James Joshua Pennington ( PhD Linguistics).

We have dedicated the month of January to the Russian language. Therefore, we have decided to feature an interview with one of our Russian into English linguists. Valentina has interviewed James to learn more about his day to day work.

Q) How did you get started in translation?

A) I began translating while working for the Moscow Circus on their tour in Ohio in 2002. When I finished my BA in Russian, I worked on the side as a Russian, Spanish, French > English translator while I attended graduate school at The Ohio State University and wrote my dissertation. Since the completion of my PhD I have worked at various universities and continue to work full-time currently as a translator/editor/transcriber.

Q) Where do you work from and if you work from home, do you miss the office/colleagues?

A) I work from home. I do miss being around colleagues; however, the peace and quiet is much more valuable for what I do, which often involves intense concentration. I can create my own ambiance at home that can’t be interfered with by anyone (except my wife, of course)

Q) Which tools do you use and do you find them useful?

A) I use Trados mostly, and from time to time get assignments that require MemoQ or MemSource. The ability in Trados to pretranslate and perpetually improve the translation memory (along with TermBases) is the biggest advantage to using this software.

Q) What is the biggest challenge when translating Russian into English?

A) The biggest challenge translating from Russian-English is colloquial expressions. Oftentimes, there can be some rather untranslatable expressions like “Ni puxa, ni pera!”, which literally means “No dust, no feather!”, but actually means “Good luck!” The high-level of metaphoricity ensures the necessity of a human translator, as the greatest problem with MT is solving metaphor.

Q) Which translation job are you most proud of and why?

A) I recently translated a 400-page book from Serbian to English, and it is up for the Ninova nagrada “Nina’s Award”, best Serbian book of 2019. My fingers are crossed!

And that’s all for now. Would you like to feature in next month “A cup of tea with”. If so, get in touch with us!