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Il (duro) lavoro dell’interprete

Postato il di metaphraze.com

Condividiamo con i nostri lettori due interessanti video prodotti da Wired per la serie Masterminds: ci forniscono un interessante spaccato del mestiere dell’interprete.

Nel primo video, Barry Slaughter Olsen – interprete di conferenza professionista da quasi trent’anni, nonché docente di interpretariato e traduzione presso il Middlebury Institute of International Studies di Monterey, in Californa – chiarisce il ruolo e la funzione dell’interprete, e ci porta dietro le quinte della sua professione, analizzando i molteplici contesti in cui un professionista può venirsi a trovare.

Il video ci mostra diverse tecniche di interpretazione (simultanea, consecutiva, chuchotage) e ci spiega cos’è il décalage (in inglese: E.V.S., ear-voice span), ossia l’intervallo di tempo che intercorre tra l’inizio del discorso e l’inizio dell’interpretazione. Immergiamoci nel mondo dell’interpretazione e cerchiamo di carpirne i segreti.

Buona visione!

Il secondo video ci mostra due professionisti, Katty Kauffman e lo stesso Olsen, mettere alla prova le proprie abilità di interpreti.
Ne saranno all’altezza? Scopriamolo insieme!

I gotta confess: this is the best job in the world… and it’s the best job in the world for a nerd like me, ‘cause I get paid to go to the best conferences, to study, and be at the state-of-the-art events on a really broad range of subjects.
I’m not pigeonholed in one thing or another… The perfect thing for a nerd!
Katty Kauffman

Pubblicità

metaphraze 2018 Word of the Year roundup #WOTY

Postato il di metaphraze.com

Ecco una panoramica delle parole dell’anno 2018, ossia le parole più significative e rappresentative dell’anno che sta per concludersi, selezionate dalle redazioni dei più importanti dizionari di lingua inglese.
Parole che hanno a che fare con l’attualità, la politica, la tecnologia, l’ambiente… insomma, parole che dovrebbero rispecchiare lo spirito dei tempi!
Solo alcune di esse sono neologismi: nella maggior parte dei casi, infatti, si tratta di parole già in uso che hanno visto una maggiore frequenza di utilizzo, magari in collocazioni o contesti nuovi.
In altri casi, può esservi stata una riattribuzione di significato che amplia lo spettro semantico di una parola già nota.

Continua a leggere metaphraze 2018 Word of the Year roundup #WOTY

On rebracketing and word boundaries

Postato il di metaphraze.com

A whole nother story – by Erich Round

Words do some truly inventive things when they change, and change they always do. Some switch their sounds around, like when hros became hors, nowadays spelt with an extra e as horse. Some lose their sense of having an internal composition, like when wāl-hros ‘whale-horse’ became walrus. Some cave in to peer pressure and change their looks to conform with others, including one of my favourite cases in English, when under the influence of similarly-meaning words probably, possibly, plausibly which all end in -bly, we get supposably, which is how in some varieties of modern English you can say ‘supposedly’. One the of truly odd things that words do though, is to start stealing sounds from their neighbours.

A famous case in English is an apron, which used to be a napron, until the n got snaffled by the a. It goes the other way too. A newt was originally an ewt. Of course, in Middle English when this n-theivery was underway, there were a few more words complicit in the heist, for example my napron also became mine apron, and your napron became yourn apron, since at that stage in English, words like my/mine, your/yourn worked like a/an.

Read the whole post here

You Speak You!

Postato il di metaphraze.com

“language is not black and white; it’s not right or wrong; it’s not good or bad…language is about communication and communication is about context.”

How we speak is one of the markers of our identity and our individual dialects are what keep the English language dynamic and evolving.

Instead of making moral judgments about how someone speaks, we should simply listen and appreciate the speaker’s unique dialect as part of his or her identity.

A TEDx talk by Kory Stamper, lexicographer and author.

The world’s English mania

Postato il di metaphraze.com

“English is the world’s second language. Your native language is your life. But with English you can become part of a wider conversation – a global conversation about global problems, like climate change or poverty, or hunger or disease.”

Jay Walker explains why two billion people around the world are trying to learn English.
He shares photos and spine-tingling audio of Chinese students rehearsing English – “the world’s second language” – by the thousands.

via TED – Ideas worth spreading

EF EPI 2018: la Basilicata di nuovo ultima in Italia per conoscenza della lingua inglese

Postato il di metaphraze.com

È stata pubblicata oggi l’ottava edizione dell’EF EPI (English Proficiency Index – Indice di Conoscenza dell’Inglese): si tratta del più ampio rapporto internazionale sulla conoscenza dell’inglese nel mondo, redatto annualmente da EF Education First, organizzazione internazionale specializzata in programmi di formazione linguistica ed accademica, viaggi d’istruzione e scambi culturali all’estero. Continua a leggere EF EPI 2018: la Basilicata di nuovo ultima in Italia per conoscenza della lingua inglese

Four reasons to learn a new language

Postato il di metaphraze.com

“Let’s face it, it’s the language of the internet, it’s the language of finance, it’s the language of air traffic control, of popular music, diplomacy… English is everywhere!”

English is fast becoming the world’s universal language, and instant translation technology is improving every year.

So why bother learning a foreign language?

Linguist and Columbia professor John McWhorter shares four alluring benefits of learning an unfamiliar tongue.

 

via TED – Ideas worth spreading

6 punctuation marks you might be using incorrectly

Postato il di metaphraze.com
Punctuation Marks

Punctuation is the art of clarifying how a group of words falls together into contractions, clauses, and sentences. Unfortunately, it is not at all clear how some punctuation marks should be used! Let’s take a look at several popular, though confusing, punctuation marks. Even if you think you’ve got the topic all sewn up, it’s worth having another look.

1. Possessive apostrophes
The possessive apostrophe is a tricky one, hanging around the ends of words, but in several different ways. So how exactly should we be using it?
Let’s start simple. For a singular noun, such as dog, you add an apostrophe plus s to the end: The dog’s collar was covered in mud.

For a plural noun, such as elephants, you add an apostrophe to the end: The elephants’ parade was troubled by rain.

For a plural noun that doesn’t end with s, you add an apostrophe plus s to the end: The children’s party went on as planned.

The place it gets tricky is with personal names, such as Charles and Ulysses, which already end in an s sound. In those cases, you generally add an apostrophe plus s if you naturally pronounce an extra s when you say the word out loud: Charles’s new tie is fantastic.
If you don’t pronounce an extra s when you say the word, then leave it out: Ulysses’ presentation is set for Monday.

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