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Swedish to English translations [PRO] Tourism & Travel / Translating the names of Swedish harbours
Swedish term or phrase:Brändön Fiskehamn
Good afternoon,
This is a bit of a random question, so please bear with me. I am currently proofreading some work (tourism-related in English) for a Finnish colleague who has some dilemmas on how to translate the names of Swedish harbours into English. I do not know any Swedish and therefore have no idea about Swedish naming conventions.
If the above term were to be translated as Brändön Fishing Harbour (which seems perfectly acceptable to me), would that be OK? My colleague has mentioned the Swedish 'definite form' and feels that perhaps it needs to be changed to Brändön's Fishing Harbour or, in another example, the Small-Boat Harbour at Brändön. The latter options seem a bit unwieldy to me but I want to get it right for my colleague. How should I approach the naming these entities? It crops up with several other facilities of a similar nature too.
Some rather unproductive googling confirms my preference so far, but I do not want my preference to overrule what is right.
Although place names are not normally translated, at least if both languages have the same alphabet, I don't feel that Brändön fiskehamn is a name after looking at Internet. You would translate Brändön Church or Brändön Marshes or Brändön Football Stadium and there is no reason to do any different here. This is not the same as 'Pearl Harbour' which is a geographical location and where 'Pearl' is not the name of a town.
I ask you all to forgive my lack of perception (I have already privately asked Lilian to forgive me). I am not mad, only old and less perceptive. I am also a victim of a not so positive phenomenon from time immemorial at ProZ.com: A participant behind e.g. a ProZ.com name of 'Doublecheck' is IRL 'Lilian Smith' and insiders constantly refer to her as "Lilian" instead of 'Doublecheck'.
Deane, just to add to the joy of this lively discussion, did you know there is fishing harbour called Burntisland in Scotland? It is however better known for its golf.
Lilian Again. I have welcomed some 80 newcomers in the last 12 months and I do not remember all the names and the eMail columns do not contain any name Nevertheless I do not understand how everybody refers to Lilian as if it was a household name and yet no comment, agree or answer by her is visible in this Brändön thread. All of you who seem to know better, please enlighten me: Who is Lilian?
We have ended up speaking of you Lillian as if you are not 'present'. I don't think this was intentional but it now seems a bit rude. I'm sure that wasn't the intention but someone could not find your entry.
So welcome to the group where we do try to help each other and sometimes, if a suggestion gets a 'negative' comment or two, it is more to help the asker than anything else or to highlight a potential problem in that comment.
It isn't to shoot down others but it can unfortunately seem like that to newcomers.
As one who contributes quite a bit, and almost never askes questions herself, I suppose that you never expected such a response from the Proz community. (Perhaps it was due to the fact that it was a weekend, and people had time on their hands.)
It's a bit funny, actually.
But I am writing here to stress my opinion that there are many different possibilities, including referring to it as a small boat fishing harbour - and that it all depends upon context. The particular document, who the target audience is, whom the "publisher" is (i.e. who is putting out the document), and the style of the writer (as well as translator).
@ Deane, I am fascinated by the etymology of place names as well, and here in Australia we have lots of interesting names. I live in the Dandenong Ranges (Woiwurrung language for "lofty mountains") in a community called Kalorama (Greek for "good view") which looks out over Silvan Dam (Latin for "of the wood/forest"). Nice to know, absolutely, but do I necessarily translate it to non-speakers of the languages in question? Absolutely not.
By the way, as a former resident of Malmö, Limhamn would be "Lime Harbour" in English. There is an old lime quarry close by, and Linné called it Kalkhamn. Read all about it at http://runeberg.org/svetym/0498.html
None of the Swedish letters should cause problems, since they can all be found among other alphabets under Infoga symbol (insert symbol) on your computer.
I have to go along with George here. As I said, place names have to be transcribed or translated if in a different alphabet. But although English does not contain ä, å, ö, I think that these letters can be reproduced in an English translation. If you don't, there are two dangers 1 Try typing out a few Swedish place names while replacing ä, å, ö with a, a and o and see the choas it creates in Google maps. You'll find yourself in the wrong village and even country. Imagine this in a Swedish tourist guide !
2 In some cases, Swedish names would lose all their meaning or undergo a change of meaning. Mönsterås would become Monsteras which is not far from 'The Monster Race'
If you start changing vowels in English, you do so at great risk. Why do it in Swedish?
Having grown up in an area with names like Parsippany, Passaic, Hackensack, Rahway, and Hoboken, all with an original meaning that is now seemingly lost to the world, I like to see the background to why locals name their places as they do, when out and about (anyone care to explain Truro?). So a (rough) or (literal) translation should be ok in limited circumstances like this, IMHO. But it should be said only once...
There are no diacritics. The Swedish alphabet has three 'special' letters at the end, ie, ä, å, ö.
Automatic update in 00:
Answers
2 hrs confidence: peer agreement (net): +1
Brändön Fiskehamn / Brändön Fishing Harbour
Explanation: I agree with Deanne, but I am still going to make my suggestion.
I would give it two names, the name it is known by and a name in English that tourists would understand.
Of course not Fire Island Fishing Harbour - Brändön is a proper name (the name of a nearby city, which may not actually be a translation for "Fire Island," or even the name of a person).
But a tourist has gotta know that it is a fishing harbour. So I say, "make up" a name, and then others will adopt it. Especially if the end client is the tourist bureau of Bottenviken or Lulea.
Brändön Fiskehamn / Brändön Fishing Harbour
Charlesp Sweden Local time: 23:16 Works in field Native speaker of: English
Brändön Fiskehamn (roughly, Fire Island Fishing Harbour)
Explanation: I can't resist this... but the standard is to not translate place names, or else you would get the often mentioned 'Glue Harbour' for the actual town of Limnhamn. For colour you can add the rough translation (that has no official meaning) the first instance the name appears, but to use the Swe name thereafter.
Then there are the exceptions like Gothenburg, -- Stockholm is known but would translate to 'Stock Isle' or similar -- have you ever heard of that place? ;-)
-------------------------------------------------- Note added at 4 hrs (2013-10-12 19:44:30 GMT) --------------------------------------------------
Hmm, since we think the name shouldn't be translated this is not really important, but ... it is roughly Burnt Island to be picky here...
Deane Goltermann Sweden Local time: 23:16 Native speaker of: English, Swedish PRO pts in category: 12
Notes to answerer
Asker: Hi Deane, thank you, you are quite right! These bits are just for a bit of colour or illumination, as it were, and apply not to the actual placename but more to the nature of the facility at that place. Otherwise, the standard has been adhered to. :)
peer agreement (net): +1
