Idioms dont travel well - Emphasis

Idioms dont travel well Idioms dont travel well When writing anything for a global audience, its best to leave idioms out of it. Idioms are groups of words whose meaning is usually metaphorical and cannot necessarily be deduced from looking at each component word. Unsurprisingly, this can make them problematic for anyone who may be attempting to translate word by word. What might you make of these turns of phrase? Spanish: I have an aunt who plays the guitar. (Yo tengo una tà ­a que toca la guitarra.) French: Its the end of the beans! (Cest la fin des haricots!) Arabic: The sky doesnt throw chicks. (El samaa la tohadef katakeet.) Spanish: To leave Guatemala and arrive in worse cornstalks. (Salir de Guatemala y meterse en guatepeor.) [Youll find the answers at the foot of this blog post.] Talking nonsense Not that English idioms are any more sensible. On the face of it, theres no obvious reason why feline nightwear (Its the cats pyjamas, for our readers who speak English as a second language) should indicate the highest of standards. Nor is it clear why a taut top lip (Keep a stiff upper lip) is a desirable feature in the face of adversity. Every country has its own idioms, which tend to reflect back on the culture they come from. Spend long enough studying translations and you might be able to hazard a guess at the meaning of other countries sayings, and sometimes find the odd crossover. Spanish: Everyone has their own way to kill fleas. (Cada quien tiene su manera de matar pulgas.) English: Theres more than one way to skin a cat. German: From a mosquito make an elephant. (Aus einer Mà ¼cke einen Elefanten machen.) English: Make a mountain out of a molehill. The question is: do you want or expect your reader to take that time? Can you be sure they wont dismiss your communication as gibberish rather than work out you dont want them literally to push an envelope, put a project in their bed or extract something from a horses mouth? Dont make work for your reader And much of the time, we dont even know where our own languages idioms came from, or why they mean what they do. We use them based on the context weve heard them in and out of habit. Little wonder, then, that they so easily trip up international readers. In the UK, we may talk of taking a rain check. But how many of us know the expression is borrowed from baseball in the US, where a rain check is the receipt from a ticket, which may be reused if rain prevents play? Lets get literal So lets not beat around the bush. When writing for global audiences, being as literal as possible is the best method by a long chalk. Anything else just wont cut the mustard. Answers: Whats that got to do with the price of tea in China? Thats the last straw! Money doesnt grow on trees. Out of the frying pan and into the fire.