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Poll: Have you ever been asked to do back translation?
Thread poster: ProZ.com Staff
Félicien Sirois
Félicien Sirois
United States
Local time: 04:04
Member
Italian to English
+ ...
Have to agree with... Hege Mar 10, 2015

Mario Chavez wrote:

Hege Jakobsen Lepri wrote:

When I read all the appalled comments "I refused, i would never" it is clear that these people had some interpretation of the word backtranslation that was on the side of what this actually means. It would have been interesting have these people translate the question in this poll into their own languages, and then have a backtranslation done - back into English, to see what the problem is.


I am sorry, Hege, I beg to differ. You are making some out-on-a-limb assumptions:

...

Perhaps you'd like to think about what you wrote and rewrite it with a little more care and respect.


Sorry, but I have to side with Hege on this one. It seems like most of the replies here are from people who do not understand what the BT process actually is. Likewise, I didn't view her post as condescending or disrespectful in any way. Yours, on the other hand, was a bit harsh in its tone...

[Edited at 2015-03-10 21:43 GMT]

[Edited at 2015-03-10 21:43 GMT]


 
Mario Chavez (X)
Mario Chavez (X)  Identity Verified
Local time: 05:04
English to Spanish
+ ...
Again, let's not assume Mar 10, 2015

Félicien,

If a translator says she doesn't do BT or won't do BT, we shouldn't assume she ignores what BT is or what BT is for. Instead of making assumptions, let's ask that translator why/why not. It's simpler, courteous and gets the point across.

Assumptions, on the other hand, risk alienating or upsetting people because they are usually based on what we carry in our heads and what our limited observations (especially here, online!) report back to us.

MC




Félicien Sirois wrote:

Mario Chavez wrote:

Hege Jakobsen Lepri wrote:

When I read all the appalled comments "I refused, i would never" it is clear that these people had some interpretation of the word backtranslation that was on the side of what this actually means. It would have been interesting have these people translate the question in this poll into their own languages, and then have a backtranslation done - back into English, to see what the problem is.


I am sorry, Hege, I beg to differ. You are making some out-on-a-limb assumptions:

...

Perhaps you'd like to think about what you wrote and rewrite it with a little more care and respect.


Sorry, but I have to side with Hege on this one. It seems like most of the replies here are from people who do not understand what the BT process actually is. Likewise, I didn't view her post as condescending or disrespectful in any way. Yours, on the other hand, was a bit harsh in its tone...

[Edited at 2015-03-10 21:43 GMT]

[Edited at 2015-03-10 21:43 GMT]


 
Mario Chavez (X)
Mario Chavez (X)  Identity Verified
Local time: 05:04
English to Spanish
+ ...
Not everyone here works in pharma Mar 10, 2015

Our colleague Félicien wrote:
“I'm amazed that so few responding translators here have had experience with BT. In the pharma industry it's a very common practice. 50% of my workload is actually typically back translation work.

What seems to be lost on most of the people replying here, is a BT is not an instance of someone telling you to retranslate your work on any given project back into the source text (that would be absolutely foolish since we only work INTO our native l
... See more
Our colleague Félicien wrote:
“I'm amazed that so few responding translators here have had experience with BT. In the pharma industry it's a very common practice. 50% of my workload is actually typically back translation work.

What seems to be lost on most of the people replying here, is a BT is not an instance of someone telling you to retranslate your work on any given project back into the source text (that would be absolutely foolish since we only work INTO our native languages, right people?).”

Why amazed? Pharma is not necessarily the bread-and-butter specialty of every translator. That sort of assumption is based on faulty logic:

a) Pharma translators are regularly required to do BT (translation done by a third party)
b) Translators doing pharma know about this particular use of BT
c) All translators are familiar with pharma use of BT

If (a) and (b) above are true, then (c) must be true. That's an illogical conclusion.

Another assumption, albeit a more innocent one, is that a translator is supposed to work only into her native languages. That's not necessarily practical or true in all situations. Instead of assuming that our ideal (translate only into a native language) has universal application to everyone doing translations, how about if we read and listen to what translators working bidirectionally have to say?

In addition, perhaps we can all benefit from reading the answers without the first assumption. Most of our colleagues responded appropriately: Yes, I've been asked to do BT and this is what I think; or, No, I haven't been asked or I do not do BT for this or that reason.

Whether we agree or not with the reasons why some translators don't do BT is not germane to the poll, in my view.

