In my work as a translator, I’ve done a fair amount of revising of other people’s work. There are certain French terms that come up time and time again, and they get mishandled by some translators time and time again. Here is my list of those tricky French terms that French-English translators need to look out for, as well as my suggestions on how to handle them.
- Les bonnes pratiques: This is a classic. I keep seeing this term translated as “good practices”. NO. No, no, no. I’m quite categorical about this one (as you can tell): the term in English is “best practices”. End of story.
- Le groupe Google; la société Google; Notre groupe: It is extremely common for French companies to refer to themselves as “groupe” (basically meaning that they’re a larger corporation that has subsidiaries). If “Groupe” is part of the company’s formal name (e.g. FCA Group), then by all means, use “Group” with a capital G in your translation. But if the phrase is simply something like “Notre groupe…“, then no. Just translate it as “Our company”. Similarly, French writers like to add descriptors like “la société” or “l’association” before proper names of organizations. Just drop the descriptor. You usually don’t need to say “the company Google”; just say “Google”. And this actually leads me to my next point…
- Association: This is the term often used in French for non-profit organizations. As such, once again, only translate it as “association” if that’s part of the proper noun. If “association” is just being used as a common noun, it should very often be translated as “organization”.
- Dynamique and dynamisme: These are two words that French companies love to throw around. They’re a nightmare for translators because they can mean all sorts of different things depending on the context. What I can say for sure is that they should rarely be translated as “dynamic” and “dynamism”. “Dynamique” as a noun usually means an activity (for example, as part of a workshop). As an adjective, it usually translates to something like “strong”, “fast-growing”, “lively”, or “powerful”. Likewise, “dynamisme” usually translates to something along the lines of “strength”, “strong growth”, or “energy”.
- Savoir-faire: This very often gets translated as “know-how”. It’s not necessarily wrong, it’s just not totally idiomatic. Translators like to use “know-how” because it’s a quick and easy cognate. The problem is that “know-how” is much more informal in English. I generally prefer to translate “savoir-faire” as “expertise”.
- Merci de votre attention: I often see this translated at “Thank you for your attention”. Once again, it’s not necessarily wrong, but it’s not the most idiomatic thing to say either. In English, we typically just end speeches and presentations with “thank you”, so I would argue that, in a translation, it’s probably best to simply drop the “for your attention”.
- Solutions à haute valeur ajoutée: This one is definitely problematic. As a translator, you want to stay faithful to the source text, but we just don’t really talk about “high value-added solutions” in English. I would suggest saying something like “valuable” instead. And while we’re on this, “solutions” is used way more in French than it is in English. Consider translating it as something like “products and services” in some cases.
- Emmanuel MACRON: The French love using all-caps for last names and brand names. We don’t really do that in English (especially not for last names). Part of translating is adapting the writing conventions of the text to the target language, which means turning “MACRON” into “Macron”. Again, this applies to brand names as well. If the French writer put a brand name in all-caps, Google it and see what conventions the company actually uses. If the company always uses all-caps (e.g. ASUS), then use all-caps. If they always use all lower-case, then strange though it may seem, use all lower-case.
- Iphone, 2 sur 4 Français…, and other errors: An important skill for a good translator is to not automatically trust the author. If you see something that is clearly a mistake in the source text, don’t replicate it. Just because the author made the mistake of writing “Iphone” instead of “iPhone” doesn’t mean you should do the same. Another example I recently saw was a French text that said something along the lines of “prèsque 2 Français sur 4…” and the translator followed suit with “nearly 2 in 4 French people”. That’s just basic math: you should reduce that to “1 in 2 French people”. Also, if you spot errors in a text (unfinished sentences, math errors, spelling mistakes, etc.), don’t be afraid to let the client know. They may appreciate your help and attention to detail.
- Société anonyme au capital de 100 euros… RCS Nanterre…: A statement along these lines often appears on French corporate documents and over the years, translators have come up with bizarre standardized ways of translating these notes. I would argue that these statements don’t need to be translated at all: it’s just corporate identification information that the French government requires. English-speaking countries don’t have those same requirements. So, if you’re in direct contact with the client, suggest that they save a little money by not having it translated. However, if you’re working through a translation agency, you’re going to have to translate it. In that case, here are some things to look out for:
– Find the right equivalent form of company: different terms are used from one country to the next, so you might have to do some digging to find the right term.
– Au capital de: I very often see this translated as “with a capital of…”. But that doesn’t really mean anything in English. The “capital” they’re referring to is share capital, so it’s best translated as “with share capital of…”.
– RCS: This stands for the “Registre du commerce et des sociétés“, often translated as “Trade and Companies Register”. First off, you don’t really need to translate “RCS”. It’s just a corporate identification number. It’s not that important for pretty much anyone reading your translation. But if you absolutely must translate “RCS”, “commerce” in this situation really probably means “business” rather than “trade”.
So there you have it: my top-ten French to English translation traps to look out for. This is not an exhaustive list, but it’ll do for now. Perhaps we’ll revisit this another day…
THE INTERPRELATOR 