CommittedLurker

Said FTer agreed to translate on a post by post basis, as requested. Not every single one, including future ones.

A few posters, including yourself, tried to take advantage of this,

Dovster

Request:

This request is aimed only at those who are demanding that all posts be in English.

Please use English correctly when posting in this thread. This is especially true of capitalization and, most especially, of not writing "english".

PhlyingRPh

If it were the official language of FT, it would reflect poorly on the FT community to enforce such a rule with any degree of vigor. Most american-based FTers know very well that the debate surrounding English in american society at large is actually a proxy argument for something that is far, far nastier. If FT is indeed an inclusive, welcoming, diverse, multi-cultural community, then strictly requiring the use of English would be anathema.

rathin100

^^

GUWonder

Your claim about me is false as I tried no such thing as you suggest. Unlike others here, I personally have nothing to gain by asking said FTer to translate anything in that thread for me. I still have neither need nor desire to request such on my own behalf -- no less so when any such hypothetical request coming from me on my own behalf would be but a waste of time as I would have nothing to gain from what are unneeded translations given my own resources.

GUWonder

Could the difference between that proxy argument and the concerns raised here be that expressions of the former are rooted in a desire to exclude other groups while the latter is rooted in trying to foster inclusiveness and accessibility for other groups as well?

GUWonder

Rather than being a nitpick, there is a substantive difference: "Online translations of German into English is a much easier and more reliable process than doing so for transcriptions of Hindi and 'Hinglish' in the Roman alphabet. There is no standardized dictionary that is officially accepted for attempted Roman alphabet transcriptions of Hindi." The German posted in the LH threads is quite ordinarily and reliably translated by online means. Roman alphabet transliterations of Hindi are not as easily and reliably translated online into English.

The EK thread would be more accessible to more people if it just used English, Devanagari script Hindi and/or the Arabic alphabet (with whatever adjustments necessary) for Arabic, Farsi, Dari, Urdu or what not. Roman alphabet transliterations of languages that don't use the Roman alphabet in standardized dictionaries make things more difficult and less reliable in terms of accessibility to more people.

PhlyingRPh

I think it is a question of context. One experimental thread in one forum dedicated to a language that can be understood by a very large component of the world's population with representation on every continent and practically every nation, is hardly a challenge to inclusiveness.

Conversely, a concerted effort to enforce a single language on a forum, when that language is not understood by many would indeed be a challenge to inclusiveness and accessibility.

rathin100

Fair point..agreed, not a nitpick, my apologies.

Ill think about this and see what can be done.

rathin100

+1 :-:

lin821

I don't know much about other languages but I can attest the above statement is true for Traditional Chinese (characters). I often have to scratch my head, trying to figure out what Chinese characters/words folks are referring to when Roman and/or pinyin transliteration is used.

rathin100

Not true of Hinglish/Urdlish/Banglish Tamlish etc. These are idioms widely used on the street, on TV in ads and in informal conversation in South Asia. ..the roman text is easy enough to get... in fact some words would be unknown outside classical/governmental circles the English word having long replaced the original. "Sandarbh"" is an example... it means context.. but no one uses it. ""Context"" has become the word...in Hindi, Bengali..etc. And so, despite the best efforts of purists, emerges a living hybrid!

Remember English is widely spoken in south Asia, is the language of communication in central government in India Pakistan and Sri Lanka, is a constitutionally recognised official language in India. Hence it elides well with Indian languages The written hybrids reflect this as much as the oral. You do need to understand the South Asian language to understand the idiom, though.

Also most South Asian languages (Tamil being a notable exception) are lineal descendants of the Indo-European group of languages, through Sanskrit -- which is not the case with Chinese etc.

CommittedLurker

Then what was your intent of post # 33 ? English to English translation ?

lin821

(underline mine)

Context, that's a great point!

I think Mandarin/Chinese fits the bill of "a language that can be understood by a very large component of the world's population with representation on every continent and practically every nation." Would you care to elaborate in the FT context, how a thread say in Chinese in Other Asian, Australian and South Pacific Frequent Flyer Programs Forum has to do with inclusiveness on FT?

GUWonder

To explain the request made in an earlier post.