Translation mistakes in the Polish version of the EU Constitution could delay the whole ratification process well as indirectly influencing its outcome.

The Polish Foreign Ministry told journalists that it has identified over 40 mistakes which are expected to take a further three to four months to correct.

Opposition politicians have said the translation contains “flagrant errors” making it impossible to implement the treaty.

“These are not just simple linguistic mistakes, but passages containing (legal) dispositions that differ from other linguistic versions”, PAP news agency quoted Kazimierz Ujazdowski of the centre-right Law and Justice party as saying.

The government will apparently fail to submit the translated document to the parliamentarians in early February as planned, and so the date for a national vote on the Constitution is likely to be postponed too.

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Paving the way for much more intuitive, interactive, and user-friendly ‘spoken dialogue technology’, DUMAS developed a multilingual speech-based system that creates new ways to communicate.

DUMAS, a three-year IST-funded project, began by developing the Athos platform, a generic and modular framework for multilingual speech-based systems. A consortium of eight partners from Sweden, Finland, Germany and the UK, its researchers built on basic speech technology, such as speech synthesis and recognition, and focused on dialogue level problems to develop systems that can process both spoken and text inputs in several languages, and provide appropriate verbal responses to the user.

DUMAS’ researchers produced 27 outputs on various levels, from research prototypes suitable for further exploration to fully commercialised and marketable products. Several results are in commercial use; five have commercial potential with a short lead time or are in the process of being commercialised at present; 12 are knowledge resources for exploitation in other research projects or in commercial products of various kinds; and five are advanced technology components for further research exploitation.

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This powerhouse of information and networking attracted over 350 last year and with the continued boom in the U.S. Hispanic market, cross-border marketing growth, proliferation of Latino media and new media channels, this year’s agenda is on the top priority list of major Fortune 1000 companies. The wide range of new and provocative sessions will include: Sergio Bendixen’s analysis of the “Hispanic Vote” in the 2004 Elections and insights for marketers “Lost in Translation –Exporting your message across cultural borders” by Draft New York’s Laurence Boschetto and Larry Harris GMAC Corporation’s Case study Segmentation Volkswagen America’s quest for Hispanic Drivers NBA and Motorola’s partnernship strategies Citibank’s credit cards and the Hispanic market- a case study Importance of English programming for Latino marketing by Jeff Valdez Future Hispanic Media trends by Monica Gadsby Cross Border expansion strategies for multinational brands by Sony’s Irving Plonskier Brand Prioritization and market opportunity- by Carlos Santiago Internet Usage of Hispanics and Budget Allocation Cross Cultural Strategies- An Anthropological lens by Rita Denny and Patricia Sunderland You’ll Meet Senior Decision Makers From: Cadbury Schweppes, Clamatto Cingular Wireless CitiCards, Citibank NA GMAC Miami Heat Motorola Volkswagen of America NBA Latin America Schieffelin & Somerset Co. Sony Pictures Television International Warner Bros. Plus: Research Ace Dr. Korzenny unravels a customized poll among agency heads on “2005 Advertising and Marketing” Strategies. A peek at what lies ahead Media Maven, Monica Gadsby outlines “Future Trends for Hispanic Media” Creativity – “Seven Proven Creative Directors Share Pathways To Success” Pre and Post Conference workshops on Research and Predictive Modeling and Segmentation tools Major clients and their key challenges and obstacles at an industry panel Seven award winning creative directors whose work has built success stories for clients.

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Unlike kids in El Paso, children across the county seldom have the opportunity to learn a second language while in elementary school. Many educators believe that it’s more important than ever to teach young students about other cultures, and that includes foreign language instruction. In our Parenting Report, we visit a group of second graders learning Spanish.

Research says children are best able to absorb a second language before puberty, when the linguistic area of the brain becomes less receptive. In fact, recent findings are part of the reason nearly 1/3 of elementary schools offer students exposure to some kind of foreign language.

Children who have early exposure to languages also have enhanced overall mental development and an appreciation of other cultures. Yet starting a language early doesn’t mean learning it better. Teenagers and other late starters can become just as fluent, though the learning process may be more difficult. If your school does not offer a foreign language, there are still other ways to expose your child. Seek out bilingual kids or adults for talk dates. Hook your child up with a foreign pen pal at a website such as e-pals.com. Or get foreign language books, videos and audio cassettes.

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Note: See the Linguistic Solutions Resources page for other foreign language instruction resources.

