Bio

Born 24 September 1947 in Melbourne, Australia.
Nationalities: Australian + Portuguese. 
BSc (physics & maths) 1968, University of Melbourne.
Mentioned in: A world of change (ITI Bulletin Jan-Feb 2015).
Swimmer. Currently training for 3000m open water and 800m pool events at 17th FINA World Masters Championships to be held in Budapest in August.

Professional freelance French-to-English translator since 1973.

1994 – 2012: freelance translator to the French naval defence industry (DCNS, Thales, Mer et Marine, etc.)
2012 – present: freelance translator to M&M.

• Member of Mediterranean Editors and Translators (MET).
• Member of WLF Think Tank, authors of 101 Things a Translator Needs to Know.
• Previously a member of SFT (Société Française des Traducteurs).

Publications

• Glossary: A French-English Glossary of Naval Defence
• Contributor to: 101 Things a Translator Needs to Know by WLF Think Tank.
• Work samples, books: Work samples, books

Blog, approach, work samples & more

• Blog: Translating Technical Journalism
• Approach: Translation by emulation, take #1 + Translation by emulation, take #2
• Work samples, technical: Show 'em what you can do #2 to Show 'em what you can do #11.1 or Turning a problem passage into a gem
• Work samples, other: Je vais passer pour un vieux con, #2

Waffle is worst and technical journalism is special

Presentation in:

A talk about types of translation categories encountered in the non-literary marketplace.

The ‘general’ versus ‘technical’ dichotomy has been around forever, but is generally inadequate.
Quality translation increasingly means translation by subject specialists which in turn demands careful job classification by subject.

This presentation takes a closer look at two categories that you may never have considered as such.
First ‘waffle’ meaning texts that say little or nothing, but nevertheless use lots of words. Despite the fact that hardly anyone sees ‘waffle’ as a category, the worst cases can be a translator’s nightmare and a financial disaster.

Second ‘technical journalism’ — my own speciality when the subject matter is naval or maritime. This category comes in two flavours depending on whether it is for a general or a specialist readership. You will, I think, be surprised to learn just how much this type of text differs from others and the resources that need to be deployed to meet the challenges.

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