Glossary of Translation Terms for Translation Clients (combined and updated)

If you’re new to buying translation, the glossary below should help you get a head start on understanding what services are available and what your chosen translator is offering.

This is by no means an exhaustive glossary. The terms mainly relate to the type of work I do, i.e. translation (not interpreting) of practical rather than literary texts. Please let me know if I’ve missed anything and I’ll consider adding it in.

Terms that appear in an entry that have their own entry are underlined.

#xl8: Hashtag short for “translate”.

Accreditation: In the UK there are two main professional bodies that accredit translators and interpreters: the Institute of Translation and Interpreting (ITI) and the Chartered Institute of Linguists (CIOL). 

It is always best to work with a member of a professional body because we are held to a high professional standard and will abide by our organization's code of conduct. We are also subject to training requirements to maintain our accreditation. 

The main ITI and CIOL membership categories are:

• FITI (Fellow of the ITI): Translators or interpreters who have been a member of the ITI for at least 10 years (unbroken) and a qualified member for at least 7 years can apply to become a Fellow of the ITI. Fellowship recognizes these members' contribution to the profession.

• MITI (Qualified Member of the ITI): An MITI is a member of the ITI who has passed the translation/interpreting assessment or fulfilled certain criteria attesting to their professionalism and skills. They appear on the ITI database and can certify translations for official use in the UK. I have been an MITI qualified translator since 2019.
  

• AITI (Associate of the ITI): Associate membership is for translators and interpreters who are establishing their business. They must have at least 1 year of professional experience and they have not passed the MITI assessment. For members with less than 1 year of experience, there are also Associate and Student membership categories.
  

• FCIL (Fellow of the CIOL): To be recognized as a Fellow of the CIOL, linguists must demonstrate they are of "advanced professional standing", meaning that they have progressed in their career, made a significant contribution to the profession and worked to promote the aims of the institute.
  

• MCIL (Member of the CIOL): To qualify as a Member of the CIOL, linguists must demonstrate a certain level of qualification and experience in their chosen profession.
  

• Chartered Linguist: A Chartered Linguist must be either a Member or Fellow of the CIOL and have at least 5 years of professional experience. They must undertake at least 30 hours of continuous professional development (CPD) each year and submit a 12 month training plan as part of their application. I have been an MCIL and Chartered Linguist (Translator) since 2018.
  

• ACIL (Associate of the CIOL): Associates of the CIOL have at least 1 year of professional experience, but don't yet meet the criteria for full membership. Linguists with less than 1 year of experience can apply for Student or Affiliate membership.
  

 

CAT tool: Computer-assisted translation tool. These tools offer translators digital environments to make their work easier. They can split the text into sentences or paragraphs (known as segments) and allow the translator to search previously translated documents (via translation memories), glossaries or term bases. Below you can see a screenshot of Trados (a leading CAT tool) and the one I am currently using. Computer assisted translation is not the same as machine translation because the human translator is still doing the actual translation work.

Certified translation: In the UK, a certified translation is simply a translation that the translator has certified is accurate via a certificate that they provide. Translation is not a regulated profession in the UK, meaning that anyone can certify a translation. However, that doesn’t mean that the translation will be accepted by the courts or the UK government. Generally speaking the UK government requires translations to be certified by full members of either the Chartered Institute of Linguists or the Institute of Translation and Interpreting.

CIOL: Chartered Institute of Linguists. A professional body for people who work with languages, including translators and interpreters. There are various membership categories and members who meet certain criteria can be recognized as Chartered Linguists. I have been a Chartered Linguist (Translator) since 2018.

 

CPD: Continuous professional development. This term isn’t specific to the translation profession, but I’ve included it because it is so important for us translators to undertake regular continuous professional development (aka training). This might take the form of translation and writing workshops, peer review and learning about our specialist areas, among other activities. I am a huge advocate for making CPD integral to our translation practice and you can find my CPD record here.

Dead/non-editable file: These files are usually scanned documents or protected files. The text they contain cannot be edited or copied. This makes it impossible to use a CAT tool to translate the text unless the text is very clear and suitable for optical character recognition (OCR).

Editable file: A word processed file that can be edited. Usually in Word, Excel, PowerPoint or plain text format.

FCIL: See Accreditation above. 

FITI: See Accreditation above. 

Glossary: This! A list of terms used in a specific field, with definitions and explanations. A bilingual glossary will include translations as well as explanations.

