Blogs

You may have heard us talk about the exceptional quality of our translation work. What does "quality" mean when talking about translation? Don't other companies provide quality as well? What sets Avantpage apart? Over the years, we've built a stellar industry reputation on maintaining excellence of quality in every translation we provide. Quality of translation means much more than translating words or sentences correctly. High quality translation is intuitive, it is accurate, it seamlessly adjusts for reading levels, and it addresses individual client and language requirements. Avantpage translation is always accurate, culturally sensitive and audience-appropriate. The reading level of the audience being translated for plays a critical part in the quality of the translation. Avantpage translators are extremely sensitive to this, and even when translating difficult medical terminology, complex financial data or legal documentation, they maintain strict adherence to the reading level of their audience. Avantpage translators accommodate reading levels from elementary school  through high school/college, and are well-versed in choosing the proper wording, sentence structure and terminology that will best serve their readers' needs. Avantpage creates meticulous style guides and glossaries for clients to further enhance the accuracy, consistency and high quality of the translations. Style guides let translators know the linguistic and stylistic preferences of the audience they are translating for, and glossaries provide important terms and their preferred translations for each client. At Avantpage, our commitment to quality encompasses consistency, accuracy, linguistic excellence, the knowledge and expertise of our translation teams, and the processes and procedures we follow to ensure exceptional service. Providing quality to our clients is our number one priority, day in and day out!

Localization is the process through which businesses customize their products, services and Internet presence to reflect differences in distinct markets - for example, when branching out to reach non-English-speaking or international markets. Localization involves much more than just translation. Graphic design, use of color, currency, symbols, writing style and cultural references are just a few examples of elements that come into play when preparing to localize. Why localize? In today's marketplace, the better question would be "why not?" As global markets grows ever more accessible, and more non-English speakers gain buying power and online acumen, localization represents the future of successful businesses. Localizing your online business presence allows you to tap into previously inaccessible markets, shows that you are culturally and ethically sensitive to customer needs, and gives you a leg up on your competitors. Localization also polishes your corporate image, and increases your visibility as a trusted provider of products and services. Avantpage specializes in helping businesses develop and execute a localization strategy that reflects their specific needs, markets and products. For more information on how Avantpage can help you localize your website, download our new localization guide, AvantWeb: Essentials of Web Localization. Inside, you'll discover answers to all your questions about the localization process: how it works, what's involved, what you need to provide, and how the workflow will proceed. To find out more about  localization and how Avantpage can help, call 877-ANY-LANG or email today!

There are approximately 47 million people in the United States who speak a language other than English. Effective communication is critical to safe, quality health care, yet many health care organizations fall short when it comes to caring for Limited English Proficient (LEP) patients. According to a study conducted by the International Journal for Quality in Health Care, language barriers in hospitals were shown to increase risks to patient safety. Data was collected on adverse events affecting both LEP and English-speaking patients. The study showed that when adverse events were tracked in both groups, 49.1% of those experienced by LEP patients involved physical harm, while only 29.5% of adverse events experienced by English-speaking patients did. Of the patients who experienced physical harm, 46.8 % of LEP patients were rated at levels of "moderate temporary harm to death" while only 24.4% of the English speakers had the same harm ratings. 52.4% of the LEP patients' adverse events were related to communication errors, while 35.9% of the English speakers were communication-related. To rectify this situation, the Joint Commission has created new communication and language standards for health care organizations that will go into effect in January 2011. Hospitals seeking accreditation will need to comply with these new standards, which include providing proficient in-person or phone interpreters; ensuring that written documentation (forms, instructions, signage, etc.) is properly translated into appropriate languages; and that caregivers and health professionals are trained in culturally sensitive communication among different ethnic groups. To find out more about  the Joint Commission and the standards, call 877-ANY-LANG or email today!

