The work that a translator does after finishing the translation and just before delivery is supervising.
It's usually similar to Yunmun in the sense that translators review their own translations once again. However, if proofreading is performed by another translator or PM, proofreading goes beyond simply proofreading and becomes a more in-depth task.
There are as many requests for proofreading from translators as there are translation requests. When I first received an inspection request, I started by saying, “Well, this isn't easy.” I think I thought it was about finding obvious errors such as wrong numbers or typos. But for some reason, it takes a lot longer than expected. If I think that my hands will be delivered to the client for the last time, I think more deeply and do research.
However, there are places where the inspection rate is half or even 1/3 of the translation rate. Apart from the high and low absolute rates, I sometimes feel that the processing rate, which is much lower than the translation rate, is unreasonable. Someone has already done the translation, so it's normal for it to proceed so quickly, so it's natural that the rate is just as low. However, when I actually tried it, “proofreading” is a task that takes as much work as translation.
Usually, requesting a separate translator to perform an inspection (while paying an inspection fee) means that the importance of the translated material is just as high. It's probably a case where even nuances, minor numbers, and terms must be accurately translated rather than the difficulty of the translation itself. The PM also asks for inspection work several times. “Translator, this is a very important text.”, “Translator, the client requested a very thorough review.” If PM's expectations are added to the burden of the work itself, such as supervision, the shoulders become heavy.
We begin the process with a commitment to meet expectations. As soon as I tried to fix it, “Well, that's a mistranslation of this sentence,” I thought, “Wait a minute... there must be an intention of translating it like this... (after a few minutes)... ah... maybe this is what it means? “Well, it's a proper translation.” and I think about each sentence as if struggling with the monitor. In fact, if you don't understand the meaning at a glance, it might not be a good translation. However, since everyone sees and thinks differently, I can't make judgments based on myself. That makes me think about every sentence from many angles. In fact, this is a common occurrence in supervising, and this is also true supervision.
What you really need to be careful about in proofreading is when both the original text and translation are very simple. Sentences that can be understood all at once are roughly overlooked. But the trap is in a place like this. There are frequent typos and mistranslations in places like this. For some reason, when you feel that the inspection is progressing rapidly, you should calm down and go back and check. Then again, you'll find what you've missed.
Even when words in the original text are omitted from the translated text, this is a part that takes up a long time. I think it's missing, so I'll keep thinking about it while trying to fix it.
Why did I omit it... I'll try to translate the sentence myself by chewing through the translation and adding the missing parts. Then you can feel it right away. That the sentence I translated was awkward. I realize that omitting doesn't hurt the meaning of the sentence and is more natural.
In other words, proofreading is the task of checking whether the translated text was translated well according to the original text, but you shouldn't be too tied to the original text. They also learn by taking responsibility in this way.
It seems that proofreading is not necessarily a critical task of picking out the wrong part of someone's translation; on the contrary, it seems to be a task of looking at how good the translation is and how complete it is.
The more I supervise, the more I feel that it's not an incidental task that I only take a quick look at with my own eyes. Since it is necessary to improve the completeness and accuracy of translations, supervising translators require more detail and a higher level of linguistic quality. Then, after doing a few proofreading tasks, when translating, “Maybe the person in charge is wondering why this part was translated this way?” While thinking about it, I think one more time about whether the translated sentence would be easy to understand in the eyes of others.
As I work as a translator, I experience the importance and difficulty of supervising work, which seems simple and simple, but actually causes translators to fall into anguish.
*This content has been transferred from Gicon Studio to Letterworks.