Bilingualism is Already ‘Critical’ to Success in Europe, Asia/Pacific and Latin America, and is of Growing Importance in North America

The ability to speak more than one language is critical to succeed in business in Europe, Asia/Pacific and Latin America, according to nearly nine out of ten (88 percent) executive recruiters from those regions who completed the sixth edition of the quarterly Executive Recruiter Index. The survey was released today by Korn/Ferry International (NYSE: KFY – News), the premier provider of executive search and leadership development solutions.

Nearly 85 percent of recruiters in Europe, 88 percent of recruiters in Asia and 95 percent of recruiters in Latin America either “strongly agreed” or “somewhat agreed” that being at least bilingual is critical to succeed in today’s business environment. Among recruiters in North America, that percentage was just 34 percent.

Despite these regional differences, recruiters everywhere agreed that in ten years, it will be “more important than today” for executives to be at least bilingual (Europe – 74 percent; Asia – 72 percent; Latin America – 79 percent; North America – 66 percent). They also reported there is a “significant competitive advantage” for executives who are multilingual – i.e., speak more than two languages fluently (Europe – 66 percent; Asia – 52 percent; Latin America – 79 percent; North America – 49 percent).

In terms of which foreign language capabilities are in most frequent demand by employers, recruiters in Asia, Europe and Latin America overwhelmingly chose English when asked to pick up to three languages (88 percent). Recruiters in North America selected Spanish (79 percent), French (43 percent) and Mandarin Chinese (30 percent)

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The what, why, and how of business blogging, by business blog expert, DEBBIE WEIL. Normally $29, ChangeThis brings you the entire report for free until January 25th. Don’t miss it!

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Hat tip: Online Business Networks

Burger King Corp. has partnered with Latin music stars Pilar Montenegro and Obie Bermúdez to promote a new sweepstakes…

The company will feature the pair in Spanish-language TV, radio and P-O-P materials targeting Whopper eaters in the Hispanic community to enter the Un Dia A Tu Manera sweepstakes in February.

The promotion continues Burger King’s partnership with Latin music. The fast food chain served as the corporate sponsor of the 2004 Latin Grammy Awards.

Montenegro and Bermúdez are the first Hispanic celebrities to endorse a consumer marketing campaign for the Burger King Corporation. TV and radio spots will feature the duo asking for the original Whopper sandwich to be made “their way” and show how the Latin idols would most like to spend a day. The two will make personal appearances in select Burger King restaurants nationwide as part of the promotional campaign.

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“Most housing growth will be driven in the future by immigrants and Hispanics,” predicted James Johnson, professor at the Kenan-Flagler Business School of the University of North Carolina in Chapel Hill.

This will result in non-white residents rising to almost half of the U.S. population by 2050, Johnson said at a seminar in New York sponsored by the Urban Land Institute, a nonprofit real estate research and education organization.

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The enlargement of the European Union from 15 to 25 member-states with nine new languages has created a kind of linguistic big bang in Brussels, with new headaches for intepreters.

“Integrating nine new official languages at one go when the newcomers joined last May was an unprecedented situation for the Commission,” said a member of the EU’s executive organ here.

Previously the EU had 11 languages shared between 15 members. Now it has 20 shared by 25.

Danish, Dutch, English, Finnish, French, German, Greek, Italian, Portuguese, Spanish and Swedish have now been joined by Czech, Estonian, Hungarian, Latvian, Lithuanian, Maltese, Polish, Slovak and Slovene.

The European Commission says it is more or less satisfied with the current state of affairs after the 10 joined — the 10th being Cyprus which shares a language with Greece.

But there were limits to the available capacity, admitted Manuel Barata, of the Commission’s translation directorate.

One of the biggest headaches has been the Maltese language. All the candidates for jobs as intepreters failed in November 2003, so all EU meetings — the council of ministers, European Commissioners, press conferences — have to be covered by outside interpreters.

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Finding adequate transportation has become one of the principal hurdles facing the most recent wave of Hmong refugees in central Wisconsin.

Mass transit can be confusing or nonexistent, finding volunteer drivers can be difficult, and the Hmong-language version of the Wisconsin driver’s manual can be tough to comprehend.

For 44-year-old Yong Yia Xiong… the permit test has proven difficult. Xiong, a new arrival to Stevens Point, failed four times, one shy of the state’s limit for taking the permit test.

He’s studied by using a Hmong-language version of the state’s driver’s manual, but the translation is confusing and ambiguous, he said.

Similar translation issues have plagued many refugees, Vang said, and the manual even contradicts itself in places. Hmong and English are very different languages to learn, Vang said, so the meaning of a statement or phrase could be altered or misunderstood in translation.

