54PM

LeinsterDub wrote: »

Didn't some guy recently get off a speeding fine because there was no Irish version or the Irish version was different? If your not happy with Irish primacy you should ask your TD to raise it in the Dáil.

He tried to but thankfully didnt succeed.

Alf Stewart. · 01-07-2016 02:01PM

They should hire that bloke from.Mandellas funeral.

"The raspberry truck jumped moose knuckle keyboard." Wha.

swimming in a sea · 01-07-2016 02:45PM

does there have to be an translator that knows Irish and say Slovakian ready to translate if some Irish MEP decides to waffle on in Irish in the euro parliament so the Slovak MEPs can get a translation? And do this for all the other languages, there must be more translators in the building than MEPs

Riskymove · 01-07-2016 03:05PM

swimming in a sea wrote: »

does there have to be an translator that knows Irish and say Slovakian ready to translate if some Irish MEP decides to waffle on in Irish in the euro parliament so the Slovak MEPs can get a translation? And do this for all the other languages, there must be more translators in the building than MEPs

As I've said, Irish is not a language used in interpretation (i.e. verbal translation) yet.

You are however, correct that in many cases there can be as many interpreters as meeting attendees.

CrabRevolution · 01-07-2016 04:36PM

Even as a Gaeilgeoir I reckon it's a phenomenal waste of time. A few weeks ago there was a discussion about them on RnaG and quite rightly one participant asked "Who is going to read these documents?"

I'd imagine the answer is 0. There must be 1000 better ways you could benefit the Irish language using that same money.

riclad · 01-07-2016 06:01PM

Someone voted for irish to be an official language in the eu,
maybe the vote for brexit was caused by people thinking of the waste of millions of euros on pointless work
as well as concerns about immigration etc
No one is gonna go to an eu office looking to read documents in irish ,
if you are that interested in politics you can speak english or get info
from the web or other sources .
How many millions is spent translating documents to irish every year.
its not like we dont need money for other things
like paying for health care or housing .

Iwasfrozen · 01-07-2016 06:19PM

swimming in a sea wrote: »

does there have to be an translator that knows Irish and say Slovakian ready to translate if some Irish MEP decides to waffle on in Irish in the euro parliament so the Slovak MEPs can get a translation? And do this for all the other languages, there must be more translators in the building than MEPs

It goes X language --> English / French --> Y language.

And Irish is useless.

CrabRevolution · 01-07-2016 11:04PM

riclad wrote: »

Someone voted for irish to be an official language in the eu,
maybe the vote for brexit was caused by people thinking of the waste of millions of euros on pointless work
as well as concerns about immigration etc
No one is gonna go to an eu office looking to read documents in irish ,
if you are that interested in politics you can speak english or get info
from the web or other sources .
How many millions is spent translating documents to irish every year.
its not like we dont need money for other things
like paying for health care or housing .

While it's certainly a waste, I doubt it costs that much to be honest. If 60 translators are needed for all the documentation in the EU, I'd say Ireland needs far fewer for the much smaller amount of legislation it produces.

galah · 01-07-2016 11:19PM

Translators are usually paid by the word though...

Lyaiera · 01-07-2016 11:22PM

CrabRevolution wrote: »

Even as a Gaeilgeoir I reckon it's a phenomenal waste of time. A few weeks ago there was a discussion about them on RnaG and quite rightly one participant asked "Who is going to read these documents?"

I'd imagine the answer is 0. There must be 1000 better ways you could benefit the Irish language using that same money.

I doubt there's a significant number of people in the UK and Ireland who read the documents even in English.

The current problem is that the three working languages of the EU are English, French and German. That means that not only do all the official documents get translated to those languages (as is the case with the EU's official languages) but all the proceedings, publicly released internal documents, and a huge amount of the spoken proceedings get translated and released in those languages.

If the UK leaves there would be very few people who speak English as their first language in the EU, and there could be debate as to whether the EU keeps English as a working language.

I think it's worth it keeping it as an EU language because English is the most widely understood second language of people in the EU. And it's an internationally significant language, especially with the US and the Commonwealth countries.

maryishere · 01-07-2016 11:30PM

It is just a small example of EC waste. Brussels wastes so many billions of euro you would just not believe it, and they were not much help to us in our banking crises either -they shafted us.

02-07-2016 12:11AM

sullivlo wrote: »

Well then they'll need a really, really specific qualification - fluency in Irish AND another EU language.

