Category Archives: common language

Translator in the translation

April 30, 2012 – 8:47 pm

This is an interesting meditation on Bible translation: http://www.lhm.org/dailydevotions.asp?date=20120430. First, it is a notice about yet another English Bible translation becoming available, and then a commentary on that. I’m not really aware of this new translation from Thomas Nelson Publishing, but Rev. Ken Klaus of Lutheran Hour Ministries reveals a few things he knows about […]

By David Frank | Also posted in Bible Translation, Bible versions, idiomatic, invisibility of the translator, natural English, sacred language | Tagged | Comments (16)

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 […]

By David Frank | Also posted in Bible Translation, Bible versions, 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 […]

By David Frank | Also posted in Bible Translation, 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 […]

By David Frank | Also posted in Bible Translation, idiomatic, natural English, standard English, translation audience, translation philosophy, translation purpose | Comments (54)

Weird books in normal language

April 30, 2011 – 8:22 am

John Hobbins recently commented: It’s important to me that we understand that the Bible is a weird book that teaches things at great odds with the way we believe and the way we do things. A quaint translation like RSV or ESV helps in making that understood. The conclusion many people draw from reading a […]

By Dannii | Also posted in Bible Translation, jargon, natural English | Comments (5)

In which the jargon takes over

September 16, 2010 – 6:05 am

In general I don’t like Biblish – it’s not the language I speak nor is it the language of those I’d hope to introduce to God. Biblish is marked by strange or ungrammatical language choices and is often insensitive to idioms. And it’s vocabulary? Obscure, transliterated, oblivious to polysemy and maybe even archaic. But over […]

By Dannii | Also posted in jargon, natural English, sacred language | Comments (26)

In which I keep it short

May 22, 2010 – 5:49 am

On the purpose of translations… I would rather speak five intelligible words to instruct others than ten thousand words in an unknown register. Who’s with me?

By Dannii | Also posted in Bible Translation, idiomatic | 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 […]

By David Frank | Also posted in ambiguity, Bible Translation, idiomatic, sacred language, translation equivalence, translation philosophy | Comments (12)

Common language Bible versions

August 11, 2009 – 7:24 pm

I often post about natural language in Bible translation on this blog. Recently I blogged that there is a difference between natural language, which is language normally spoken or written by native speakers of a language, and common language. Natural language for someone who is highly educated and/or is able to use a high register […]

By Wayne Leman | Also posted in Bible Translation, Bible versions | Comments (16)
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