Accuracy in Translation

The examples examined thus far in this chapter have indicated that President Obama’s speeches were inaccurately translated in a significant number of cases but were nevertheless presented as direct quotes. In order to discover why, the interviewees were asked to look at the various examples shown above and to give possible explanations. Some were asked about their own translations while others who were not part of the team of reporters that covered the 2012 U.S. presidential election were asked to provide their own opinions regarding the translations. Since it is necessary that the interviewees’ identities remain anonymous, their answers are presented below in an aggregated manner. Where the comments of specific interviewees are cited, they are referred to as Interviewee A, Interviewee B, and so on to retain their anonymity. Only Shirato’s comments are indicated as his own.

All interviews were conducted in Japanese and translated into English by the author of this study.

Most of the interviewees stressed the importance of accuracy in news translation especially in the case of direct quotes. When asked Question 11 from Table 5.1, “Is there anything that you keep in mind when translating?” Interviewee A responded, “To be accurate. This is a must.” Interviewee B said that the translation of direct quotes needs to be “word-for-word” and “nothing should be left out.” Interviewee C agreed that for high-ranking officials, word-for-word translation is “necessary” and additional information should be put in parentheses or placed outside of the quotation marks, if needed, in order to present the quote as verbatim as possible. Interviewee D said, “Nothing other than that uttered by the

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speaker should be added within the quotation marks,” and also proposed the use of parentheses when adding information. Others, such as Interviewee E suggested that the grammatical structure should also be retained when possible, even if it might lead to unnatural phrasing in Japanese. “I think we should try to preserve the flavor of the original phrase” he said, and pointed out that readers seem to appreciate some level of foreignness when it comes to translating words uttered in a foreign language.

On the other hand, some mentioned that “fluency” of translation is also important. Interviewee F admitted that in some cases, “free translation” was necessary in order to make the translated Japanese text readily understandable to the reader. However, Interviewee C stressed that when translating parts of a speech to be presented as a direct quote, extra care should be given so that the TT reflects the content of the original speech as precisely as possible, even if it leads to some awkwardness in the wording. As he described:

When translating direct quotes, I want to make it as close to the original wording as possible. As a result, the fluency tends to be lost, but we have to accept it. Sometimes, the editor would ask me “Can I change it this way?” but I would respond by saying “No, because that is not how the speaker said it.”

(Interviewee C, personal communication, September 17, 2014) Overall, there seemed to be a consensus among the journalist-translators that whatever is contained within quotation marks needs to be either preserved or changed only when there is a good enough reason to do so. For example, Interviewee B, who has experience as an editor for the international news section, stressed that whenever something unnatural or contradictory in a direct quote was found, he would ask the journalist-translator to tell him what the original phrase was.

In such cases, if official transcripts or relevant news articles released by international

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wire services were available, he said that he would have them printed out to double check whether the direct quote was faithful to the original or not. This seems to be a common practice in news agency newsrooms such as that of the AFP, especially when translating direct quotes, where “the desk can ask a reporter or producer to obtain original quotes when they are in a different language to that of the report”

(Bielsa, 2007, p. 149).

Interviewee D who also has experience as an international news editor explained that he would have international news reporters in Tokyo check the translations done by other media outlets, as well as local news reports coming out of the region where the speech event had taken place in order to detect possible mistranslations. However, when it comes to editing content within quotation marks, he said that consultation with the journalist-translator was necessary. This understanding of the necessity for consultation with the original author of the article (i.e. the journalist-translator) was shared by Interviewee C who also has experience both as a Washington correspondent and as an international news editor in Tokyo.

He described the process in the following manner:

In the case of direct quotes, I always try to ask the reporter directly when there are some things that need to be clarified. As you know, we have a time difference [between Japan and the respective overseas bureaus], so I would not wake the reporter up [in the middle of the night] if the changes I want to make were cosmetic such as changes in post-positional particles.

In those cases, I would go ahead and make the necessary changes, but would send the galley proof with a note asking the reporter to check the changes carefully. I would also call the reporter up in the morning to make sure. If there is something clearly wrong about the direct quote, I will call the reporter immediately even if it means waking him or her up. I do not want to go ahead and make changes on my own especially if it is a direct

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quote, because in the case of an exclusive interview, for example, the interviewer is the only person who knows what has actually been said.”

(Interviewee C, personal communication, September 17, 2014)