Last month, I read a fascinating article in The New York Times* about the discovery of a new language, spoken by a remote group of about 1,000 people in India. There are approximately 7,000 recorded languages in the world, yet many are rapidly disappearing. On an expedition to record and preserve endangered languages, a team of linguists traveled to a remote area of Northeastern India, in the foothills of the Himalayan Mountains. They were interested in the Aka language, spoken by approximately 6 to 10 thousand tribal villagers. These people live near the borders of China, Tibet and Burma, and subsist on hunting and farming, raising pigs and growing rice and barley. Small villages consist of bamboo houses set on stilts. In the tiny mountain village of Kichang, the linguists heard villagers speaking a language that did not sound like Aka. The new language was Koro, with words, syntax and sounds that were entirely different from Aka. Although the Koro speakers live in close proximity to the Aka speakers, they had a completely different language, which had never before been recorded or identified. Researchers are not entirely sure how Koro has survived as a language, as its speakers presently number only about 800 to 1,000. Why is it important to preserve languages that are in danger of becoming "extinct"? Why should we attempt to document and recognize them, when they are spoken by so few people? Language represents a people's history, its culture, its place in the world, and sometimes, its future. It is critical that these languages are preserved, recorded, and studied, for understanding a culture's language is how we eventually understand the people as well ... how they think, how they behave, how their society is structured, how they use and process information. By documenting and attempting to understand threatened languages, we can explore a small glimpse of living history. * "Hunting One Language, Stumbling Upon Another" John Noble Wilford, The New York Times, October 11, 2010

There are over 1 billion people in the world who speak some form of Chinese. The most popular Chinese spoken languages are Mandarin (the official language of the People's Republic of China and the Republic of China), Cantonese, Wu, and Min. No matter what spoken language or dialect is used, the Chinese have only two systems to represent their language in written form. Traditional Chinese and Simplified Chinese are the two writing systems used by those who read, write and speak Chinese. Because of cultural, historical and political reasons, written text in China evolved into two different and separate writing methods. While both writing systems share the same grammatical structure and are essentially the same language, they are not interchangeable. Traditional Chinese has been in use since the 5th century, A.D. It uses about 13,000 characters, and some of them are highly complex. Because Traditional Chinese was so difficult to learn, many, many Chinese remained illiterate. The Simplified Chinese writing system, which uses about 8,000 simplified characters, was introduced by the Chinese government as an official writing language in 1949 in order to combat the problem of illiteracy in China. Simplified Chinese text has fewer strokes per character and fewer characters in use. It is easier to write and understand. Simplified Chinese is used in mainland China and Singapore, and Traditional Chinese is used primarily in Hong Kong, Taiwan, and among the Chinese speaking population of Malaysia. Chinese speakers in the United States generally use Traditional Chinese as well. Although Traditional Chinese is more complicated, it allows for more precise pronunciation, and more distinctiveness and legibility between characters. When translating documents into Chinese, translators must be aware of which system their audience uses, and sometimes must translate the document into both. Here are some examples of Traditional Chinese characters in black, and their simplified counterparts in red*: *Omniglot.com, The Guide to Languages, Alphabets and Other Writing Systems

As educators know, bare-bones budgets and reduced funding mean that California's schools have to do more with less, cut corners where they can, and make every last dollar count. As districts across California ready their systems and personnel  to produce this school year's SARCs (School Accountability Report Cards), they must also consider the type of translation solutions they will need to accommodate the State's guidelines on disseminating  information.  When 15% or more of the pupils enrolled in a school speak a primary language other than English, it is required that schools provide the SARC in that primary language. When you partner with Avantpage, you are working with the best in the translation business. The quality of our translations is second to none, and our cost-effective menu of translation services offers affordable choices well within school budget constraints.  We can translate into Spanish, Hmong, Tagalog, Vietnamese, Chinese, Korean, and over 150 other languages - swiftly, accurately and affordably.  We understand the education market, and have a proven track record working  with California education clients. In today's uncertain economic climate, it pays to do business with companies you can trust to do what they say they will, for the price they've quoted, in the time you've agreed upon.  Avantpage has built a stellar reputation on mutual trust, high quality deliverables and exceptional customer service. Contact us today to find out how we can work together to  produce the translation materials required to complete your SARC on time and within your budget.

