I used to work in a county museum in Taiwan. We have guidebooks and webpage in English and Japanese versions except from our official language Mandarin. I was responsible for review of English translation. From my experience, the easiest way is to find a good translator whose native language is English and also good at Mandarin. That works well. Good luck! Jenli ----- Original Message ----- From: "Ayumu Ota" <[log in to unmask]> To: <[log in to unmask]> Sent: Wednesday, May 31, 2006 9:23 PM Subject: [MUSEUM-L] Foreign Visitor Services >I was assigned to review English translation hand-out of the permanent >exhibition labels/captions and am interested to know how other museums are >developing services for foreign visitors. > > Since I am working for a museum in Japan, my institution's first attempt > is to develop English translations of web pages, a general brochure, and > exhibition labels. > > It is possible to translate web, brochures, labels, audio guide scripts, > videos, etc. into different languages. However literal translations may > not be able to communicate meaning/concept to people with different > cultural background. Do you develop texts by additional/background > information for visitors who are not familiar with your culture? If so, > who will be writing these texts (curators, educators) and how to decide > what to include or omit (visitor evaluation?). > > Also, how do other institutions design, train, and evaluate guided tours > in other languages? If inquiry methods are not common in one culture, > does institution allow more didactic tour or try to incorporate inquires? > Do you hire multi-lingual person to evaluate these tours? > > Any experiences/suggestions/thoughts will be helpful. Thanks in advance. > > Ayumu Ota > Shibusawa Memorial Museum > Tokyo, Japan > www.shibusawa.or.jp > > ========================================================= > Important Subscriber Information: > > The Museum-L FAQ file is located at > http://www.finalchapter.com/museum-l-faq/ . You may obtain detailed > information about the listserv commands by sending a one line e-mail > message to [log in to unmask] . The body of the message should > read "help" (without the quotes). > > If you decide to leave Museum-L, please send a one line e-mail message to > [log in to unmask] . The body of the message should read > "Signoff Museum-L" (without the quotes). > > ========================================================= Important Subscriber Information: The Museum-L FAQ file is located at http://www.finalchapter.com/museum-l-faq/ . You may obtain detailed information about the listserv commands by sending a one line e-mail message to [log in to unmask] . The body of the message should read "help" (without the quotes). If you decide to leave Museum-L, please send a one line e-mail message to [log in to unmask] . The body of the message should read "Signoff Museum-L" (without the quotes).