The Foreign Media in Japan (Chester Dawson)

July 1999 JAT Meeting

Chester Dawson is Tokyo Bureau Chief of the Far Eastern Economic Review, a Hong Kong-based weekly magazine published by Dow Jones & Co. He has worked as a journalist for six years, most recently with The Associated Press and before that at Bloomberg News. A graduate of Harvard University's Regional Studies in East Asia M.A. degree program, he earned a his B.A. degree at Ohio University and spent his junior undergraduate year abroad at Sophia University in Tokyo.

Mr. Dawson spoke about the challenges faced by foreign correspondents in Japan -- from the decades-old `kisha kurabu' system here to the recent marginalization of international news coverage in the American media. Attendees were also treated to a discussion of which Japanese publications are considered a must-read for savvy 外国特派員.

This meeting was particularly informative and instructive to JATers who are involved in finance, economics and general politics.

JAT Members (left to right) Unidentified Member, Kathleen Taji (JAT Director), and Ron Jones

The World of Sumo (Doreen Simmons)

June 1999 JAT Meeting

JAT Members at a recent meeting

(The meeting report from Doreen Simmons' talk
is available to JAT members in
the July/August 1999 Bulletin.)

Doreen has been watching sumo and making notes on it for 25 years. In her main job, at the Foreign Press Center, she has helped set up press tours and advised foreign journalists (of 29 countries, at the last count) on how to get sumo stories. The results have ranged from the vibrantly successful to the catastrophic. She has been writing a bimonthly sumo column for Kansai Time Out (a Kobe-based magazine) since 1983 and has been a regular contributor to Sumo World since 1987. Doreen is probably best known for her live sumo commentaries in English on NHK's worldwide satellite service, which began in 1992.

On the perilous world of Sumo, Doreen has the following comments: However good a translator or interpreter you may be, a specialized field outside your experience is a minefield.

Many people have come to grief when they ventured into the world of sumo. Sumo is deceptively simple; all you need to do, you believe, is a bit of homework: buy a paperback in English, learn the terms, check with Kenkyusha, and you're off! As she further related, the results of these feeble attempts at understanding an ancient sport are frequently a disaster.

Doreen described tales of people writing books on sumo with little or no direct experience of it, and certainly with no understanding of how much there is to know. Amidst these war stories Doreen gave us the benefit of her experiences over a quarter of a century, and the respect for the profession as well as the humility that is necessary to write about it, for as she says, even after 25 years she is still not sure that she's ready to publish a book on sumo.

Her talk was unashamedly anecdotal but provided plenty of food for thought about crossed wires and failure to match mental images.

Literary Translation (Professor Yano)

April 1999 JAT Meeting

On Saturday April 17, 1999, JAT welcomed Professor Kozaburo Yano, who discussed literary translation. Professor Yano is from Meisei University and has translated numerous novels in the popular genre, including several by Steven King. His summary:

日本翻訳者協会の四月定例会（４月１７日１４：３０〜１６：３０） 話題： 「翻訳者は裏切り者」　（traduttore e traditore) 話者：矢野浩三郎。literary translation （手作り翻訳）一筋に３０年以上。 出版した翻訳（和訳オンリー）本は、フィクション、ノンフィクション、児童 書、アンソロジーなど、総計６０冊に近い。その間、出版社（早川書房）の編集 者、著作権エージェント（チャールズ・Ｅ・タトル商会、海外評論社）を経て、 矢野著作権事務所を設立（同社は後に発展解消して、現在の日本ユニ・エージェ ンシーとなった）。現在、明星大学日本文化学部言語文化学科教授。 ［話題の内容］　アメリカのエンタテインメント作家、とくに話者が翻訳を手掛 けてきたスティーヴン・キングの作品（"Ｍｉｓｅｒｙ"、"Ｄｏｌｏｒｅｓ 　Ｃｌａｉｂｏｒｎｅ"、"Ｔａｌｉｓｍａｎ"　ｅｔｃ。）を中心に、その日 本語への翻訳の困難→不可能→裏切りへのプロセスを、実例を明示してお目にか けます。"ｌｉｔｅｒａｒｙ　ｅｑｕｉｖａｌｅｎｔ　ｏｆ　ａ　Ｂｉｇ　 Ｍａｃ　ａｎｄ　ａ　ｌａｒｇｅ　ｆｒｉｅｓ　ｆｒｏｍ　ＭｃＤｏｎａｌｄ'ｓ"（キングみずからの言葉）である文体がどうやって日本語になるのか（するわけが ない！）のカラクリをみずから暴露する、講演ならぬ、懺悔を致します。

The meeting report from Professor Yano's talk is available to JAT members in the May 1999 Bulletin (Part 1) and June 1999 Bulletin (Part 2).

