Arabic Translation Services Require Special Care

By Author: sammdsn0
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Summary: Arabic is one of the world’s most widely spoken languages and also one of it’s most challenging for English speakers and, in many respects, for Arabic speakers themselves. While the 280 million Modern Standard Arabic “speakers” share a common written language, regional differences between spoken Arabic are significant. In addition, as a right to left language that requires special software to render, Arabic translation services often find themselves at odds with standard technical configurations of their software and operating systems.

Content: Arabic is one of the world’s most widely spoken languages and also one of it’s most challenging for English speaking language service providers. While the 280 million Modern Standard Arabic “speakers” share a common written language, regional differences between spoken Arabic are significant. In addition, as a right to left language that requires special software to render, Arabic translation services often find themselves at odds with standard technical configurations of their software and operating systems.

Arabic translation is quite challenging ...
... from the perspective of a project manager at a translation service. Few project managers at Western translation firms are even proficient in basic written Arabic. While many can speak numerous languages, Arabic seldom is one of them making reliance on carefully vetted team of translators paramount. In as much, while many languages require little more than a translator and an editor to produce a high quality product, it is often necessary for a translation service to have an Arabic translator co-manage projects.

In addition, Arabic translation can be extremely difficult to format and often requires a typesetting specialist, even to reproduce a basic text in Microsoft Word. Such issues as fonts, keyboard layouts, operating systems, and of course the right to left orientation of written Arabic itself make it an exceptionally challenging to translate while capturing the visual elements and layout of the original. Even perfectly formatted texts are sure to look incorrect if opened on a system not specifically configured to handle Arabic. It is often necessary to deliver work in PDF or jpg so that the correct visuals are displayed and the translation is clearly seen.

One of the most interesting aspects of Arabic translation is that written Arabic is quite different than spoken Arabic. That is, a written text read aloud may not be mutually intelligible to listeners, though when read it will comprehensible to readers. This is due to the fact that Arabic has a standard writing system, but not a common system of speech. This is not necessarily an issue for a firm offering translation services in Modern Standard Arabic but it makes life quite difficult for those offering interpretation.

One should bear in mind that Arabic is quite different than English and that the barriers to communication are significantly greater in the Arabic speaking world than in the English speaking world. Spoken Arabic has been described as a continuum more than a shared language. If there were a “standard” dialect, Egyptian Arabic would be the most obvious candidate as both the largest and oldest Arabic speaking civilization. However, it is a best practice to work with linguists with origins in one’s target market, even when producing written Arabic translation and certainly for other types of language services.

Arabic translation is a challenging language with many low quality service providers so be sure to employ only the top translation service.