Off the top of my head, only French, German, Spanish and maybe Greek are taught in schools. So you'd need people able to speak Irish AND Flemish, Dutch, Portugese, Italian, Swedish, etc etc etc.

Very niche job market.

Before Irish was made an official language, Irish speakers needed to be fluent in four EU languages. Now that Irish is an official language they, like citizens of most other EU countries, need to be fluent in three. No matter what the usual drones say, that situation joined the very long list of discrimination against Irish speakers. I'm glad my taxes are being used to support an intellectually and culturally Irish community - after all, far too much of them are given to funding a myriad of intellectually and culturally English endeavours. As unpopular as it is to say it, there's zero point in having an independent Ireland without intellectual and cultural independence. Zero. It's a misnomer.

02-07-2016 12:11AM

CrabRevolution wrote: »

A few weeks ago there was a discussion about them on RnaG and quite rightly one participant asked "Who is going to read these documents?"

I'd imagine the answer is 0. There must be 1000 better ways you could benefit the Irish language using that same money.

I was a bit apprehensive about posting on Boards what with disturbing all the English speakers beavering away reading official EU documents in the English language, God bless them.

02-07-2016 12:17AM

maryishere wrote: »

It is just a small example of EC waste. Brussels wastes so many billions of euro you would just not believe it, and they were not much help to us in our banking crises either

How refreshing that you're not engaging in Europhobia again, Mary. Not. In a very globalised world, Ireland's membership of the European Union is the only hope for the intellectual independence of this deeply anglicised state, and the myopic anglocentric outlook of far too many of its citizens. The sooner we become more European and less anglocentric the better. That's a major step towards real freedom that beats the almost 100 years of verbal republicanism (Dev's government between 1932 and 1937, a genuinely radical government, excepted).

Iwasfrozen · 02-07-2016 12:55AM

Deleted User wrote: »

How refreshing that you're not engaging in Europhobia again, Mary. Not. In a very globalised world, Ireland's membership of the European Union is the only hope for the intellectual independence of this deeply anglicised state, and the myopic anglocentric outlook of far too many of its citizens. The sooner we become more European and less anglocentric the better. That's a major step towards real freedom that beats the almost 100 years of verbal republicanism (Dev's government between 1932 and 1937, a genuinely radical government, excepted).

Take a look at our geography. We aren't going to become any less "anglocentric" any time soon. And translating documents into Irish isn't going to help revive the language.

shane9689 · 02-07-2016 02:24AM

Jesus, the hate for your own language is real...sick of boards... full of complainers who don't even understand their own culture...off to Dublin with the lot of ye

LordSutch · 02-07-2016 05:49AM

Shenshen wrote: »

I was listening to Newstalk this morning and one of the stories that caught my attention was about the EU now hiring translators for Irish - there are 60 open positions at the moment, and they were interviewing someone who claimed it could be over 100 in the next year or 2.

The person was gushing about the great opportunity for people with a degree in Irish, how fantastic it was that there would be all those jobs for them, translating every single EU transaction and live-translating for meetings and discussions.

And there was me thinking I'm normally very happy to defend the EU, I think it's a great institution which has achieved much throughout its existence. But this - sorry, this is an incredible, massive waste of money to keep a small lobby group happy.

By all means, provide translation to delegates who otherwise wouldn't be able to fully follow proceedings, but can you show me 1 person, just 1 person on earth who would require this service as they can't follow the discussions in English?
By all means, encourage people to learn the language and to use it where they can, but to waste resources on providing translation and material in Irish that nobody needs and wants (I'm not sure how many MEPs that lobby group has in Brussels) is absurd.

Here's a link with some details : http://www.thejournal.ie/irish-translators-eu-recruiting-2813266-Jun2016/

Oh the irony, specially 'post Brexit' when we're claiming to be the only English speaking country left in the EU.

Iwasfrozen · 02-07-2016 01:53PM

shane9689 wrote: »

Jesus, the hate for your own language is real...sick of boards... full of complainers who don't even understand their own culture...off to Dublin with the lot of ye

I don't hate English, in terms of usefulness it's the best language in the world. What made you think anyone hated English?

