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Is there any prospect of patent translation training being offered?
Thread poster: Nathalie Ohana
Nathalie Ohana
Nathalie Ohana  Identity Verified
United States
Local time: 07:23
English to French
Jan 30, 2011

Hello,
I would like to expand my specialties and would be interested in patent translation training.
Any advice on this ?
Any future training on ProZ ?
Thanks.
Nathalie
 
IPtranslate (X)
IPtranslate (X)
Brazil
English to Dutch
+ ...
Background Jan 31, 2011

Nathalie Ohana wrote:

Hello,
I would like to expand my specialties and would be interested in patent translation training.
Any advice on this ?
Any future training on ProZ ?
Thanks.
Nathalie


As an engineer and linguist (both MSc), with a lot of experience in patents (having worked for a long time for the European Patent Office), I can only stress the importance of being technically skilled if you want to go into patent translations. Even for people who know what the subject matter is about, it is sometimes VERY difficult (if not impossible) to translate a patent. The writers of these things (very often people who have a legal background and don't understand anything from the technical point of view) come up with texts that are......worthless....

So, first thing in my opinion is a technical background, secondly is a thorough linguistic understanding of often extremely complicated texts, and thirdly, a huge amount of perseverance after having practiced a lot. Also: don't expect all your patent translations to be of a high standard; sometimes it simply isn't possible to come up with a good translation without rewriting the whole thing, which you should in no case do! These people prefer literal translations instead of linguistically correct translations, out of fear that there might be a legal problem because of a difference (often nuances) between versions.

Good luck to you!
 


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Is there any prospect of patent translation training being offered?






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