Re: Preparing doc for translation

[Elaine Winters <ewinters -at- NETCOM -dot- COM>]

        There are, of course, many categories of human behavior to
        consider in this realm.  Here are a few things to think about --
        for openers:


        Similarities and Differences in your user group:

        Cultural Context
                high or low
        Linguistic
                Official language(s) & dialects, Style of Writing, Bi or
                Multi Lingual Population
        Technological
                Telephone system, Computer availability, sophistication (1-10)
        Educational
                Body of Knowledge, Teaching Style; traditional & modern, Literacy,
        Political
                Trade, Legal, Traditions/Symbols
        Economic
                Currency, Wealth?, Number Formats
        Social
                Etiquette (business/non-formal), Family, Prejudices,
                attitudes toward age/leisure time
        Religious
                Food, Colors, Icons, Forbidden behaviors

        D. Victor has a great summary of some of these; I also
        recommend his book:

        DAVID VICTOR* : 'LESCANT'
        L/LANGUAGE
        E/ENVIRONMENT & TECHNOLOGY
        S/SOCIAL ORGANIZATION
        C/CONTEXT
        A/AUTHORITY CONCEPTION
        N/NON-VERBAL BEHAVIOR
        T/TIME

        * Victor, David A, International Business Communication


 -------------------------------------------------------------------------
 E. Winters: Principal                 Program Facilitating and Consulting
 Berkeley, CA, USA                     510-843-0909    ewinters -at- netcom -dot- com
 Instructional Design  *  Interactivity  *  Cross - Cultural Communication
 _________________________________________________________________________


On Mon, 19 Sep 1994, Romay Jean Sitze wrote:

> This sounds like a worthwhile collection of information.  I'll be looking
> forward to seeing more on this.  As a writer in an area which is
> frequently interesting in issues which must be presented in other
> languages, especially both English and Spanish, such information would be
> very useful to have.

> On Mon, 19 Sep 1994, Doug Osborn wrote:

> > Hi All,
> >
> > One of the requirements of a documentation set that i am planning at the
> > moment is that the documentation is easy to translate into languages other
> > than English. I've read about "restricted grammars" - limited
> > sets of usable words - that can be used to aid this process.
> >
> > Please email me if you have:
> >
> >  - knowledge about restricted grammars (not sure about the term)
> >  - an example restricted grammar or pointer to one
> >  - any tips about preparing doco for translation
> >  - translated documention before and can list things that would make your
> >    job easier.
> >
> > I will collect responses and post them back to the list.
> >
> > Thanks,
> > Doug
> >
> > ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
> > Doug Osborn                          | CiTR, Level 6, Gehrmann labs,
> > Technical writer                     | The University of Queensland,
> > InterNet: d -dot- osborn -at- citr -dot- uq -dot- oz -dot- au     | St Lucia, Qld, Australia 4072.
> > Phone : +61 7 365 4321               | Fax: +61 7 367 0441
> > ---------------------------------------------------------------------------



> *****************************************************************************
> *   RoMay Sitze                                         rositze -at- nmsu -dot- edu    *
> *****************************************************************************
> *     Only the curious wil learn and only the resolute overcome the         *
> *     obstacles to learning.  The quest quotient has always excited         *
> *     me more than the intelligence quotient.  -Eugene S. Wilson_           *
> *****************************************************************************