gmane.comp.audio.musicbrainz.user

jmillikin | 4 Oct 08:41

[mb-users] Complex translation/transliteration case: Chinese, Japanese, and English oh my


Original track: http://musicbrainz.org/show/track/?trackid=8160895
Translated track: http://musicbrainz.org/show/track/?trackid=8226274
Edit: http://musicbrainz.org/show/edit/?editid=9452703

The original track is on a Japanese release. The title has two parts -- the
first is 「ティアオイエツォン」, pronounced "Tiaoietson", and is a transliteration of
the Chinese text 凋葉棕 (meaning "withered leaf") into Japanese kana. The
Chinese text is pronounced as "Diāo Yè Zōng". The second part of the
original title is English "(withered leaf)" -- the direct translation of the
Chinese text.

For the translation of the full release into English, I chose to simply drop
the Chinese portion and promote the parenthesized English to the full title.
I think this follows the artist's original intent. Another editor has
suggested that the Chinese be maintained in the track title, by
re-transliterating it from Chinese -> Latin (and skipping the intermediate
Japanese). This would result in the track title "Diao ye zong (withered
leaf)"[1].

I asked what the best solution was on IRC, and the general response was
"WTF???". Hopefully there will be some experienced MBers on mb-users that
can help sort this thing out.

[1] Or something similar, depending on how fancy to get with the diacritics.
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Leonardo Prado | 4 Oct 09:17

Re: [mb-users] Complex translation/transliteration case: Chinese, Japanese, and English oh my

IMHO, a translation is just... A translation. You just get the
original meaning of the word and put it in the best form on the other
language. So, it doesn't matter if the translation came trough two,
three or more translations, as the meaning remains the same.

If ティアオイエツォン (Tiaoietson) have the same meaning as 凋葉棕 (Diāo Yè Zōng)
and "withered leaf" maintain the meaning of the original word,
"withered leaf" is sufficient. Adding just one track with a "dual
translation" will just get confusing.

2008/10/4 jmillikin <jmillikin <at> gmail.com>:
>
> Original track: http://musicbrainz.org/show/track/?trackid=8160895
> Translated track: http://musicbrainz.org/show/track/?trackid=8226274
> Edit: http://musicbrainz.org/show/edit/?editid=9452703
>
> The original track is on a Japanese release. The title has two parts -- the
> first is 「ティアオイエツォン」, pronounced "Tiaoietson", and is a transliteration of
> the Chinese text 凋葉棕 (meaning "withered leaf") into Japanese kana. The
> Chinese text is pronounced as "Diāo Yè Zōng". The second part of the
> original title is English "(withered leaf)" -- the direct translation of the
> Chinese text.
>
> For the translation of the full release into English, I chose to simply drop
> the Chinese portion and promote the parenthesized English to the full title.
> I think this follows the artist's original intent. Another editor has
> suggested that the Chinese be maintained in the track title, by
> re-transliterating it from Chinese -> Latin (and skipping the intermediate
> Japanese). This would result in the track title "Diao ye zong (withered
> leaf)"[1].

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