Back Translation Essay ⋆ Business Essay Examples ⋆ EssayEmpire

The verbal translation of a document or a questionnaire has two principal methods—forward translation and backward translation. While forward translation is a method to convert a document or a questionnaire from the source language to the target (foreign) language, the back translation method is used for translating the same document or the questionnaire back from the target language to the original (source) language.

The back translation method has been traditionally used in educational testing and psychological measurement, and has proven to be an important tool for scientific study, legal or ethical liability reviews, and in marketing research. Moreover, the development of new opportunities in global marketing research in the 21st century has increased the importance of the back translation method as an instrument for assuring the quality of translation between source and target languages in the emerging markets beyond the United States, Europe, and Japan.

This method is used to identify language conversion errors by translating back from the target language to the source language. In other words, the back translation process enables the producer or the owner of the document or questionnaire to see how the forward translation will be read by the target audience. The trouble spots are then identified by comparing the back translation to the original document or questionnaire. A few examples of such trouble spots are the parts in a document where the meanings may have been altered or parts that are not fully comprehensive. These defects are then corrected according to the objective of the project and to the satisfaction of the producer or the owner. There are numerous procedures, judgmental or statistical, to evaluate the equivalence and the quality of translation.

In a verbal translation process, a single translator or a group of translators prepares one or several versions of forward translations of the document or the questionnaire from the source language (S) to the target language. These bilingual translators are native speakers of the target language. These translations in the target language are then translated back to the source language (S’) by another translator or group of bilingual translators who are native speakers of the source language. The final translated version (S’) and the original document (S) are then compared to detect errors and to evaluate the quality of the translation.

The quality and the accuracy of the back translation depend on the competency of the translator(s). A committee approach using a group of translators, instead of a single translator, is preferred to reduce translation errors in back translation. This is organized either by a parallel or a split translation. In a parallel translation several translators make independent translations of the same document/questionnaire. A final version is then decided after reviewing those translations in a meeting. For example, a project coordinator evaluates two questionnaires, back translated from Hindi to English, and finds some differences in some of the questions. In one of the questions, the first translator used the meaning of the word Aankho as “eyes,” whereas the second translator used “vision” instead. The project coordinator contacted both translators to resolve the discrepancies before running a pilot test of the final questionnaire. This approach is time consuming and costly, yet more accurate.

The split approach, on the other hand, saves time and requires less effort. In this case, the document/ questionnaire is divided among two or more translators in an alternate fashion. Each translator then meets with a reviewer to agree on a joint version. To ensure consistency, the committee, including the translators, reviewers, and an adjudicator, reviews the whole document/questionnaire and decides on the final translation.

The bilingual translators are susceptible to developing a particular language structure and usage, and therefore may translate commonly used idioms incorrectly. There is also the possibility of using words that are difficult for respondents to understand. Often the intended meaning may not be captured properly by using standard rules for translating the nonequivalent terms, for example, amigo as friend. However, with a thorough knowledge in both languages, the bilingual translators are capable of making sense of a poor translation and thus provide a back translation with acceptable quality.

There is always a possibility of dominance of the source language since back translation starts with the assumptions of the structures and the terms of the source language. A “decentering” approach is used to reduce the dominance of the source language by modifying both source and target document or questionnaire through successive iterations and translations, until both terminologies are equally well understood and equivalent in each language context. This process results in the best translations; however, it is time consuming and tedious. Many international projects have difficulty in decentering due to the lack of resources.

This process becomes almost impossible in the case of translations involving three or more languages.

Verbal translation, including back translation, is an art rather than a science. A word in one language literally may have no equivalent in another language, or could have a completely different “meaning” or effect in the translated language. A skilled translator is capable of conveying the true meaning, instead of verbatim interpretation. An idiomatic phrase can be forward translated and back translated using standard rules without conveying proper meaning. For example, the phrase Das Leben in vollen Zügen geniessen in German may be forward translated as “enjoy life in full train” in English and literally back translated. However, the translation methods have failed to convey the proper meaning “live life to the fullest.” Another example of how the meaning of a phrase can be changed during the verbal translation process is as follows: In preparation of a questionnaire for Brazil, a part of the questionnaire was forward translated from French un repas d’affaires (a business meal) to Portuguese as jantar de negocios. When back translated, it became a “diner d’affaires” (business dinner).

Back translation is likely to fail to identify formal textual problems, such as those affecting target language syntax, morphology, spelling, orthography, punctuation, parallelism, or consistency. It is also a time-consuming and expensive method. However, if used properly, back translation is an efficient and valuable tool to confirm the integrity of any project involving two or more languages by revealing the accuracy of the translation.

Bibliography:

Richard W. Brislin, “Back-Translation for Cross-Cultural Research,” Journal of Cross-Cultural Psychology (v.1/3, 1970);
Donald T. Campbell and Oswald Werner, “Translating, Working through Interpreters and the Problem of Decentering,” A Handbook of Methods in Cultural Anthropology (Natural History Press, 1970);
Samuel Craig and Susan P. Douglas, International Marketing Research (John Wiley & Sons, 2005);
Samuel Craig and Susan P. Douglas, “Collaborative and Iterative Translation: An Alternative Approach to Back Translation,” Journal of International Marketing (v.15/1, March 2007);
Ronald K. Hambleton, “Translating Achievement Tests for Use on Cross-national Studies,” European Journal of Psychological Assessment (v.9, 1993);
Harkness, “Questionnaire Translation,” in J. Harkness, F. J. R. Van de Vijver and P. Mohler, Cross-cultural Survey Methods (John Wiley & Sons, 2003);
Charles S. Mayer, “Multinational Marketing Research: The Magnifying Glass of Methodological Problems,” European Research (1978).

This example Back Translation Essay is published for educational and informational purposes only. If you need a custom essay or research paper on this topic please use our writing services. EssayEmpire.com offers reliable custom essay writing services that can help you to receive high grades and impress your professors with the quality of each essay or research paper you hand in.