Re: My first translation in Moten! Champagne for all!

On Thu, 3 Jun 1999, Kristian Jensen wrote:

> What would? I have often speculated on that. The bible is the most
> widely translated book in the world, so on that basis it seems to be
> the natural choice for conlang samples. Unfortunately, as you said,
> there are things in the bible that would be difficult (if not
> impossible) to interpret for another culture.
>
Well, I haven't little constructive to offer, I'm afraid. Even the
Linguistic Survey of India carried out in the late 19th century defaulted
to a bit of the Bible, namely the parable of the prodigal son. That
gives very curious results, especially since the native speakers had
to translate from the English or Hindi or whatever other language they
knew into their own language. That Lepsius in his _Standard Alphabet for
Reducing Unwritten Languages and Foreign Graphic Systems to a Uniform
Orthography in European Letter: Recommended for Adaption by the Church
Missionary Society_ used bits of Bible texts for illustrative purposes
is excusable by the nature of his employers, but even he didn't try
to give a bible text with the Egyptian and Persian Cuneiform scripts.

> Perhaps there's some UN mandate we could use instead. But that
> sounds boring to translate. So I guess culturally neutral means
> boring. Again I ask, what can we use instead?
Well, why should everyone present the same text? Why should people
not submit a text that shows the particular qualities of their
language to advantage? Together with some explanatory notes,
that would form a very fine encyclopedia of Conlangs, besides
possibly giving a taste of the variety of concultures. I think
it would make a more interesting read ;-).

Boudewijn Rempt  | http://www.xs4all.nl/~bsarempt