In the wake of the recent federal health care regulations that went into effect on September 23rd, 2010, it's now more critical than ever to make sure that client health care information is distributed clearly and in a timely fashion. As more people become eligible for health care under the new laws, health care organizations and insurance providers will find that they are faced with greater challenges regarding language access. And as these reforms become part of our legal fabric, new and updated information must be prepared and distributed to everyone--proficient  English speakers, non-English speakers and  limited English speakers alike. How Can Avantpage help? Avantpage has highly qualified translation teams in place consisting of certified linguists who are trained specialists in threshold languages including Arabic, Armenian, Cambodian (Khmer), Chinese, Farsi, Hmong, Korean, Russian, Spanish, Tagalog and Vietnamese. We offer the most competitive pricing in the translation industry, and our AvantFlow online translation management system, experienced project managers, translation memory tools, and experienced linguistic teams ensure that our translation services consistently exceed industry standards and requirements. To meet increased workloads due to the health care regulations, Avantpage has recently ramped up our translation capacities, improved processing volume and timelines, and enhanced our quality control and service abilities. Whatever our clients' needs, we will deliver--swiftly, accurately and within budgetary constraints. Questions, confusion and misunderstandings are bound to be common offshoots of these sweeping regulatory changes. It's critical that you have procedures in place - including accurate, high-quality translation services -to help alleviate frustration and ensure that your clients understand the wording of these changes, how they will be affected, and the timing of all the different reforms. Written materials, websites and electronic correspondence must all be kept current, reflecting new information as it is made available by the government. We're Committed to Keeping You Informed Avantpage is scheduled to attend a number of important conferences that will address these latest issues. Please stop by and visit us at any of these conferences if you're available. We'd love to meet with you, and outline what we're doing to keep our clients informed of these critical developments in the health care field. We plan to report back with our impressions, observations and perspectives after these shows, so we will be in contact with you then.

Did you know that from September 15th through October 15th, America celebrates National Hispanic Heritage Month? This observation began in 1968 as a celebratory week under President Lyndon B. Johnson, and was expanded by President Ronald Reagan in 1988 to cover a 30-day period. This month-long celebration marks a way for Americans to honor the contributions, culture and history of U.S. citizens whose ancestors hail from Spain, Mexico, the Caribbean, and Central and South America. September 15th was chosen as the start of this celebration because this date is the anniversary of independence for five Latin American countries: Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras and Nicaragua. In addition, Mexico declared its independence on September 16, and Chile on September 17. Throughout the country, people of Hispanic descent will be celebrating this year's theme:  Heritage, Diversity, Integrity and Honor:  The Renewed Hope of America (Herencia, Diversidad, Integridad y Honor: La Renovada Esperanza de America). Classrooms, museums, art galleries, government programs, and the media will offer a chance to explore Hispanic history, culture, art, literature, humanitarian contributions and more. The term Hispanic, as defined by the U.S. Census Bureau, refers to Spanish-speaking people in the United States of any race. On the 2000 Census form, more than 35 million people identified themselves as Hispanic or Latino. Population growth  trends show that by 2050, Latino populations are expected nearly to triple. In California, the Hispanic population is expected to grow by 16.5 million people in the next 40 years. Read more about how Spanish translation can help you reach these prospective buyers in their own language, on their own terms, or call  877-ANY-LANG or email today!

Where do different languages come from? Who speaks them? How are they unique? How do they change and evolve over time, becoming the "modern" languages spoken and written today? These are just some of the ideas we'll explore in our new blog topic: Language Spotlight.  We've chosen Hmong as our first language, and if you have any suggestions for subsequent languages you'd like to see in the spotlight, please let us know! The Hmong ("mung") are an Asian tribal culture who have lived primarily in the countries of Laos, China, Vietnam and Thailand. After fighting for the United States in the Vietnam War, many Hmong were forced to flee their Southeast Asian homeland, and chose to settle in America to avoid oppression and persecution in Asia. There are approximately 200,000 Hmong living in the United States, and their numbers are concentrated in Minnesota, Michigan, Wisconsin and California. The total number of Hmong speakers worldwide is estimated to be about four million, including those in America. Did you know that for generations the Hmong had no written language? There were no written texts, no alphabet, and knowledge and culture were passed from generation to generation through spoken language only, often in the form of folktales and song. In the 1950s, Western missionaries worked with Hmong advisors to develop a way to write Hmong words using the letters from the French, English and German languages. This was called the Romanized Popular Alphabet, or RMA. The idea behind this was to be able to create a written Hmong language that used common Western letters, without having to rely on a lot of elaborate characters. Today, the RMA is the most widely used writing system for Hmong. The two major dialects spoken by Hmong Americans are known as White and Green. While mutually understandable, these two dialects differ somewhat in both lexicon and phonology. The Hmong language is monosyllabic, tonal, with a variety of dialects. Hmong shares some characteristics with several other Asian languages, including Chinese and Vietnamese. For information about Hmong translation, click here.