ITI: Institute of Translation and Interpreting. A UK-based professional organization for professional translators and interpreters. I have been a member since I was a translation student over 10 years ago. The ITI has different membership categories, with full (assessed) membership denoted by the letters MITI.

Language direction: Most translators only translate into their first language or language of habitual use from their second or third language. My language directions are French to English and Spanish to English because I translate only into English and not into French or Spanish.

Language of habitual use: Your language of habitual use is the language you use on a daily basis. If a translator has lived in a country where their second language is spoken regularly, they might translate into their language of habitual use rather than their native or first language. My language of habitual use is the same as my native language (English).

Language pair: The source or original language and the language that the text will be translated into. I have two language pairs: French to English and Spanish to English.

Localization: Adapting a text (or other content) to a specific local market. For example, you might need to localize an English ad campaign developed in the UK for an American English audience because spelling conventions and the language used will be different.

Machine translation: Machine translation is translation done by a computer using a machine translation engine. There are several machine translation engines on the market (e.g. Google Translate, DeepL and ModernMT) and each has its merits and shortcomings. While machine translation is no longer simple word-for-word substitution and can produce fairly good results, computers still can’t translate and write like real people. The translations they produce are often not fit for purpose.

MCIL: See Accreditation above. 

MITI: See Accreditation above.

MTPE: Machine translation post-editing. This is when a machine translation engine (like DeepL, ModernMT or Google Translate) is used to automatically translate a text and the output is edited by a professional translator. Post-editing (for short) can be “light” with minimal changes or “full” to achieve the quality of professional human translation.

Native language/mother tongue/first language: This is generally the first language a person learned in childhood. It might not, however, be their strongest language if they only use it at home or if they haven’t used it regularly for many years.

 

OCR: Optical character recognition. When software is used to automatically convert text in a non-editable format to an editable format by recognizing the letters. The clearer the document and the more sophisticated the software used, the higher the quality of the OCR output.

PEMT: Post-editing machine translation. See MTPE. It’s the same thing…

Plain English: Writing clearly using shorter sentences, less jargon and more active verbs. Writing in plain English doesn’t mean dumbing down a text. It means writing so your target audience can take on and understand your message quickly and easily.

Proofreading: Checking a final text for minor errors like typos, extra or missing spaces and incorrect numbering. Each editor or translator will define proofreading differently, so check with them what they mean when they use this term.

Quality Assurance (QA): A set of checks to ensure that the translation is of the required quality level. Many QA checks can be done automatically using a CAT tool, e.g. checking numbers and formatting have been transferred correctly.

Revision: Checking the translation against the source text for accuracy. Revision can include improving the translation to make it more appropriate to the target audience, to make it sound more natural or to improve the style. Like proofreading, what’s included in revision varies by translator, so confirm what your reviser will actually check when revising.

Source language: The original language of the text that will be translated.

Source text: The text that will be translated.

Style guide: A document setting out the guidelines that writers and translators should follow when writing for your organization. The English language is not governed by any specific authority, so different spelling, grammar and punctuation conventions are used in different countries and by different organizations. Your style guide can also provide instructions on clear writing/plain English, brand voice and inclusive language, to name just a few elements. I have posted about style guides here, here and here.

Sworn translator: In some jurisdictions, translators must be approved by the courts to carry out official translations. They are then called sworn translators. You can usually find a list of sworn translators by contacting your local court, consulate or embassy.

Target audience: The people who will read a document (or at least the people who the writer wants to read it).

Target language: The language into which the document will be translated. The language of the translation.

Target text: The translation. The document in the target language. The result of the translation process.

 

Source text in the source language >> TRANSLATION >> Target text in the target language (aka the translation)

 

Term base: Similar to a glossary, a term base is a list of words commonly used in a field plus their translations. It is different from a glossary because it is bilingual and doesn’t always include definitions. It is different from a dictionary because it only includes key words and phrases. A term base could be recorded in a simple spreadsheet or using more sophisticated software.

Translation: Put very simply, the act of converting a text from one language into another or the result of this process.

Translation memory: A special type of file produced using a CAT tool that contains old translation segments. Translators can search a translation memory to make sure they are using consistent terminology. These files usually have the file extension .tmx (or similar).

Word count: The number of words in a document.

 

Let me know if you can think of anything to add or if you want to chat about how translation can help you get more from your international partnerships.