Dr.

Tamara JG Barbosa
INCO 3011 Business Translation

Fall 2016

65 Terms a Translator Should Know

Just like any other industry, the translation industry also has its own
terminology and business jargon related to different job types, translation
categories, language skills, equipment and tools used in the industry and so
on.
1. A language: A translation
professionals native language or
language of habitual use. Terminology
used more commonly by interpreters
than translators.
2. Abstract: a short summary of an article,
book or paper, often with a list of
important terms.
3. Adaptation: This term can mean a
number of different things, but in the
context of translation, it is generally a
non-literal translation.
4. B language: Languages that a
translation professional (usually an
interpreter) can speak, read and write
almost as well as their native language,
and well enough to translate into as well
as out of. Terminology more often used
by interpreters than translators.
5. Back Translation: A translation that has
been translated back into the original
language, i.e., a text that has been
translated twice, once out of a specific
language, and then a second time back
into that same language. Often used as
a way to proofread or check the
accuracy of meaning in a translation.
6. Bilingual: Someone with strong
communicative skills in two languages.
The term is often reserved for someone
with native or near-native proficiency in
two languages. How fluent one needs to
be in order to be considered bilingual is
a matter for discussion.

7. C language: A language that a

translation professional can read and
understand well enough to translate out
of, but cannot write or speak well
enough to translate or interpret into.
Generally a term used more for
interpreting than translation.
8. CAT Computer Assisted (sometimes
Aided) Translation: CAT tools are
software programs designed for and
tailored to translators needs.
9. Certified Translation: A certified
translation is one in which a translation
agency or freelancer carries out a
translation project and then certifies that
they did the work in the form of an
accompanying certificate or signature.
Generally the statement is then
notarized. Certified translations are
often necessary for official documents.
10. Certified Translator: A translator who
has earned or received a certificate from
a school, association or program.
11. Chuchotage: Literally, whispered
interpreting. The interpreter is posted
beside the client and in real time
discretely 'whispers' his/ her translation
of the words being spoken.
12. Conference interpreting: Interpreting
spoken words or speech at a conference,
whether simultaneously or
consecutively.

Dr. Tamara JG Barbosa

INCO 3011 Business Translation
13. Consecutive interpreting: Interpreting
in which the interpreter starts to
translate only after the speaker has
finished his/ her utterance. Often used
at smaller conferences, etc., and
generally used in courtroom settings,
and speeches.
14. Copy editing: A copy editor checks the
formatting, facts, grammar, spelling, and
accuracy of a text. If there is a style
sheet or house style, the copy editor
makes sure that the entire text
conforms to it; s/ he also keep an eye
out for defamatory statements that
could create legal issues (libel). This is a
separate step from proofreading or
editing for content and style of writing
itself.
15. Copywriting: Copywriting refers to the
writing of text that will be used on
brochures, websites, marketing
materials, etc. It is always best to have
copy for foreign countries written by
experts from that country.
16. Court interpreter: A trained interpreter
who often has passed a state exam or
certification process who provides
interpretation during legal proceedings.
Requirements regarding accreditation
and certification for court interpreting
vary from country to country.
17. DTP (Desktop Publishing): A service
offered by some translation agencies
and freelancers. A DTP expert can use
foreign fonts for items such as
typesetting, creation of image files,
brochures, company reports, etc.
18. Dubbing: The process of replacing the
original spoken voices from the
soundtrack to a video or film with new
voices speaking the local language.
19. Editing: sometimes also called
Revising, Proofreading, or Reviewing.
Reading a text to identify errors,
inconsistencies, incorrect grammar and
punctuation, poor or inappropriate style.
In the case of a translation, editing or

