International Translation Day

First of all, I’m wishing all translators, interpreters and students a happy International Translation Day, which is celebrated every year on September 30th on the feast of St. Jerome.

According to Wikipedia,

The celebrations have been promoted by FIT (the International Federation of Translators) ever since it was set up in 1953. In 1991 FIT launched the idea of an officially recognised International Translation Day to show solidarity of the worldwide translation community in an effort to promote the translation profession in different countries (not necessarily only in Christian ones). This is an opportunity to display pride in a profession that is becoming increasingly essential in the era of progressing globalisation.

According to the International Translators Association (you can find more information on the International Translation Day here),

[...] the challenge of International Translation Day remains the same: to raise awareness of the translation profession.

For those who didn’t know, St. Jerome is the patron saint of archeologists, archivists, Bible scholars, librarians, libraries, schoolchildren, students and translators. You can read about his life and works on this Wikipedia article. Last year, Jill Sommers posted a very detailed post about him, which was also about the way he worked as a translator (he revised and translated parts of the Bible into Latin, and awarded sainthood thanks to the services he rendered to the Church). Quoting  the article posted on the TIHOF’s website:

Jerome’s humility regarding his own work set a good example for translators who followed him. He freely admitted ignorance, even embarrassment, when warranted, and revisited some of his translations, making corrections and additions. On the other hand, he also pointed out that a translation’s accuracy depended greatly on the reliability of the source text: copyists often inadvertently introduced errors, which would be compounded and passed down through the centuries.

The International Translation Day has a different theme every year. This year’s theme is Working Together.

Many translation-related events are organized on this day. For example, ProZ.com’s first virtual conference, starting at 10 am GMT, which runs for 12 hours and you can attend for free. Always speaking of ProZ.com, some members even organize pow-wows.

Worldaccent.com posted a themed greeting card here. Being keen on graphic design, I didn’t hesitate to make mine:

(Credits: font by Fonts for Peas and flower brush by buburu)

Introducing LBT’s Facebook Page

I haven’t updated this blog for almost a month, and I’ve got a lot to write. In the last few days I just didn’t know which subject I should write about first. I’ve got many ideas running through my head, and I’ll eventually translate them into actual posts, one step at a time. Don’t worry, your RSS readers won’t be flooded with posts from my blog in the next few hours!

Today’s topic is Learning by Translating’s official Facebook page. I opened it a few months ago and, like my Twitter page, its purpose is to be a window on my site’s updates and to interact with readers and potential clients. I use Twitter more extensively though, since I also use it to post interesting links I find thanks to the people I follow there. Too bad Twitter has also a limit: your posts mustn’t be longer than 140 characters.

I’m also posting a schedule for the next few days below. I’m available for translation work until the 28th. If you need to get something translated from English/French into Italian, don’t hesitate to contact me!