...if you must
The last few weeks of my faculty class ended up having a lot to do with translation. This was largely due to the head of the Translation Department, Ms. Liao, attending my class, and she kept giving me material on Chinglish (Chinese-English) that she wanted me to lecture on. Eventually I decide to just make translation the last "unit" of the semester.
It turned out to be the most interesting and revelatory theme I had ever taught. The students were a hodgepodge of different levels of English, so they were always difficulty to teach, but Chinglish was one thing they all could understand and enjoy equally. Having them "correct" municipal and commercial signs was an excellent interactive activity, and some of the zanier examples I found online (engrish.com) amused them. The Chinglish lecture I gave at WEB hadn't gone nearly as well, I think because some were ashamed or offended by the topic. In the faculty class Ms. Liao was concerned about the impression incorrect English made to foreigners, but no one took it personally. Apparently businesspeople have a different opinion of it than teachers--perhaps because it brings back bad memories of foreign business partners laughing at signs when they are shown around the city.
I explained to to the class that in my opinion public signs are usually not so crucial that they must be absolutely correct standard English and that in fact, one thing foreigners love about China is Chinglish. We also discussed how correcting the English would destroy part of the meaning. Much Chinglish is created by literally translating the Chinese phrases which traditionally more verbose for poetic effect. For example metaphor and personification are often used, as in "the grass is sleeping." In translating the signs into correct, modern English, something valuable is "lost in translation" (Yes, and I showed that movie too).
Still, I understood that the Chinese don't want to be laughed at, so we tried to think of a compromise that saved both art and face. My solution was to make signs grammatically correct but leave them wonderfully strange. For example, one such sign states: "The grass is growing. Think about step into." The entire wording is strange, but only the second sentence is grammatically incorrect. I would change it to "The grass is growing so please think before stepping on it." Unnecessarily wordy and awkward, but the Chinese-ness is intact. Simply using "Keep off the grass" would lose the cultural value.
The topic went well beyond class. Ms. Liao recruited me for an ongoing project that the department was doing for the local government. Two of the other teachers had already spent a day correcting signage for them. You can read Dan's Wall Street Journal report about it at
The grass is smiling. Please go around.
Then last Monday I accompanied her, some students, a news producer, and a cameraman to Hong Mei Park for what turned out to be the filming of a Changzhou news special. In order to assist the city, students from our school and Nanjing Normal University had teamed up to document more Chinglish signage and discuss the corrections. Apparently I had been assisting the project the entire time and was named one of the "leaders." We went around the park and I explained to the camera what I thought was wrong and needed to be changed about various examples of municipal Chinglish, such as "Challenger on water" (bumper boats) "Lofty mountainsand flowing water," and "Pay attention to safety. Beware of Falling Into Water."
Naturally I was careful not to eliminate the Chinglish entirely. It is my opinion that the signs do not need to be concise or natural-sounding as long as the meaning is reasonably obvious, and most Chinglish does get its point across, if in a very strange way. Of course park signs like "no speeling," which make no sense of all, must be remedied--perhaps by placing another sign next to it that translates the non-word into whatever they were trying to say ("spilling, spelunking, etc.) Many, including embarassed Chinese businessmen, would probably disagree with me, but if they are so serious about eliminating the chuckles then businesses and governments should hire a good translator rather than rely on computer programs that directly translate every word. Of course maybe they did and those translators had a sense of humor like me...and thus Chinglish was created.
But I'll be darned if I help destroy an art form.
Leb Wohl.
You took the words right out of my mouth. You don't want Chinglish cropping up in important documentation or similar things, so you bring in a professional translation agency.
ReplyDeleteBut most of the time, Chinglish is absolutely harmless and can even be beautiful. Going on from your "The grass is sleeping" example, I saw a picture of another one. It said something along the lines of:
"Young, tender grass. How hard-hearted to trample".
I don't know about you but I find that far more effective than "Keep off the grass". As you say, it would lose so much.
No-one likes to be laughed at but I think it's rare that there's any malice in the laughter. There certainly isn't from me. I laugh because it amuses me but I always remember that someone has made an attempt at English. That's more than I can claim about Mandarin.