Fall 2016
proofreading also involves ensuring that
the translated text matches the source
text and correcting it when it does not.
What exactly proofreading, revising and
editing entail and how they differ from
each other is the subject of much
debate. What is important is that the
person commissioning the work
communicates clearly what is expected
of the editor.
20. Escort Interpreting: An interpreter who
accompanies a client, often in the field
of travel or tourism
21. Free Translation: A loose translation
from the original. This term is used to
contrast with a word-for-word or literal
translation.
22. Freelance Translator: A freelancer acts
as an independent entity and is not
considered an employee. Most
translation agencies use freelance
translators.
23. Gist Translation: Clients may ask for a
gist translation when they just want to
get the gist of the meaning, i.e., a rough
summary of a text, so that the most
salient points can be understood.
24. Glossary: In the context of translation,
a glossary is a specialized, singlelanguage dictionary used by translators
working on difficult text with specific
terminology. It includes a term and its
definition in the target language. For
very specialized texts clients are
sometimes asked to provide a glossary
to ensure the translation meets their
needs.
25. Hard copy: Hard copy refers to the
original paper source of a document that
needs translation. Examples would be
faxes, letters and brochures, among
others.
26. In-house translators: Translation
professionals working as employees for
a non-translation company, generally full
time.

Dr. Tamara JG Barbosa

INCO 3011 Business Translation
27. Interpreting: Interpreting can be
defined as the oral translation of spoken
words, as opposed to the written
translation of written texts. It requires
special skills (note taking, summarizing,
language skills), a good memory, sheer
mental stamina and, often, arduous
training. There are several types of
interpreting: simultaneous, consecutive,
conference, liaison.
28. Judicial translating or interpreting:
Another term for legal translating or
court interpreting.
29. Language Family: A group of languages
that can be shown to derive from a
common root. (for ex., IndoEuropean)
30. Language pairing (also referred to as
Language combination): The languages
between which a translator or
interpreter works.
31. Legal translation: The translation of
legal documents. Legal translation
requires a variety of advanced skills:
complete mastery of both source and
target languages; a good knowledge of
the two legal systems involved;
knowledge of the relevant sub-areas of
law; an awareness of any other relevant
disciplines and subject matter (for ex.,
steel and the processes involved in
making it, if the documents of a case
concern a steelworks); and training in
the art of translation itself.
32. Liaison Interpreting: A generic name
for business interpreting; also general
interpreting for trade conventions and
other general business situations.
Usually refers to the activities of a single
interpreter who accompanies an
individual or delegation around.
33. Literal Translation: A word-for-word
translation. It ignores things such as
humor, sayings, and puns, etc., that lose
their meaning when translated word for
word. As a result a literal translation

Fall 2016
generally reads stiffly and is not
idiomatic to the target language.
34. Localization: Localization involves
taking a product and making it
linguistically and culturally appropriate
to the target area (country/ region and
language) where it will be used and sold.
Translation is only one of the activities
involved in localization: in addition to
translation, a localization project
includes many other tasks such as
project management, software
engineering, testing, and desktop
publishing.
35. Machine Translation: Machine
translation (MT) is automatic translation
in which a computer program takes over
all the work of translating. Obviously, a
computer will work much faster (and
more cheaply) than a human being. It
can be a useful method if the purpose of
the translation is limited, for ex., to get
a rough idea a gist of what a text
contains and/ or to process large
numbers of documents very rapidly.
36. Machine-Aided Translation: A range of
specialized software tools developed to
enhance the skills of translators.
37. Mother tongue (also Native language):
The language a person grows up
speaking and knows "naturally." It is of
course possible to have translators with
more than one mother tongue if they
have parents from different countries or
grow up in a foreign country.
38. Multilingual: A person who is fluent in
more than two languages. See
discussion of bilingual.
39. Native language: Another term for
mother tongue.
40. Native-speaker competence: Oral and
written command of a language that is
equivalent to that of a person who not
only learned the language as a child and
has continued to use it as his/ her
mother-tongue, but who also has had
some language training.

