Translators

Keeping in mind that our target audience for literacy materials are remote peoples throughout Papua New Guinea we have a need for translators to help make our materials more accessible to these audiences. 

Specifically, we are looking for:

Admittedly, those second two options represent a very small pool of people, nevertheless, anyone willing to serve as a translator can have a direct impact on the success of our project.  Can you help?

Tips for translating from everyday natural English into Simple English.

Writing Rules
  • Restrict the length of noun clusters to no more than 3 words
  • Restrict sentence length to no more than 20 words (procedural sentences) or 25 words (descriptive sentences)
  • Restrict paragraphs to no more than 6 sentences (in descriptive text)
  • Avoid slang and jargon while allowing for specific terminology
  • Use articles such as “a/an” and “the” wherever possible
  • Use simple verb tenses (past, present, and future)
  • Use active voice
  • Write sequential steps as separate sentences
Grammar/Vocabulary Rules
 
  • Plural nouns are formed by adding -s or related forms, as in drinksboxes, or countries.
  • Nouns are formed with the endings -er (as in prisoner) or -ing (building). Adjectives are formed with the endings -ing (boiling) or -ed (mixed).
  • Adverbs can be formed by adding -ly (for example tightly) to words that Basic English calls “qualities” (adjectives that describe objects).
  • Negatives can be formed with un- (unwise).
  • Both pronouns and verbs use the different forms they have in English (for example I go to himHe goes to me).
  • Compound words can be formed by combining two nouns (e.g. soapbox) or a noun and a preposition (sunup).
  • International words, words that are the same or similar in English and other European languages (e.g. radio), use the English form.
  • English forms are used for numbers, dates, money, or measurements.
  • Any technical terms or special vocabulary needed for a task should be explained in the text using words from the Basic English vocabulary (for example the ‘vocabulary’ is the list of words).
 
 

Contact us!

If this sounds like a fit for you or someone you know, please contact our literacy team by emailing cd-resources-admin@ntmpng.org and let us know a bit about yourself and how you might be able to help as a volunteer translator.

How we acknowledge our translators

Any works that we create will need to be done so fully with the understanding that this is a volunteer effort, credit under a non-commercial copyright will be given but there can be strictly no offer or expectation of commercial or financial interest in this project. Currently any books produced will be published with creative commons copyright protection.

For more information on creative commons, take a look here.

With this type of copyright protection, we will be able to share our library with  other organizations around the world free of charge or restriction while at the same time preserving acknowledgement to those who have written, illustrated, edited, translated or contributed in some way for each project we add to our library.

Translators frequently asked questions

I can translate from English to Spanish (or some other language), would you like my help?

The end goal of this project is to get material into the hands of remote peoples in their own local languages here in Papua New Guinea. So we do prioritize Melanesian Tok Pisin, English & Simple English translation of our materials. But if you are willing to help with other languages, especially global languages such as Spanish, French, Chinese etc, please consider helping helping us. We are happy to include other language versions as well, simply because it may meet critical needs elsewhere in the world which we would only be too happy to see happen.

As I translate, the text ends up being much longer, is this a problem?

It is common in many circumstances to end up with different text lengths when translating and often this is preferable. Since our final audience will be remote & isolated people the goal is NOT to translate efficiently. The goal is instead to translate effectively, often times an expanded meaning is far easier to re-translate into a 3rd language than a very efficient translation that makes use of complex vocabulary etc.

Let’s take a look at this example, this was recently written by a native English speaking author..

“In general, the types of farms are livestock, dairy, and crops. A farm that focuses on livestock may raise beef cattle, turkeys, pigs, sheep and goats for meat. A dairy farm raises milk cows. A farm may also just grow crops. Some farms have livestock or dairy and also grow crops. These types of farms are actually jobs to make money and a livelihood.”

Now let’s look at a more expanded version that will communicate more clearly by using simpler words..

It is very common in the United States for people to have many different kinds of farms.  There are farms that mostly have animals like chickens or cows or pigs, turkey or sheep, these different kinds of animals are looked after so they can be sold for meat.  Animals that are looked after for money are called livestock and so a farm that looks after lots of animals for money would be called a livestock farm.  Some farms that have lots of cows would be called another kind of farm.  They would be called a dairy farm because milk and things made from milk like cheese are all kinds of food called dairy food.  So farms that make lots of dairy food are called dairy farms.  Many other kinds of farms in the United States mostly work on planting different kinds of food in the ground, food like corn and wheat and soybeans and potatoes and many other kinds of food are very commonly planted in farms.  These kinds of food that are planted in the ground are called crops. A farm that just plants food for money would be called a crop farm.  But some farms look after lots of animals and plant lots of food too, and also some look after lots of cows to sell milk too, so not all farms are the same.  But all of these kinds of farms do all of this work in order to make money so they can look after their families.”

The new text is much longer but utilizes far fewer complex vocabulary, it expands on explaining many ideas that would otherwise be foreign to a remote & isolated new reader.