Author Archives: David Frank

descriptive linguist, linguistics consultant, translator, editor

What is Your Translation Metaphor?

July 9, 2011 – 8:29 pm

A classic article in communication studies is “The Conduit Metaphor: A Case of Frame Conflict in our Language about Language” by Michael J. Reddy (1979). In our way of thinking about language, we seem to have an image in mind of packaging our thoughts into words and then sending those words across to someone else [...]

Posted in Bible Translation | Comments (116)

Vernaculars and Lingua Francas, Part Two: Translation Implications

July 1, 2011 – 8:47 pm

I have already explained something about vernaculars and lingua francas. They are not two types of languages, but two uses of language, depending on whether or not the language is the mother tongue of the speakers or is an “other-than-mother-tongue” that speakers use to communicate with each other. I wouldn’t say that there is a [...]

Posted in Bible Translation, Bible versions, common language, idiomatic, natural English, non-native speakers, source text, standard English, translation audience, translation purpose, vernacular | Comments (117)

Vernaculars and Lingua Francas, Part One: Foundations

June 27, 2011 – 2:18 pm

I have an interest in lingua francas (or linguas franca, or linguae francae, or whatever). The phrase means, literally, “language of the Franks.” The explanation is that from an Arabic perspective, all Europeans were “Franks.” In the first half of the Second Millenium, there was a specific language form called Lingua Franca, a Romance-based pidgin [...]

Posted in Bible Translation, common language, Hebrew, idiomatic, linguistics, natural English, non-native speakers, standard English, translation audience, translation philosophy, translation purpose, vernacular | Comments (120)

Does a Translation Have to Sound like a Translation?

May 5, 2011 – 2:49 pm

I raise the question of whether a translation should necessarily and inevitably sound like a translation because there are people who seem to think that this is the case. That is, since the translation takes as its starting point a text in a foreign language–if it weren’t “foreign,” we wouldn’t be translating it, would we?–and probably [...]

Posted in Bible Translation, common language, idiomatic, natural English, standard English, translation audience, translation philosophy, translation purpose | Comments (54)

The incarnation of the Logos

December 15, 2010 – 3:35 am

There is nothing so profound and so beautiful as the beginning of John’s Gospel. Mirroring the beginning of Genesis but conscripting the language of the Greek philosophers, John begins, “In the beginning was the Logos.” My own style is more like Luke’s: “The time came for the baby to be born, and she gave birth [...]

Posted in Bible Translation, Greek, idiomatic | Comments (22)

It is easier for a hippopotamus to…

December 7, 2010 – 7:58 pm

I recently returned from Africa, where I was working with a translation of the Gospel of Luke into a language that has had no previous Bible translation and a culture that has had very little contact with Christianity. I was not responsible for producing the translation into this language, but I was responsible for evaluating [...]

Posted in Bible Translation, biblical idioms, idiomatic, literal translation, translation accuracy, translation audience, translation equivalence, translation philosophy, word for word | Comments (40)

Accurate but not Clear?

January 28, 2010 – 2:08 am

A standard that most of us who are involved in Bible translation hold to is that a translation must strive to be clear, accurate and natural. That is the ideal, though sometimes a trade-off is involved. These are the three criteria for a good Bible translation. Sometimes acceptability is added as a fourth criterion. I [...]

Posted in Bible Translation, translation accuracy | Comments (40)

Reflections on the nature of Bible translation

December 29, 2009 – 12:12 am

I have been strangely quiet on this blog for a long time now. Part of the problem is that I don’t have much that I want to say about the particular wording of English Bible translations. I am much more interested in the bigger issues, like the philosophical, theological, theoretical, cultural and sociological dimensions of translation. I see [...]

Posted in ambiguity, Bible Translation, common language, idiomatic, sacred language, translation equivalence, translation philosophy | Comments (12)

Yet another Bible translation?

February 17, 2009 – 7:10 pm

I have read about another new Bible translation into English. This is the Freeware Bible project, and you can read about it online at www.freewarebible.com. The translator is Bill Jemas, who apparently is well-known in comic book circles. Jemas apparently felt the need to completely rethink how the original scripture texts were translated into English, so [...]

Posted in Bible Translation | Comments (18)

Obligatory possession and Bible translation

December 19, 2008 – 7:01 pm

Each translation has its particular approach, and should have an audience in mind. The translators have to ask, “Who is going to read this translation, and how can we render the source text in a way that is suitable for them?” We are blessed in English to have a number of different translations of the [...]

Posted in Bible Translation, semantics, source text, translation audience, translation equivalence, translation philosophy | Comments (5)
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