Dr. Tamara JG Barbosa

INCO 3011 Business Translation
41. Notarized translation: A translation that
has been taken to a notary and certified
by the notary. What that involves varies
from country to country.
42. Phone interpreting: Interpreting carried
out over the phone or in a video
conference, using a three-way calling
phone patch, Internet video
conferencing, etc.
43. Polyglot: Someone who is multilingual.
44. Proofreading: Strictly speaking, this is
the act of checking a text before printing
it or turning it into a client, in order to
ensure that no mistakes have been
made in typesetting. The term is often
used to refer to the act of revising or
editing a text and in common parlance,
proofreading refers to the revision,
checking and editing of a translated
text. After a translation is complete
often a second translator will read
through the document and compare it
against the original. In addition to
checking the quality of the translation s/
he will also check for spelling, grammar,
typos, punctuation, syntax, and so forth.
45. Simultaneous Interpreting: The
interpreter starts to translate before the
speaker has finished his/ her utterance.
Most often used at large events such as
conferences and carried out by panels of
at least two interpreters using special
equipment. As this type of work is
particularly tiring and stressful, the rule
of thumb is that an interpreter should be
able to take a break after 20 to 40
minutes of continuous work.
46. Source language: The language or
document from which translation or
interpretation is carried out.
47. Source text: The document from which
a translation is carried out.
48. Subtitles: Written captions that run at
the bottom of the screen for a video or
film. They are an alternative to dubbing

Fall 2016
when one wants a video to be
understood by those who speak a
different language from the original.
49. Supertitles: Subtitles that are projected
along the top or side of an opera stage
or, in some situations, projected onto
the seat in front of the audience
member. By necessity, supertitles and
subtitles are abbreviated versions of
what is being sung.
50. Sworn translator: A translator or
interpreter who has taken an oath and
can therefore produce certified
translations or interpretations in court.
51. Target audience: The people that an
interpreter addresses. Used mostly in
connection with simultaneous
interpreting. Sometimes used in the
sense of target readership.
52. Target language: The language or
document into which a translation or
interpretation is carried out.
53. Target readership: The group of people
for whom a text is translated, for
example subject experts, novices,
prospective customers, etc.
54. Target Text: The document into which a
translation has been carried out.
55. Technical translation: A technical
translation is one in which the subject
matter is specialized, technical, and
involving technology, due to the use of
specialized vocabulary in a text. Topics
such as engineering, software, manuals,
etc., would all be considered as technical
translations.
56. Tone Languages: Languages that use
pitch to distinguish words, either by
meaning or grammatical function (for
ex., Chinese).
57. Transcription: Writing down exactly
what was said in a recording or speech.

Dr. Tamara JG Barbosa

INCO 3011 Business Translation
58. Translation: The transfer of meaning
from one language to another in writing.
Translation takes place in writing and
interpreting is its oral counterpart. The
two terms are often confused. At its
best, a successful translation should
read as if it were originally written in the
new language.
59. Translation Memory: A translation
memory is a database in which a
translator can record (usually
semiautomatically) translations and
terms for future reuse and easy
searches. Although these programs are
best classified under computer-aided/
assisted translation, one must not
confuse them with machine translation
programs, as translation memory
software does not translate anything by
itself, whereas a machine translation
system actively produces language and
translations based on linguistic data,
such as grammatical rules and
glossaries.
60. Translator: A translator converts the
written text of one language into

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another. Translators only deal with
written media. Oral or audio translations
are carried out by interpreters.
61. Transliteration: Transforming text from
one script to another usually based on
phonetic equivalences. For example,
Russian text might be transliterated into
Latin script so that it can be pronounced
by English speakers.
62. Unit Of Translation: The smallest entity
in a text that carries a discrete meaning.
It varies all the time, ranging from
individual words to phrases and
sentences, all the way up to entire
paragraphs.
63. Voice-over: a recording of the spoken
voice.
64. Word count: A standard measure of the
size of a text. Translation projects, for
example, are often priced on a per-word
(US) or per-1000-word (GB) basis.
65. Word Order: The arrangement of words

Tassini, Adriana (2012-01-01). The Translator Training Textbook: Translation

Best Practices, Resources & Expert Interviews (Kindle Locations 3289-3307).
Global Translation Institute (GTI). Kindle Edition.