I'm not sure what you mean by "reformable texts" or "triple parallel text", but I have long been looking for a practical way of producing a triple parallel text of the following format:
Mandarin (putonghua) Chinese character text Mandarin phonetic representation using either pinyin or zhuyin, including tones English conceptual translation An even more interesting formulation would include a fourth parallel text - English literal (word for word) translation. Producing such a text in hard copy would be difficult and awkward to read. However, a digital version could provide an easy way to toggle the display of the various elements on or off as required. Furthermore, a digital version could easily offer a fifth and sixth parallel text - audio in either of the two languages. This would provide an excellent learning tool for both students of Chinese, and Chinese students of other languages. There already exists a body of work that lends itself very well to implementing this concept. It consists of a series of Chinese translations of the Tintin comic books by the Belgian Herge. These were published in Taiwan some decades ago and are unfortunately out of print. They display Chinese character text with the zhuyin phonetics and tones displayed vertically after each character. The translation is far from literal, and is further complicated in that it was not made from the original French, but from an English translation. OTOH, translations into a large number of other languages are already available. I'm baffled why this approach has not been tried commercially, especially since China has had an agreement with the copyright holder for a couple of years now to publish Chinese versions of Tintin. It seems a terrible waste... On Apr 4, 5:53 am, StubbornVN wrote: > When reformable texts are used you rarely get a triple parallel text > because the nationally dominant language would leave minority > populations to provide rare triple parallels. Here in Vietnam they can > also double write stories with different language authors to suit the > parallel French or English versus Vietnamese audiences, surely ethnic > Chinese would compound the problem with the availability of > specialized authors rewriting the same story many ways! If I was in > that business I would help compound the selection issue too; product > distributors use rebranding! > > I'm getting the feeling a different language analysis technique is not > going to happen @Google Translate! Defining which words are subtracted > or added by normally undefinable language influence groups is probably > beyond a web.1 category machine. Not that I'm able to competently > recognize all the language influences in my native language either! > > On Apr 3, 5:53 am, otropogo wrote:> Thanks for the interesting example, > chinyuwan, but I see that only two > > of the characters in this sample sentence are found in both Mandarin > > and Cantonese versions. > > > It would be even more helpful to see two sentences saying the same > > thing, and using the same characters (or as many as possible the same) > > one with Mandarin style, the other in Cantonese. > > > From your last sample it's not clear whether Google's grasp of grammar > > is causing the misinterpretation or its unfamiliarity with the > > characters used in Cantonese. > > > BTW - it's surprising how many common German words Google gives up on > > and simply repeats in English translation as though they were proper > > names. > > > On Mar 31, 3:22 pm, chinyuwan wrote: > > > > otropogo, > > > Thanks for your advice. > > > > Google translate performs much better with Mandarin grammar. it is > > > just useless with Cantonese grammar. > > > >http://img.skitch.com/20100331-kktp6j1944qnfku67m7eh3iir5.jpg > > > > Technology and internet liberate more people to write in Cantonese > > > lexical and grammar. Internet can allow this language, that isn't > > > allowed to be written officially, to be written out. > > > Yes, in official and serious writing, people use Mandarin grammar. > > > That is, in the old publishing media. > > > However, on the internet, more people write in Cantonese grammar. > > > This is why google translate should realize the existence of written > > > Cantonese because there are lots of websites are in written > > > Cantonese. > > > > Beside, written cantonese has history of more than a hundred years > > > old. Many words are standardized. -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "General" group. To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [email protected]. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/google-translate-general?hl=en.