Also not all refugees read Hmong, said Chia Khang, a 1984 refugee who now works as a client services worker at North Central Community Action Program in Wisconsin Rapids. Some write Laotian or read Thai, and getting an interpreter to help with the English-language version of the manual can be tough.

“I used to ride the bus for two whole years, the first two years that I came,” Khang said. “Most of the problem, what I saw, is the reading and writing.”

In one of the largest relief efforts in history, a new issue is cropping up: mismatched aid.

Relief groups have opened boxes meant for tsunami survivors to discover coats sent by donors apparently unaware the island nation is in the tropics, as well as polyester shirts and pants, which don’t absorb sweat, and fleece baby clothes.

“They’d melt to death,” said Pam Porodo, co-founder of Impakt Aid, a recently formed independent group working out of Colombo, the Sri Lankan capital.

Westerners touched by the suffering also have sent food, generously emptying out their larders of items that might be standard fare back home but don’t quite work locally.

Canned mixed vegetables in cream sauce are one example. First of all, most locals don’t have a can opener. Secondly, people here eat fresh vegetables and most don’t like the taste of creamed or canned food, or may well get sick from it.

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Amid the devastation of South Asia, where the earthquake and tsunamis have killed more than 150,000 people, a striking story is quietly emerging.

Western tourists — those ne’er-do-wells better known for lounging on the beach, sipping tropical drinks and haggling over the price of $4 hotel rooms in poverty-stricken towns — are doing some good.

Proclaimed Reuters: “Tsunami turns tourists into aid workers.”

Declared The Independent in Great Britain: “The tourists still come — only now they want to help.”

Instead of fleeing the devastated areas, some Western travelers are actually seeking them out, offering to lend a hand to overburdened relief agencies and local officials. The phenomenon is repeating itself, according to reports, in Thailand, Indonesia and Sri Lanka.

Too many travelers, we are told, export their own culture when they go abroad, bringing Western demands with their dollars and Euros, encouraging old worlds to abandon traditions prematurely.

Long before the tsunamis struck, a subtle shift was occurring. More travelers than ever are seeking meaningful cultural exchange overseas. They are searching for ways to see the world, if only briefly, through others’ eyes, to understand foreign cultures in a way they hadn’t before.

They are signing on with organizations like Global Exchange and Cross-Cultural Solutions, which lead trips, often to little-visited places, that focus on education, understanding and, occasionally, volunteer work.

At its worst, travel in the developing world only highlights the disparities between the haves and have-nots, fostering resentment toward Western tourists.

But more often than we hear about, travel forges connections between peoples across great economic and cultural divides. It brings us together. And even in the worst of times, it can reveal us at our best.

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The ability to recognize patterns in the sound of speech is considered fundamental to the development of spoken language. Only two species of mammals, humans and tamarin monkeys, were known to possess this ability — until now.

New research has identified a surprising third — rats.

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A seminar on Southeast Asian culture was held in Fengshan, Kaohsiung County yesterday to deepen local people’s understanding of the people of the region.

A worker from the Eden Social Welfare Foundation, which organized the forum, noted that the Taiwanese need to know more about Southeast Asia in light of the fact that more and more Taiwanese are marrying women from the region, the children are growing up in cross-cultural marriages, and leads to special challenges for schoolteachers.

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Translation costs at the European Union are set to pass a billion dollars a year as the economic bloc struggles to accommodate 10 new members after its expansion into Eastern Europe and the Baltics, officials said.

Critics chafe at the sum, but to many its money well spent in keeping Europe’s quilt of cultures – and national egos – intact.

The 10 new members that joined in May expanded the EU to 25 and added nine new languages for a total of 20. Once the many cross-translation services this requires are at full speed, the overall costs will rise to $1.06 billion per year from about $720 million now, according to European Commission documents published Friday.

Interpretation costs may reach $312 million in 2007, up from $137 million last year.

Together, funding this unique system will take almost $2.62 out of the pocket of every EU citizen every year. Many EU citizens have balked at the cost and called for a drastic reduction in the number of languages used officially.

The United Nations, with far more member nations, uses only six official languages, critics note. But Europe’s Tower of Babel is essential, said Ian Andersen, a department head at the Directorate General for Interpretation.

“There is no way around it if you want to work in a community of law,” he told reporters. When EU laws are binding on its citizens, they should be able to consult them in their own language.

“It is the democratic right of everyone who participates in decision-making to make their point and to have access to information on an equal footing,” said Andersen, a Dane.

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