JAT Member Hiro Sato and JAT Director Emily Shibata-Sato
(no relation)

Trust and Interaction with Clients (Duncan MacIntyre)

March 1999 JAT Meeting

Duncan MacIntyre

For our March 20, 1999 JAT meeting, JAT welcomed  Duncan MacIntyre    who talked about issues of trust and interaction between business  parties.

Duncan is the president  of his own company, like many of us, and has a considerable amount of experience in dealing with outside translators. His talk focused  on his own experiences with successful and unsuccessful enterprises,  and his coming to understand the value of intangible human qualities  in managing a business. Richard Thieme, JAT Programs Director, believes that this is an often overlooked issue for translators.

Many translators get into the business because of their fondness for reading and curiosity in general and  tend to forget the fact that there are real people on the other  end of the phone line or receiving e-mail.

Duncan's own synopsis:  The afternoon began with a tale of two companies: one that  is failing; one that is succeeding. Duncan's talk addressed the issue of trust and its economic value, and the feasibility of bridging the gap  between creator and client with a transparent business structure. 

He spoke of the business model he and his friends are experimenting with, and how it has possibilities for opening new opportunities for translators.  The creators know all the prices. The producers charge what the  market will bear and justify their take to the creators, just as the creators justify theirs to the producers. All are partners in the creative process, which often begins with translators. As partners,  the translators seek to earn higher prices for their work, principally  by taking the initiative to study more of the background of the client and project, reaching beyond the isolated workstation via media both  analog and digital.

Duncan discussed how best to achieve outreach, and led attendees in a discussion of how to put the  whining and the complaining aside and enrich one's working life.  Duncan sees possibilities for powerful new approaches to client-creator  communications and defining attitudes that can help divert the energy  of competition into collaboration. 

Appreciating and respecting the artisan ethos of the Japan Association  of Translators, he offered his talk as a proposal on the philosophy of business and its practice, one that he has thought of giving to this audience for some years. Involved in PR, his talk focused on PR work, but it most definitely was not intended as self-PR.

About Duncan Macintyre:  President and owner of Struggling Artists International, Inc.  since 1991, Duncan Macintyre is also a shareholder in a Canadian  microbrewery and in a new Japanese company called Digital Jungle,  Inc. He is incompetent as a translator,but works from Japanese  sources as a  writer, narrator, director and producer of commercial and documentary material. He has been a member of the Tokyo Bilingual Toastmasters Club for some 5 years, and has won numerous speech contests. He holds philosophy degrees from the University of British Columbia and the University of Paris I, Pantheon-Sorbonne.

The meeting report from Duncan Macintyre's is available to JAT members in the July/August 1999 Bulletin.

Technical Terms in Financial Translation
(Scott Urista)

February 1999 JAT Meeting

On Saturday February 20, 1999, JAT welcomed Scott Urista, formerly of Paribas Capital Markets' Japanese equities research department and a financial translator with considerable business in international banking.

After attending the Faculty of Economics of Osaka University, Scott worked as an assistant economist with The Japan Research Institute, a Sumitomo Group think-tank, where he was responsible for covering economic issues in China and Hong Kong up to and following the Handover. He subsequently served as a translator in Nikko Securities' fixed income (Asia) department prior to taking up his present position.

Scott's presentation spanned the nuts and bolts of technical terms that can prove troubling to a translator, as well as issues involved with the various types of documents that he produces as part of his job (annual reports, broker's reports (particularly equity research), bond and forex market reports, quantitative analysis, etc.)

Scott Urista