[Edited at 2015-03-10 22:45 GMT]
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Muriel Vasconcellos
Muriel Vasconcellos  Identity Verified
United States
Local time: 02:04
Member (2003)
Spanish to English
+ ...
Yes - and you may have too, without knowing it Mar 11, 2015

I'll bet some of you have done them without realizing it. Sometimes a client will purposely not tell me that they have given me a back-translation. They believe, incorrectly, that it shouldn't make any difference. Several times I found out when I was researching the terminology and ran across the original article on the Internet.

Of course it's wrong-headed not to tell the translator because, as others have pointed out, it's a very different process.

I actually enjoy do
... See more
I'll bet some of you have done them without realizing it. Sometimes a client will purposely not tell me that they have given me a back-translation. They believe, incorrectly, that it shouldn't make any difference. Several times I found out when I was researching the terminology and ran across the original article on the Internet.

Of course it's wrong-headed not to tell the translator because, as others have pointed out, it's a very different process.

I actually enjoy doing them. It's a challenge to make the translation as literal as possible and still sound decent. I don't like it when people don't tell me it's a back-translation. Several

Tania Samuelsson wrote:

Tim Drayton wrote:

Yes, I do what appear to be back translations from time to time, although I am not usually told that this is what they are, nor would I expect to be.

I think you need to be told it is a backtranslation so you do not "fix" source text problems (since your "source text" is actually a "target text"). The purpose of the BT is to discover problems in the target text which is being backtranslated.
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larserik
larserik  Identity Verified
Sweden
Local time: 10:04
Albanian to Swedish
Extremely important: don't fix bad translations Mar 30, 2015

Tania Samuelsson wrote:

Tim Drayton wrote:

Yes, I do what appear to be back translations from time to time, although I am not usually told that this is what they are, nor would I expect to be.

I think you need to be told it is a backtranslation so you do not "fix" source text problems (since your "source text" is actually a "target text"). The purpose of the BT is to discover problems in the target text which is being backtranslated.


I do back translations of test questions at least once a year, about 3 000 words each time. In the first step, my customer orders (from an agency) translations into about 10 languages. Now, because the customer doesn't master all these languages and needs to know that the test questions are correct, they order back translations and the agency subcontracts me to do it.

I didn't translate in the first step, since I only work into my native language, and the second step is one of my normal working languages. You could say it is what I always do - but as Tania has pointed out, it is not. It's very important not to "help" the first step translator by understanding ("fixing") bad parts of the translation, because then the end customer will use it as is, instead of asking the first step translator to correct it (I often make suggestions but, as I said, I don't translate both ways - on the contrary, that seems to be normal for translators in many countries).

Judging from some answers here, back translating isn't very common. I wanted to stress Tanias warning, because I know that this difference to a normal translation has to be learnt by first-timers.


 
Montple
Montple
Local time: 09:04
Spanish to English
Back translation Mar 31, 2015

Yes, many times. As others have commented, it is a standard method of quality control in the pharmaceutical industry. I rather enjoy it, but you do have to bear in mind that you can't translate with the freedom you have when translating a source text from scratch. The temptation to " improve" a back translation has to be resisted - the client wants to know that the original text has been translated in such a way that the meaning is as clear in the target language as it was in the source.

 
Tina Vonhof (X)
Tina Vonhof (X)
Canada
Local time: 03:04
Dutch to English
+ ...
Need to know Apr 2, 2015

I agree with several previous comments: you do need to know that it is a back translation, so that you translate exactly what it says and don't go about fixing either the source or the target text. They will first be compared by experts (who don't speak your source language) and then you may be asked to do some fixing.

I have done several BT, some very lengthy. It is common with medical trial documents, such as the patient information and consent form, because they want to make sur
... See more
I agree with several previous comments: you do need to know that it is a back translation, so that you translate exactly what it says and don't go about fixing either the source or the target text. They will first be compared by experts (who don't speak your source language) and then you may be asked to do some fixing.

I have done several BT, some very lengthy. It is common with medical trial documents, such as the patient information and consent form, because they want to make sure that the prospective patient cannot misunderstand something due to a mistake in the translation. With non-medical documents, it is usually the client who insists on BT.

The only time I have disliked doing it was during the checking phase of a very long document, when the text came in 2 out of a total of 5 columns and both the source column and the target column looked like this:
a few words{121}{122}
a few words{123}one word{124}
{125}a few words{126}
That nearly drove me around the bend.
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Poll: Have you ever been asked to do back translation?






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