Samaris · 02-07-2016 02:20PM

shane9689 wrote: »

Jesus, the hate for your own language is real...sick of boards... full of complainers who don't even understand their own culture...off to Dublin with the lot of ye

The problem is that the majority of us don't understand it, have never learned how to speak it, and would be a bit stuck for understanding European paperwork if there's no English option.

I live in a Gaeltacht, btw.

Ficheall · 02-07-2016 05:30PM

"60 new jobs created for Irish people" leads to massive whinging on boards. Well done, folks.

kowloon · 02-07-2016 07:23PM

Ficheall wrote: »

"60 new jobs created for Irish people" leads to massive whinging on boards. Well done, folks.

60 pointless jobs. May as well be paying people to build roads to nowhere.

Mec27 · 02-07-2016 08:14PM

Iwasfrozen wrote: »

Take a look at our geography. We aren't going to become any less "anglocentric" any time soon. And translating documents into Irish isn't going to help revive the language.

Why not? We live in a Europe where it is cheaper to get to Paris than some parts of Ireland. VIVA L'EUROPA! For too long we shunned our mainland in favour of the bigger island off the mainland, but no more. Ireland's future is European:)

Iwasfrozen · 03-07-2016 12:04AM

Mec27 wrote: »

Why not? We live in a Europe where it is cheaper to get to Paris than some parts of Ireland. VIVA L'EUROPA! For too long we shunned our mainland in favour of the bigger island off the mainland, but no more. Ireland's future is European:)

We're a bit like Ukraine, we'd like to be more European to justify our independence but geography has welded us to a powerful neighbour and geography is impossible to ignore.

Easca Peasca · 03-07-2016 01:20AM

Great news, it's always good to hear of more job opportunities being made.

Cue an existential crisis for AH as it decides which it dislikes more; someone drawing the dole or a Gaelgeoir making use of the cúpla focal :P;)

Shenshen · 03-07-2016 11:31AM

Easca Peasca wrote: »

Great news, it's always good to hear of more job opportunities being made.

Cue an existential crisis for AH as it decides which it dislikes more; someone drawing the dole or a Gaelgeoir making use of the cúpla focal :P;)

That's quite a twisted view.
I'm all in favour of new jobs, if those jobs contribute in any way, shape or form to the economy or society on the whole. In other words, if they provide a service that's useful to others.

In this case, much as I'm happy for people earning a living, I feel that the contribution these guys will make can only be measured in their providing more paper for waste management companies to recycle.

The person who was interviewed on Newstalk gloated about the fact that they've forced the EU to create these positions and they won't be at any cost to the Irish tax payer. The subtext seemed to be that those were the two sources of income for the people in question - Irish tax payers money, or EU tax money. And wasn't he the smart one for fixing it so that this time, it didn't come out of the Irish state's coffers?

Would you be as happy to see your EU contribution going to funding Sorbian translators?

You'd be struggling to find a single person on this island who understands Irish better than English, yet 60 people will be paid for producing translations nobody will ever read...

maryishere · 03-07-2016 11:46AM

Shenshen wrote: »

That's quite a twisted view.
I'm all in favour of new jobs, if those jobs contribute in any way, shape or form to the economy or society on the whole. In other words, if they provide a service that's useful to others.

In this case, much as I'm happy for people earning a living, I feel that the contribution these guys will make can only be measured in their providing more paper for waste management companies to recycle.

The person who was interviewed on Newstalk gloated about the fact that they've forced the EU to create these positions and they won't be at any cost to the Irish tax payer. The subtext seemed to be that those were the two sources of income for the people in question - Irish tax payers money, or EU tax money. And wasn't he the smart one for fixing it so that this time, it didn't come out of the Irish state's coffers?

Would you be as happy to see your EU contribution going to funding Sorbian translators?

You'd be struggling to find a single person on this island who understands Irish better than English, yet 60 people will be paid for producing translations nobody will ever read...

+1.
Nail on the head. Let us also not forget that Brussels gets this money (to pay the translators) from our taxes. The taxes we as members of the EC pay. Taxes on all of our imports (from i-phones to electronics to entertainment to clothes etc) in to the EC.

Riskymove · 04-07-2016 09:28AM

Deleted User wrote: »

I'm glad my taxes are being used to support an intellectually and culturally Irish community - after all, far too much of them are given to funding a myriad of intellectually and culturally English endeavours.

I have no problem in funding being used to support Irish culture - including the language

Unfortunately, this matter will do absolutely nothing to help it.

EU hiring Irish translators

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