Did you know that there is a vast pool of prospective buyers out there who you may be overlooking? According to research presented by The Hispanic Center,* the number of foreign-born United States citizens has increased significantly between the years 2000 and 2007. During this time, the number of foreign-born U.S. residents increased by 22.2%. In actual numbers, this translates to an increase of 6.9 million foreign-born individuals now residing in the United States. In total, there are over 38 million foreign-born residents, and 80 percent of these people were born in Latin America or Asia.** What does this type of demographic change mean for your business, your marketing strategies, and your ability to tap into lucrative new markets? The truth is, these folks have the purchasing power and the need for what you're selling. They're interested in your products and they're eager to buy ... but have you done everything you can to reach out and connect with them? Translating your product information, your advertising message and your marketing strategies into language these prospective buyers can understand and respond to gives you a clear-cut advantage over your competition. Although many of these individuals are proficient in English, reaching out to them in their native tongue shows that you are sensitive to their needs and respect their cultural differences. When you make the effort to translate information about your products and your business, you are taking the first step towards building powerful, long-term relationships with new foreign-born prospects. To find out more about how translation can help you reach these prospective buyers in their own languages, on their own terms, call 877-ANY-LANG or email today! We'll be happy to outline our translation services, offer suggestions for creating and maintaining a multicultural marketing presence, and help you take your marketing efforts to the next level. * Pew Hispanic Center tabulations of 2000 Census (5% IPUMS) and 2007 American Community Survey (1% IPUMS)

At Avantpage, we use glossaries and translation memory to save time in the long run, saving our clients money, as well as provide consistency within a translated document and among all your translated documents. Custom glossaries are built for each client, so that their preferences are recorded for future use. For example, if a client prefers the word "team member" instead of "employee," that's the word that will always be used. Using glossaries, any of our translators will be able to pick up material related to the same client, and have fewer questions about the way certain terms are to be translated. Working along the same lines, translation memory (TM) software helps us build on the previous work of our translators to save time in the future. Once a document has been completed and reviewed for quality assurance, it is converted to a TM file. When it's time to complete a new translation for the same client, we can analyze the new document against previously translated documents. The application helps decipher which words and phrases have been repeated and indicates how they were previously translated. Even though these technologies do not rely on computers to make the translation, they do make the translation process much more efficient by building on existing work. In the end, it's always an educated human translator that makes the final decision, as we strongly believe it should be.

Our friend, Carolyn Wang Kong, MPH, MPP, Practice Leader, Language Access, Northern California Diversity, Kaiser Permanente, will be participating in a noon-time panel presentation on September 24th at the Commonwealth Club of California. The topic of discussion is Cross-Cultural Health Care: Caring in All Languages. The event will address how doctors and patients can overcome the language barriers to enable and enhance access to health care. Come hear how technology is helping doctors and patients communicate through cyberspace. Kaiser Permanente Northern California has done excellent work in this area, and we're sure Carolyn Wang Kong and the rest of the panel will present an interesting and engaging hour. The event is underwritten by the California Wellness Foundation. For tickets, go to www.commonwealthclub.orgor call (415) 597-6705      . Location:  The Commonwealth Club, San Francisco Club Office 595 Market Street, 2nd floor SF, CA 94105 Time:  11:30 a.m. check-in; Noon program Cost:  MEMBERS FREE, $20 non-members, $7 students (with valid ID)