When politics and translation collide
Written by ForeignExchange Translations on Wednesday, June 30, 2010
Translation service providers often work in a type of global wonderland: You interact with people around the world who are worldly and open-minded. Unless ones work involves animal testing or abortion or a similar topic, translators are unlikely to get political about their work.
But the world, it is a-changing.
We recently received the following email from a medical translator who has worked for a long-standing device client of ours:
"I'm not sure if you were aware, but there is a boycott in Mexico regarding travel, business, services, etc. related to Arizona and companies based there. It has come to my attention that [medical device company] is a company based in Arizona, U.S.A.It's not like our team was living under a rock and hadn't heard of recent events in Arizona but we were nevertheless surprised.
I offer my sincerest apologies, but I have to terminate my contribution to this project due to my collaboration with this boycott. My timing is highly unfortunate. I realize this will affect our working relationship. I hope you can understand that had I known this earlier, I would have informed you appropriately."
What is your take on this?
Is it the right thing to do to quit work for political reasons? Or should you suck it up and separate translation work from politics?
ForeignExchange Translations provides specialized medical translation and software localization services to medical device and pharmaceutical companies. Contact us to learn more.
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Even outside of content, there are always careful lines to watch. For example, when a client requested translation of Arabic for Israel (Arabic being one of the official languages of that government), we were quickly corrected by our Arabic translator that the Arabic would be for Palestine, not Israel. This was an unintentional gaffe (to say the least) on my part, but reminded me that I can't work in a vacuum as I would like.
It is certainly within anyone's rights to refuse work based on their own ethics, and I certainly find it admirable to put ethics above financial compensation. What I find interesting about this example, is that the translator refused the job based solely on the location of the headquarters of the client company. To my knowledge, the company itself did not support the immigration law, and obviously wouldn't be in a position to immediately pack up and move their operation to another state, regardless of their disposition towards the law.
[Via LinkedIn]
I don't often get to have a say in how the world works, but this is one area where I do.
[Via LinkedIn]
@Inga: Good point! Once you've agreed to interpret something, if the discussion 'goes south' so to speak, how do you react? Your professionalism is definitely present in your post--even if you disagree, its your job to translate, without bias as much as possible if you have accepted the job.
This topic seems to have struck a chord...there will always be things requiring translation that not everyone agrees with. It is a fine line of when to say no, and when to become a 'machine' It is definately admirable to hear all of your opinions, and that you have stood your ground at times and turned jobs down!
I definitely think that we should stick to impartial standards in work, since we share projects with coworkers from different parts of the world, different political and religious views and different attitudes to life.
And as regards clients, well, we just have a commercial relationship, that's it and that's the best position we can take to avoid discussions.
I would like to receive your input from our posts:
http://blog-de-traduccion.trustedtranslations.com/la-sorpresa-genera-desorden-2010-07-06.html
Best regards,
Amelia
The line "let us just have a commercial relationship" reminds me of a presentation I heard at the Spanish Cultural Attaché's London premises during a round table discussion. One of the panelists (a fellow translator) said "do not forget that translation is the second oldest profession in the world. someone had to make sure that the prostitute's client knew that her price for "services rendered" was 2, 3 or perhaps even 20 or 30 shekels". In other words, translation has a lot and has had a lot to do with morality. The Italians even have a famous saying: "traduttore tradittore" (translator traitor). So do not think there is no ethical context in quite a large chunk of translation work. Our profession may agree or disagree as to what constitutes a limit, but lines have been traced and will be traced in the sand of day-to-day translation. For example, some of us would not translate divorce papers, even though this is a huge market that is unlikely to stop, particularly in our litigious Western societies. Some of us do not wish to contribute towards the banalization of play in the children of our societies, and thus refuse to be part of a huge industry, namely the videogames industry whose aggressive marketing towards virtual reality so much has obscured true reality. There are many stands one can take, and yes, they will cost you. Honor will keep you thinner (not because you diet but because you refuse to feed yourself if it means compromising their beliefs).
Here we need to discern carefully between the profession and whether by interpreting/translating we are actually helping or not the unfair situation. Moreover, there are many types of boycotts. It is something, for instance, to boycott Israeli products as a consumer by not buying them, to actively protest the exploitation of Palestinians, and something to impose this to a store that needs to cater to everybody's tastes, needs and views. Each story has a side, everybody has a political, economical, religious, sexual, social, racial, philosophical orientation. I feel that my duty as a human being and interpreter is to respect other views, and this does not mean that I agree or help them by interpreting/translating. Therefore, if I feel that my interpretation/translation actively helps an unfair situation, I decline the assignment. Most of the time, however, I really don't know whether this is helping or not a situation, unless the situation is plainly obvious, at which point I can always recuse myself.