ak2 translation - General translation

Tokyo prof strives to rescue an Aboriginal language from oblivion

Wed, 20 Jan 2010 10:07:55 -0500

"Every language is a cultural asset of humanity," is how Tasaku Tsunoda expressed his motivation for costarting a project in 2002 to teach the extinct Warrongo language to the Aboriginal people of the Warrongo tribe of northeastern Australia.

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Smart spectacles aid translation

Thu, 05 Nov 2009 07:54:50 -0500

Resembling glasses but lacking lenses, the headset uses a tiny projector to display images on a user's retina.

NEC said it planned a version that used real-time translation to provide subtitles for a conversation between people lacking a common language.

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NativeTung Poised to Transform Language Translation Industry With Announcement of Revolutionary Product

Tue, 22 Sep 2009 08:53:28 -0400

SAN DIEGO, Sept. 22 /PRNewswire/ --NativeTung today announced at the DEMOfall 09 conference, the premier event that showcases the latest cutting-edge technologies, a product that enables websites to quickly and easily establish multi-language content channels that maximize global audience reach and engagement online. NativeTung is pioneering the emerging real-time automated translation (RTAT) segment of the language translation industry. NativeTung's Global Management (GM) solution allows websites such as blogs, corporate sites, and social networks to create, analyze, and grow their international business on the Internet.

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Bhutan: Dzongkha to get simpler?

Sat, 19 Sep 2009 06:15:34 -0400

19 September, 2009 - The 9th Dzongkha Development Commission (DDC) Conference, that ended yesterday, has made a series of recommendations to promote and simplify the national language so that people not only speak it but also find it easier to read and write it.

In total, the 75 experts and members attending the conference made 62 recommendations ranging for simplifying the language, making the curriculum uniform and interesting to future policies and plans.

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Finding New Meaning in One of the World’s Oldest Books

Sat, 29 Aug 2009 09:21:16 -0400

Since at least the fifth century, generations of Buddhists have memorized and chanted the Diamond Sutra, a short Mahayana Buddhist scripture. The work, which offers meditations on illusion and perception, was originally written in Sanskrit and first translated into Chinese in 402 A.D. Despite the text’s longevity, Stanford religious studies professor Paul Harrison’s latest research suggests that previous translations may have incorrectly interpreted certain words in a way that affects the entire meaning of the text.

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“Bowlingual”: Portable dog language translator

Fri, 17 Jul 2009 08:47:59 -0400

Japanese toymaker Takara Tomy claims it has developed a device that can translate what a dog “says” into human language and emoticons in real time. And the so-called “Bowlingual” [JP] isn’t being marketed as a (pure) gag product.

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Sanskrit - A global language to be proud of

Tue, 26 May 2009 07:47:48 -0400

There are many mottos in Sanskrit which have been readily adopted, like: Republic of India, Satyameva Jayate `Truth alone triumphs'; LIC of India, Yogakshemam VahÃ¢myaham `I shall take care of welfare'; Indian Navy, Shanno Varuna `May the ocean be peaceful to us'; Mumbai Police, Sadrakshanaaya Khlaha Nigrahanayah `For protection of the good and control of the wicked'; All India Radio, Bahujan Hitay Bahujan Sukhay `For the benefit of all, for the comfort of all'; Indonesian Navy, Jalesvava Jayamahe `On the sea, we are glorious'.

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Artificial Intelligence Cracks 4,000-Year-Old Mystery

Sun, 26 Apr 2009 06:38:38 -0400

An ancient script that's defied generations of archaeologists has yielded some of its secrets to artificially intelligent computers.

Computational analysis of symbols used 4,000 years ago by a long-lost Indus Valley civilization suggests they represent a spoken language. Some frustrated linguists thought the symbols were merely pretty pictures.

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Personal odyssey draws translator to ancient works

Sun, 19 Apr 2009 13:33:03 -0400

'Nothing is sacred': Stephen Mitchell's love of Taoist masters brings ideas of two Chinese scholars to light

"If I'm a scholar, I'm an amateur," says Stephen Mitchell, the soft-spoken translator of Rainer Maria Rilke and the book of Job as well as Gilgamesh , the Bhagavad Gita and his all-time favorite, the Tao Te Ching --- as he says, "that marvel of lucidity and grace, the classic manual on the art of living."

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Decoding an ancient language

Sun, 01 Mar 2009 09:51:08 -0500

ALMODOVAR (Portugal) - WHEN archaeologists on a dig in southern Portugal last year flipped over a heavy chunk of slate and saw writing not used for more than 2,500 years, they were elated.

The enigmatic pattern of inscribed symbols curled symmetrically around the upper part of the rough-edged, yellowish stone tablet and coiled into the middle in a decorative style typical of an extinct Iberian language called Southwest Script.

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Google Translate now understands 41 languages

Sun, 01 Mar 2009 09:48:05 -0500

Mountain View (CA) – Google’s translation engine that is used daily by millions has now been updated to support 41 languages, which comprise 1640 language pairs in Google's translation matrix. Google claims it can now translate text for 98% of the world's Internet users. What do you want to translate today?

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Best translated book

Fri, 20 Feb 2009 07:12:56 -0500

NEW YORK - A HUNGARIAN novel about a writer who lives with his mother and an eclectic, experimental collection of Japanese verse have been named winners of the Best Translated Book Awards for fiction and poetry.

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2,500 languages threatened with extinction: UNESCO

Thu, 19 Feb 2009 15:40:41 -0500

PARIS (AFP) — The world has lost Manx in the Isle of Man, Ubykh in Turkey and last year Alaska's last native speaker of Eyak, Marie Smith Jones, died, taking the aboriginal language with her.

Of the 6,900 languages spoken in the world, some 2,500 are endangered, the UN's cultural agency UNESCO said Thursday as it released its latest atlas of world languages.

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Writing the Web's future in numerous languages

Wed, 31 Dec 2008 08:52:18 -0500

The next chapter of the World Wide Web will not be written in English alone. Asia already has twice as many Internet users as North America, and by 2012 it will have three times as many. Already, more than half of the search queries on Google come from outside the United States.

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Being a 'native' speaker of English doesn't mean you can teach it!

Sat, 13 Dec 2008 09:47:48 -0500

Language schools that harbour condescending remarks and false presumptions based on outward appearance

My friend's mother was recently hired by an international school in Bangkok. As she was settling her payroll-related documents, the school presented her with a piece of paper, which stated different salary scales. If you're an expatriate educated in the US, you'll receive a 95,000 baht salary, plus housing allowance, tickets home and free schooling for your children if you choose to matriculate them there.

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