Looking for a Spanish translation

September 11, 2007 9:31 PM

[TranslationFilter] Can someone translate this sentence into Spanish: "Your excellent english provides convenience to everybody around you"?

Babel Fish comes up with "Su inglés excelente proporciona la conveniencia todos alrededor de usted." Unfortunately, I don't know how close to correct that is.

I was inspired by this Language Log post.

posted by sbutler to Writing & Language (17 answers total)

Well, it seems alright to me, but I am by no means fluent. On thing though, you need an "a" after conveniencia: " . . . proporciona la conveniecia a todos . . . "
posted by The Esteemed Doctor Bunsen Honeydew at 9:40 PM on September 11, 2007

Depending on the context, it's either:

Su excelente inglés proporciona conveniencia para todos a su alrededor.

or

Su excelente inglés es conveniente para todos a su alrededor.

I think my translation is correct, but, the sentence kinda doesn't make much sense. Even the original one. Just a thought.
posted by CrazyLemonade at 9:47 PM on September 11, 2007

Oh, I see now on your link that they're saying something similar to my "it doesn't make much sense".
posted by CrazyLemonade at 9:51 PM on September 11, 2007

Response by poster: I'm looking at it as a "what if you ran across this sign in an American university?" I'd like to throw together something in Photoshop and blog it just to see what my friends' reactions are.

Personally, I'd find it the original a bit offensive if I were Chinese.
posted by sbutler at 9:54 PM on September 11, 2007

Response by poster: CrazyLemonade: ohhh... I guess all of this would make more sense if I pointed out that different spoken dialects of Chinese aren't mutually intelligible. For example, someone who speaks Cantonese wouldn't be understood by someone who speaks Mandarin.

I forget that not everyone knows that.
posted by sbutler at 10:01 PM on September 11, 2007

Umm, the above translation is technically correct, but it makes no sense in either language.

Su excelente inglés proporciona conveniencia para todos a su alrededor.

A better way might be proporciona conveniencia a todos de su alrededor.

Either way the sentence doesn't make a lot of sense.
posted by T.D. Strange at 10:19 PM on September 11, 2007

For a precise translation a little more context might be needed. Or, if possible, rephrase the english sentence (which I find a little odd).

Not a literal transalation but anyway...

"[Tú|Sú] excelente nivel de inglés es útil para las personas que te rodean"
posted by edmz at 10:36 PM on September 11, 2007

edmz, "tu" only has an accent when it means "you", and not when it means "your".

"Su", on the other hand, never has an accent.

By the way, the way you phrased the sentence adds a little more sense to it.
posted by CrazyLemonade at 11:09 PM on September 11, 2007

I'd rather say it as:

"Su excelente inglés ofrece una comodidad a todos los que le rodean."

(IANAT, just a native speaker.)
posted by Iosephus at 12:17 AM on September 12, 2007

Native (argentino) speaker here. edmz's translation makes sense, even for the nonsensical original sentence
posted by jazzido at 12:26 AM on September 12, 2007

Su inglés excelente les conviene a todos los demás.

(although my Spanish is really Central American, so this translation might grate on a Spaniard.)
posted by emd3737 at 6:29 AM on September 12, 2007

In English it sounds like an awkwardly backhanded compliment. Is that the intention? The original translation from Chinese is very awkward but the problem with a direct translation is that it probably won't get the real meaning across. "Convenience" doesn't really work in the context of the quote. I'm not sure if it would work directly in Spanish. Sometimes in films, the translation is entirely different but conveys the correct idea.
posted by JJ86 at 6:32 AM on September 12, 2007

"...les conviene a todos los demás."

makes it seem like it's more convenient for everyone else [and maybe not so much for you].
posted by CrazyLemonade at 10:00 AM on September 12, 2007

T.D. Strange is almost correct, the literal translation is "Su excelente inglés proporciona conveniencia a todos a su alrededor." This is grammatically correct, makes the exact same sense as the original english version and sounds just as odd.
Native, chilean.
posted by signal at 11:55 AM on September 12, 2007

And I'd go with "Su", not "Tu", 'cause the guy in the original poster is wearing a suit.
posted by signal at 11:56 AM on September 12, 2007

The analogy here is somewhat flawed. The writing on the original poster is in mandarin, imploring people to speak mandarin. So the truest translation is "Your excellent English", or "Su excelente Español".

I'm not sure where you're going with this translation, so I won't say anything else. It's a strange sign, definitely, and I'm glad language log exists to pick up on things like this.
posted by kiltedtaco at 1:28 PM on September 12, 2007

Yes, but the sign says "Your excellent Mandarin", in English. So the correct analogy would be, for instance, trying to get people to speak English instead of Spanish.
So: "Su excelente inglés", or "Your excellent Spanish".
(Language names aren't capitalized in Spanish, so "inglés", not "Inglés".)
posted by signal at 1:45 PM on September 12, 2007