Category: Food translation

Cooking up the right words: hints, tips and tricks for successful food translation

27 May 2023

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ITI Scottish NetworkIt is hard to imagine two things more intimately tied than language and food. Not just because they both require our mouths and tongues, and involve our emotions, but because they are two fundamental, defining aspects of the culture of a people. Translating food therefore poses some particularly demanding challenges that call for highly transcreative, outside-the-box thinking.
Mike will start the morning by discussing the links between language, culture and food with particular reference to Italy, and why they are so important.
After the coffee break, he will continue with a more interactive session where participants will take an analytical and critical look at some material from restaurant menus. The examples used refer to Italian cuisine, partly because it is so well known internationally and partly because this is the food Mike is most familiar with. They will be in English, although some Italian will inevitably creep in. The aim is to look at ideas for solving specific practical problems, thereby gaining insights that can be applied to food translation in general.
Participants should come away with a clear notion of the type of problems food translation poses and some ideas on how to tackle them.

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Cooking up the right words: hints, tips and tricks for successful food translation

14 October 2022

METM22It is hard to imagine two things more intimately tied than language and food. Not just because they both require our mouths and tongues and involve our emotions, but because they are two fundamental, defining aspects of the culture of a people. Translating food therefore poses some particularly demanding challenges that call for highly transcreative, outside-the-box thinking.

Participants will take an analytical and critical look at some material from menus and cookbooks. The examples used refer to Italian cuisine, partly because it is so well known internationally and partly because this is the food the facilitator is most familiar with. They will mostly be in English, although some Italian will inevitably creep in.

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Cooking up the right words

Spotlight on specialization: a three-part medley

It is hard to imagine two things more intimately tied than language and food. Not just because they both require our mouths and tongues and involve our emotions, but because they are two fundamental, defining aspects of the culture of a people. Translating food therefore poses some particularly demanding challenges that call for highly transcreative, outside-the-box thinking. Michael will give some practical examples of how to tackle this task on the menu and in the cookbook.

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Il legame culturale tra lingua, cucina e popolo

TranslatingEurope Workshop 2020

Anche se la definizione di cultura varia, sia la lingua che la cucina normalmente appaiono fra i fattori distintivi. Dunque, il nesso fra le due cose è di fatto inestricabilmente radicato nella cultura di un popolo. L’importanza di una lingua comune per unire un popolo fu sentita dai padri fondatori dell’Italia unita, che non persero tempo nell’imporre l’italiano come lingua nazionale. Oggi si può affermare che, almeno per quanto riguarda la lingua, il processo di unificazione è riuscito, ma non si può dire altrettanto per la cucina: i diversi piatti della cucina italiana hanno ancora forti connotazioni regionali.

Forse non tutti gli italiani, però, sanno che anche la lingua inglese non è monolitica in cucina: ci sono numerosissime differenze lessicali fra l’inglese britannico e quello americano.

La presentazione in oggetto analizza le problematiche che nascono da queste premesse.

Guardare la registrazione.

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