Slavic Languages

All presentations are in English unless otherwise noted.

SL-1 (T, 1:45pm-3:15pm) - All Levels
Slavic Languages Division Annual Meeting
Nora S. Favorov (Orlando, Florida), freelance literary and commercial translator, and administrator, ATA Slavic Languages Division

In addition to a review of the financial and administrative affairs of the division, this year's meeting will feature a presentation on its history and a discussion of the state of the market for translation and interpretation between English and the Slavic languages.

[CANCELED] SL-2 (F, 10:15am-11:45am) - Beginner
Getting Down to Business: Translating Russian Financial and Economic Terminology
Loren R. Tretyakov (Orchard Park, New York), freelance Russian®English translator

This presentation will focus on the translation of financial and economic terminology from Russian to English. Special attention will be given to terms regularly encountered in the Russian press and business/financial texts. Solutions will be offered for terms that might not be found in financial dictionaries. A glossary of Russian terms and suggested English translations will be provided. The presentation will also address differences in Russian business practices that create challenges for translators.

SL-3 (F, 10:15am-11:45am) - Intermediate
U.S. Legal Terms: How to Say It in Russian and Ukrainian
Vadim Khazin (Colts Neck, New Jersey), International Center for Environmental Resources and Development, City University of New York, and an ATA-accredited (English®Russian) freelance translator, editor, and interpreter; and Boris Silversteyn (Venice, Florida), freelance Russian and Ukrainian translator and interpreter, and chair, ATA Dictionary Review Committee

U.S. legal terms often present challenges to Russian and Ukrainian translators and interpreters. A lot of concepts and terms in the U.S. legal system have no equivalents in the Russian and Ukrainian languages, as today's Russia and Ukraine have inherited their legal systems from the former Soviet Union. The presenters will provide a list of a number of terms they have encountered in their translation and interpretation practices, along with dictionary translations (as well as their suggested translations if different from the dictionary). The ensuing discussion might result in an agreement to compile a list of preferred source-language terms.

SL-4 (F, 1:45pm-3:15pm) - All Levels
Annual Susana Greiss Lecture
Thirty Years Before the Slavic Mast: The Personal Narrative of a Literary Translator
Michael H. Heim (Los Angeles, California), University of California

SL-5 (F, 3:30pm-5:00pm) - All Levels
Transplanting Toads, Constructing Camels
Nora S. Favorov (Orlando, Florida), administrator, ATA Slavic Languages Division, and freelance commercial and literary translator; Alex Lane (Pagosa Springs, CO), Russian®English translator and interpreter, and assistant administrator, ATA Slavic Languages Division; and Lydia Razran Stone (Alexandria, Virginia), literary and technical translator, and editor, ATA Slavic Languages Division newsletter (SlavFile)
Presenting Languages: Russian and English

In this workshop, panelists will present preliminary translations they have made of a Russian poem (to be selected) and, with the audience's participation, discuss them and merge them into one final rendering selected by audience consensus.

SL-6 (S, 1:45pm-3:15pm) - Intermediate
Navigating the Cyrillic "Swamp": Understanding Encodings
Alex Lane (Pagosa Springs, Colorado), interpreter and ATA-accredited (Russian®English) translator, and assistant administrator, ATA Slavic Languages Division

There are few things more disheartening than not being able to properly display Cyrillic characters on a computer screen (having this happen to, or in front of, a client is one of them). The ability to quickly troubleshoot and authoritatively fix such problems is both a time-saver and reputation-builder. This workshop will review three major encodings used to display Cyrillic characters on various computers: Windows-1251, KOI8-R, and UTF-8 (a.k.a. Unicode). Problems and issues related to Internet browsing, word processing, and the Windows and Linux operating systems will be illustrated and explained.

SL-7 (S, 3:30pm-4:15pm) - Advanced
The Influence of English Syntax on Nominal and Adjectival Word-Formation Models in Technical Russian
Michael K. Launer (Tallahassee, Florida), vice-president, RussTech Language Services, Inc.

In recent years, technical documents written in Russian have exhibited new kinds of word formational patterns that violate normal Russian processes. This presentation will examine the kinds of changes that are occurring, describe them in linguistic terms, and suggest possible reasons for these changes.

SL-8 (S, 4:15pm-5:00pm) - All Levels
Son of False Cognates: More Russian®English "Relatives" That Go Their Own Way
Steve Shabad (Ossining, New York), associate editor, Newsweek, and freelance Russian®English translator

Cognates can be among the trickiest words and phrases to translate because they tend to lull you into rendering them with the word of the same root in the target language. But, in fact, there are often better solutions, not only in terms of dictionary definitions but also in terms of usage. This session offers an entirely new collection of entries, focusing mainly on subtle, and perhaps debatable, examples of different usages. Audience participation is encouraged.

New SL-9 (T, 3:30pm-5:00pm) - All Levels
Slavic Game Show: Double Jeopardy
Larissa Kulinich (Kirkland, Washington), freelance translator and interpreter, and instructor (English and Russian); and Steve Shabad (Ossining, New York), freelance Russian>English translator

In keeping with the format of a "game show," this session will continue the Slavic Languages Division's tradition of holding a workshop on the RussianÖEnglish translation of idioms, sayings, and other challenging terms. Everybody is invited to take part in this fun event.

(Related Sessions: Legal Translation and Interpreting (LAW-1), The Concept of Equivalence in Court Interpreting; and Medical Translation and Interpreting (MED-4), A Crash Course in Inferential Statistics and Experimental Design for Translators)