[One Sip of a Book] Writing That Gets Read by Translators Is a Survival Skill

This book explains the principles of translation based on linguistics and translation studies and clarifies the criteria for judging good translations. For those who want to know how to produce natural translations that sound truly Korean, it provides practical skills for selecting words, constructing sentences, and organizing texts. It reminds translators, who may easily feel isolated in their arduous solitary work, of the social meaning and value of the concrete act of translation. It also introduces methods to easily evaluate and revise translations by identifying problems just by looking at the translated text. This book offers deep insights for those interested in translation or working in related fields to communicate and share with each other.

‘Koreanness’ has so far been used as a silver bullet to justify countless pieces of advice on translation and sometimes to block verifiability. Of course, it is desirable to translate by reflecting the characteristics of the Korean language, but even this can be excessive. While the grammatical rules of Korean must be followed, once these are met, the remaining areas are up to the author and translator to decide. -Prologue: Questioning Principles and Norms

The reason why you should not fully trust dictionaries when translating is that the words we actually use and recognize in speech or writing are not individual words but vocabulary. As we commonly know, a word is ‘the smallest unit of language that can convey meaning on its own.’ The meaning of a word can be found in a dictionary. On the other hand, vocabulary refers to the meaning units patterned and stored in the ‘lexicon’ inside our minds. The meaning of vocabulary can be discovered by observing people’s language usage patterns. -1. Peaceful Resorts and Hot Jungles: The Meaning of Words

The knowledge that can be acquired from books is only a part of human knowledge. It is difficult to learn specialized terms, slang, colloquialisms, dialects, and subtle tones that vary according to different relationships and emotions from books. The most useful source for learning living knowledge is always ‘people.’ One must not neglect paying attention to people and directly experiencing the world. -4. Exciting Games and Bouncy Balls: Semantic Roles and Technical Terms

Readers have no obligation. There is no need to spend time (and money) reading texts that are unpleasant, hard to understand, uninteresting, or not worth reading. Therefore, for authors or translators who make a living by selling their writing, writing texts that are easy to read is not a matter of choice or preference but an essential survival skill to acquire. -5. What Can and Cannot Be Possessed: Deconstructing Abstract Nouns

Conflicting Translation | Written by Yoon Youngsam | Crescendo | 416 pages | 22,000 KRW

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.