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Presentation
Breaking Language Barriers in the Scientific Community: The Benefits of Translating English Articles into Spanish
Idaho Conference on Undergraduate Research
  • Valeria Montelongo, Boise State University
  • Carolina Viera, (Mentor), Boise State University
  • Fatima Cornwall, Boise State University
  • Cristina Barber Alvarez-Buylla, Boise State University
  • Sandra Velazco Salvatierra, Boise State University
  • Maria Nieto Ordosgoitia, Boise State University
  • Edgar Ayala, Boise State University
  • Mayra de Anda Hernandez, Boise State University
  • Maria Escobedo-Gonzalez, Boise State University
  • Mary Guillen, Boise State University
  • Karen Hernandez, Boise State University
Additional Funding Sources
The project described was supported by the Pacific Northwest Louis Stokes Alliance for Minority Participation through the National Science Foundation under Award No. HRD-1410465, the NSF Idaho EPSCoR Program, and the National Science Foundation under Award No. OIA-1757324.
Abstract

The majority of scientific articles are published in English. As a result, researchers face challenges reaching a bigger audience of non-English speakers. Correspondingly, Project SCIENTIA closes the language gap between these communities by translating and disseminating research articles from the research program Genes to Environment: Modeling, Mechanisms, and Mapping (GEM3). Through interdisciplinary collaboration we translated a total of three abstracts, keywords and titles. We also interviewed the authors to understand the main idea and stay true to the article’s message. Different issues arise when translating a scientific text, like multiple meanings in translation. For that reason, our team created standardized glossaries of scientific terms by the use of parallel texts which are texts similar to the one being translated in the target language, and were found on official Spanish websites and scientific texts. Reliable translating outlets, that included academic papers, were used to accurately translate the scientific term, group discussions and the use of parallel texts were used to ensure the precision of the translation. The combination of these methods added credibility to the translation while acting as a resource researchers can use to make their work more accessible to the Spanish-speaking community.

Citation Information
Valeria Montelongo, Carolina Viera, Fatima Cornwall, Cristina Barber Alvarez-Buylla, et al.. "Breaking Language Barriers in the Scientific Community: The Benefits of Translating English Articles into Spanish"
Available at: http://works.bepress.com/carolina-viera/13/