All federal government institutions in Canada use both English and French as official languages. This means that the citizens of Canada have the option to communicate or receive information from government institutions in either language.

Translating all official communications of the 2010 Olympics will certainly cost a significant amount. However, it has been reported in the Canadian Press that the only officially bilingual province of Canada, New Brunswick, will help do the translation of documents for the 2010 Olympic Games from English to French. New Brunswick has doled out an amount of $60,000 to Sport NB, a non-profit organization, to coordinate the translation process.

For more information, you can read the full report by the Canadian Press here: Canada’s only bilingual province to help translate documents at Vancouver Games

And the Government of New Brunswick’s press release here : Sport NB receives $60,000 to translate documents for Vancouver Olympic organizing committee

London’s Metropolitan Police Service, for instance, has spent approximately £10.6 million (that’s nearly $17.6 million) on translation, setting a new record.

The London Daily News reports with the full figures, and cites an interesting list of languages that the Metropolitan Police have had to support over the past year, including…

• Urdu
• Slovak
• Russian
• Portuguese
• Czech
• Bulgarian
• Arabic
• Farsi
• Kurdish
• Lithuanian
• Polish
• Punjab
• Romanian
• Gujarati

The total amount, writes the Daily News, is the “equivalent of nearly £30,000 a day.”

Read the full story at the London Daily News: Metropolitan Police spend over £10million on translation services

Read the full story by Joanna Skailes at The Press and Journal: Defence lawyer starts hiring his own translators

This week, the Wall Street Journal reports on the Academie’s attempts to come up with French equivalents for English-language computing terms such as cloud computing (which, for those not in the know, consists of accessing remote data over a network, so as to preserve the resources of the computers on the receiving end). The suggested phrase was “informatique en nuage,” literally “computing in cloud,” a phrase which left the board of the Academie cold.

The reaction, as reported by Max Colchester:

“What? This means nothing to me. I put a ‘cloud’ of milk in my tea!” exclaimed Jean Saint-Geours, a French writer and member of the Terminology Commission.

“Send it back and start again,” ordered Etienne Guyon, a physics professor on the commission.

Although the French should, on the one hand, be commended for trying to preserve their own culture, one can’t help but wonder if it’s futile in a way, particularly considering the immense influence of the largely English-speaking internet as it continues to grow, evolve, and change the way we communicate with one another on a global scale.

Read Max Colchester’s full article on the Wall Street Journal: The French Get Lost in the Clouds Over a New Term in the Internet Age

The award is given out annually to a North American who has made a significant impact in the field of translation. Dr. Schulte, who founded the Center for Translation Studies at UT Dallas in 1980, received the award for “methodologies derived from the art of translation to redirect the interpretation of literary works and nurture associative thinking and creativity through the use of translation tools and techniques.”

So congratulations once again to Dr. Schulte!

You can read more about his Center for Translation Studies at the UT Dallas department’s website, or you can read the full article detailing his award and achievements here: Prof Honored for Advancing the Art of Translation

Until recently, individuals were bringing in friends, family, and children to help them translate what their doctors where telling them and vice-versa. While this method worked for most patients, it was ultimately risky, as these individuals did not posses a broad enough vocabulary to translate the full breadth of medical terminology.

As reported by TMCnews, the solution to this problem was the Language Access Metro Project, where individuals in need of translators can have access to interpreters fluent in their native languages. Not only are these translators skilled in language interpretation, but they are also trained to watch for cultural signs and body language to fully communicate what the patient is saying.

The system has been a hit, and there are now hopes to extend their services further to other states.

Read this full story at TMCnews: Interpreters step up for better health

According to the Singapore Association for the Deaf, sign language classes have jumped to record highs. The number of participants in the past year have leaped from 1,067 individuals to 1,500.

The main reason for this peak in numbers is the fact that sign language is visual, and can work well in noisy environments. At this moment, leaning sign language has become something of a trend–it is the popular thing to do in Singapore!

Demand for these course are increasingly high, to the point that many institutes offering such courses have had to begin offering weekend sessions and move classes to public libraries.

Read the full story, as reported by Leow Si Wan, at Asia One: More signing up to learn sign language

In previous decades, machine translation had been the biggest breakthrough in technology for the translation industry. Companies and researchers have predicted the progress of this new technology proposed by Lee and the White House to be speedier, as well as more efficient and precise.

But most of these new technologies have not quite progressed as far as many individuals had hoped…

There are still many problems with the accuracy of machine translation, and the possibility of a global market free of language barriers is still a goal to work towards.

Many companies have decided to combine the power of both humans and computers in order to double their turnaround times, but have met with little success; even the most up-to-date software cannot keep up with the growing change of language. This is a risk many companies cannot afford to take. In the White House report, officials state how translation plays into their strategies for growth of the economy through international trade. With this initiative, they hope that someday real-time translation between major languages of the world will directly lower the barriers to international commerce and collaboration.

While it is not know how much of the $1 billion dollar stimulus will go to translation, there will continue to be a need for companies dealing in international trade to utilize the services of translation companies in order to better suit their needs in a changing economy.

Read more on this topic as reported by Damian Joseph of BusinessWeek: White House Challenges Translation Industry to Innovate

Photo via the White House Museum.

This application serves to provide translations of particular phrases used throughout the site. These phrases have been translated by the users, and then votes are collected on which translation is the most accurate. The highest-ranking translation is then utilized on the actual site…

As reported by Cade Metz of The Register, when the app was first introduced, it produced a Spanish-language Facebook in only two weeks. Following the Spanish translation, a French Facebook was produced in only 24 hours. Today, the social networking behemoth has come out with yet another an addition to the connect program, which purports to ease the translation of any website.

Read Cade Metz’s full article on The Register here: Facebook turns users into web translation engine

But with the need for foreign trade and immigration the need for translations will not stop. For many companies, translation services are just a minor part of their expenses when compared to the company’s total capital. Additionally, a threat to the translation industry is that some companies attempt to use their employees who already know a different language to complete a translation as opposed to going to an agency. But even so, companies with international contracts will need to have high-quality translation services to maintain their image and clientele…

Image is important in international industries because it allows companies to attract more business by spending the money to accommodate potential customers and clientele. Not only are businesses involved in the international affairs, but colleges also want to attract international students, and to fulfill this need must turn to the services of translation agencies to translate their brochures and applications.

The translation industry can survive in times of crisis and continue to thrive for years to come!

For a more in-depth look into how the translation industry can and has survived, written by Sander Mijer, continue reading here: Translation business will survive recession