Borrowings and Calques... a trap for translators?

A translator's work consists of an indirect process. A message is taken in in an X language, then its meaning grasped and lastly delivered into an Y language.

Throughout this process we might come across certain lexical items which do not seem to belong a language's standard repertoire. In such cases, 'borrowings' or 'loanwords' are being employed.

These words pose certain difficulties for translators as we ask ourselves: do we translate an already translated or borrowed word or should we leave it intact?

First, let us clarify the meaning and differences of both terms. "Loanwords" are words incorporated into a language which maintain the same structure, function and form. "Calques" are the literal translations of lexical items where the meaning and concept stay the same rather than its form.

After a certain time and when the use of a borrowed term is widely spread, then a community is said to incorporate the word as part of their language and is no longer a neologism. That word is said to be lexicalized where the morphophonological traits of the recipient language shape the new word which stops resembling is foreign origin.

In such cases, that word already forms part of the language thus, it should be translated. An example of this is the Spanish term "estándar" whose origin can be found in the English "standard". Notice that the Spanish language has shaped the new word as a vowel is needed before an "s" in initial position, the stress has been added and the final "d" consonant is deleted.

Recent loanwords which have not yet been lexicalized are bound to be left just the way they are. Sometimes, a footnote might be necessary to clarify the concept but bare in mind the translator's reputation or including them! With regard to technology, English is the main source of new creations of words. How would you translate "Software" and "hardware" into Spanish? Although other languages such as French do have an equivalent in their own language, Spanish does not, so it is quite impossible to translate such terms.

However, when calques are involved, a translator needs to bear in mind the existence of some of them. These terms usually have conventional translations such as "rascacielo" in Spanish from the English "skyscraper" and the English "flea market" from the French phrase "marché aux puces".

So, always keep in touch with new words which enter your language, check if they are widely used, if new meanings are added to them, if they adapt to your language in ways that they do not look like foreign words and most important of all, check the DICTIONARY to see if the word you are looking for has an entry. Then you will be able to determine whether to translate the word or not to ensure you deliver a translation worthy of a professional...