Organizing Your Time as a Freelance Translator – Part 1

Posted On January 10, 2013By TranspanishIn Tips for Translators/  1 Comment

Freelancing as a translator or in any other industry requires an expert level of time management. Many people mistakenly believe this means figuring out how to make themselves work as much as possible within a given day or week — which is really just figuring out how to fight procrastination, or how to make yourself into a workaholic, depending on how far you take it. The truth is, time management as a freelance professional means understanding what you need to get out of each day, and making sure you achieve it regularly, if not every day.

For some freelancers, their time is best divided on a per-project basis (“I want to finish this large translation by the end of the week”, or “I’d like to get these three small assignments done today.”) For others, organizing their time in hourly increments makes more sense. The latter group of freelancers might think of their work time in terms of hourly rates, while the former group may simply set productivity goals. However a freelancer chooses to mentally organize their time, getting it organized for the purpose of setting — and meeting — personal goals is the first step.

Another important aspect of managing your time effectively is to have an honest, one-to-one chat with yourself about how well you work with distractions. Especially with translation work, freelancing can require a significant focus at some times and, let’s be honest, less focus other times. Knowing which type of project you’re accepting, or getting ready to begin, is essential in planning your time. If you receive a highly technical job, for instance, you may want to make sure beforehand that your work time will be uninterrupted. On the other hand, if it’s a job that you can easily knock out on a tablet or smartphone while riding the subway, or at home while watching a toddler, then go for it. The trick is to be honest with yourself about how much quiet you need to work and how much focus a particular job requires, and then plan the day or week ahead of time.

One final thing to consider is the paradoxical role that technology plays in your life as a freelancer and as a person living in the 21st century. With the plethora of tools out there to help people get their work done faster and easier, technology can also seem like the modern, adult version of a kid knocking at door asking you to come out and play. The fact that freelance translators spend their working hours in front of a screen certainly doesn’t help. What seems to work for many freelancers is setting reasonable — not overly optimistic — goals. “I won’t check Facebook or headlines for the next hour,” for example, or limiting social media/break times to a predetermined number of minutes, and sticking to it. If you can’t go eight or nine hours without partaking in these distractions, then allow yourself to do it with strict limitations so that it doesn’t get out of hand.

Free image courtesy of FreeDigitalPhotos.net

Quick tips to organize your time

  • Schedule your day
  • Avoid distractions
  • If you work at home, let your family and friends know your working hours so that they don’t disturb you
  • Use a calendar
  • Track your time
  • Choose the best time of the day to work
  •  Take small breaks

Organizing Your Time as a Freelance Translator – Part 2

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Meaning of “la migra”

Posted On January 8, 2013By TranspanishIn Did you know?, Spanish Language, Spanish Translation, Tips for Translators, Translation Buyers/  2 Comments

Following the last post on US Border Patrols, we’re taking a look at a term widely used in immigration contexts – La Migra. The term is more often heard in states along the border with Mexico than any other region of the U.S., although it can be heard just about anywhere that Spanish slang is used.

Image source: http://www.zazzle.com

A derivative of the Spanish term migración (migration) or related to migraciones – the offices dealing with immigration issues in Spanish-speaking countries – the term has become shorthand for both agencies and individuals that deal with immigrants and immigration. Both the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and Border Patrol agencies can be referred to as La Migra, as well as the personnel who work for them, including immigration officers and agents who perform inspections of cars crossing the border or in search of illegal immigrants in places of business.

While the term is not only used by immigrants who are in the U.S. illegally, if you hear La Migra come up in conversation, chances are someone is complaining about an encounter with immigration officials – much the same way a person might complain about having to deal with the law.

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U.S. Border Patrol to Refuse Interpretation Assistance Requests from Other Law Enforcement Agents

Posted On January 4, 2013By TranspanishIn Latinos, Spanish Translation, Tips for Translators/  No Comments

Image courtesy of: U.S. Department of Homeland Security

Towards the end of November 2012, an impactful memo was released to little media attention by the Deputy Commissioner of U.S. Customs and Border Protection, David V. Aguilar. The memo simply stated that Border Patrol agents would no longer respond to requests for language assistance (e.g. Spanish interpretation) from law enforcement officers who are not within the Department of Homeland Security. U.S. Border Patrol agents are required to be bilingual and traditionally have met the interpreting needs of law enforcement agents from other departments.

While the exact cause of this memo remains elusive, it comes shortly after the Northwest Immigrant Rights Projects filed a civil rights complaint arguing that the use of Border Patrol agents as interpreters unfairly limited access to government services for people being questioned who had limited English abilities. Immediately after the policy change was announced, the American Immigration Council hailed the decision, adding that these interpretation services “unconstitutionally targeted individuals for deportation based on the fact that they looked or sounded foreign and eroded trust between immigrant communities and law enforcement agencies.”

The memo further added that law enforcement personnel outside of the Department of Homeland Security would instead be given “a list of available local and national translation services.” As a result, Spanish interpreters working in the private sector would fill agents’ needs moving forward. However, critics of the policy change argue that interdepartmental collaboration would be severely hindered, including evidence-gathering and even officer safety. They add that while it may not affect agents working close to the border with Mexico – where most personnel are already bilingual – it could have serious repercussions for those working farther away from the border.

The change comes at a time when the number of Border Patrol agents is increasing rapidly, along with the federal budget which funds their operations.

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Linguistic Diversity in the U.S.

Posted On January 3, 2013By TranspanishIn Languages, Tips for Translators, Translation Buyers/  No Comments

Diversity in North America has essentially been on the upward trend since the continent was first colonized. It’s natural, then, that the region’s linguistic diversity would be increasing as well. But while linguistic diversity in the U.S. in particular has undeniably been rising in recent decades, according to a report by the Census Bureau, these bilingual and multilingual gains have come unevenly.

For one thing, linguistic diversity appears to be intricately tied to geography. For example, Asian languages such as Chinese and Korean are more widely spoken in California and Hawaii, along the Pacific coast. The concentration of French speakers is mostly in Louisiana and Maine, while German speakers are primarily found in North and South Dakota. Meanwhile, Spanish is spoken far more heavily along the Mexico border and in Florida, as is to be expected.

Language Diversity

Free image courtesy of FreeDigitalPhotos.net

What may be less expected is the rate of growth of speakers of another language in the US. Sure, with current rates of immigration, it makes sense that the number of foreign language speakers in the US would increase quickly. After all, the country was built by immigrants. Yet what a report from the Census Bureau analyzing linguistic diversity in the U.S. between 1980 and 2007 revealed was that the number of foreign language speakers is increasing faster than population growth itself. And that’s just talking about people who speak another language at home – not the number of people learning a foreign language.

How is it possible that the number of native speakers of a language other than English can grow faster than overall population growth (an astounding four times faster, to be exact)? The answer is that more immigrants are retaining their linguistic heritage and teaching their children from an early age. While there were 381 distinct languages recorded in the report, the languages were categorized geographically by source, including Spanish, other Indo-European languages, Asian or Pacific Island languages, and all other languages. With its own category in the report, Spanish constituted 62 percent of the population of native speakers of another language.

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