May 08
2008Many technical writers in the U.S. and other countries majored in some form of English, journalism, or technical communication. Here at National Instruments Shanghai, most of the technical writers are also English majors. The only difference is that English is our second or third language.
NI is an American company so English fluency is high on the job requirements list. Everyone here at the Shanghai office speaks English very well. The technical communications department, including technical writers and the localization team, probably has the highest level of English fluency, not just here at the Shanghai office, but in the entire country! And yet, the level of fluency can’t compare to that of a native English speaker.
At NI, we write all our documentation in English. The technical writers in Shanghai have to work extra hard to match the quality of documentation written by our Austin technical writers. Even though English is the “official language” here in the Shanghai office, most people still speak Chinese throughout the day. The developers we work with usually communicate in Chinese with a few English words here and there. These developers are quite capable of explaining things in English but in the end, everyone just speaks Chinese. We have to learn everything in Chinese first, then write documentation in English. After that, the localization team translates the English documentation into Chinese and other languages.
This back and forth translation can be quite challenging. English is my third language, but because I was mainly educated in the U.S., my English is much better than my Chinese. However, I didn’t learn phonics and grammar like native speakers, so I struggle with both languages. There are some things I understand only in English and other things (like countable and non-countable nouns) that I can never figure out. When working with developers, I have difficulty understanding concepts in Chinese because I’m not used to hearing certain technical terms in a different language. I ask stupid questions like “what’s a hard drive” or “what’s an analog signal.” Other times, I understand perfectly what the developers tell me in Chinese, but I don’t know how to translate into written English.
Sometimes, the developers help me write conceptual information in English, but I have to do some major editing. I don’t always understand what they are trying to say because word-for-word translation from Chinese to English doesn’t always make sense. Developers don’t always use the most appropriate words to explain something, which leads to incorrect information. Also, logic and sequence are very important in technical writing, but they might get confused or rearranged during translation due to subtle language differences. I have to ask many questions to make sure I fully understand the content before editing and rewriting the conceptual topics.
As you can see, language is probably one of the biggest challenges of being a technical writer in China. I can’t speak for all technical writers at NI or in China, but we have to recognize that as non-native English speakers, no matter how many years of English we study, how grammatically correct we try to be, English is not and will never be our mother tongue. We just have to work harder and go through more reviews to ensure the highest quality of documentation.
The same could be said about technical writers in India and other countries that are doing a lot of the outsourcing work. The current trend is that technical documentation is gradually moving to onsite R&D centers in countries like India and China. More on this topic in future posts.
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Excellent post! Most tech writers are aware that some of their readers have a different home language from the one the documents are written in. The other side is tech writers writing in a language different from their own.
Your post really brings home the difficulties all parties can have with language differences. I really like this bit:
I have difficulty understanding concepts in Chinese because I’m not used to hearing certain technical terms in a different language. I ask stupid questions like “what’s a hard drive” or “what’s an analog signal.”
Yes!! I worked in the Netherlands for a while, and I cringe at the things I said and the silly questions I asked, even though my Dutch is very good. You can always tell by the carefully blank look on the other person’s face
Sometimes the documentation written by a non-native speaker is fairly unintelligible. We’ve all seen this in product instructions. In most cases, the writer is probably not a tech writer. I posted an example here:
http://ffeathers.wordpress.com/2007/08/12/who-needs-a-technical-writer/
Your own English is really excellent. I think this shows the value of a technical writer’s training and experience — we focus on producing text that is at least understandable even if it’s not always elegant.
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Hi Susan,
I stumbled on your blog today and liked what I saw. My name is Rahul, and I work as a senior technical communicator at Samsung, South Korea. I also write a technical communication blog, though not as consistently as you do.
You can contact me at prabhakar[dot]rahul[at]gmail[dot]com
Thanks,
Rahul Prabhakar
Rahul Prabhakars last blog post..IT Slowdown in India Might Just Be a Faux Pas
Interesting.
I work as a tech writer in Japan, as the only “native” in my section at a famous electronics manufacturer.
Here, everyone believes their English is better than the foreigner’s. They also have a distinct preference for foreigners who speak no Japanese at all.
Based on the ten years I’ve been in this business, I can say with confidence that the Japanese have extreme prejudices on bilingual matters. For example, they are very reluctant to admit that the native might just possibly know more about his/her mother tongue than they do. Even worse is their reluctance to accept that some non-Japanese can do J to E translations. The prevailing attitude here is that no non-Japanese (with the exception of domestic Koreans and the occasional Chinese) is capable of comprehending Japanese.
It’s a long time since I was in China and when I was there I wasn’t in this line of work, but I cannot remember the Chinese being quite so hostile in this respect. How is it? Do you trust non-Chinese when it comes to translation? Is it normal to assume that the foreigners know nothing and are probably incapable? Do the non-foreigners have their work checked and criticized?
(These are all very common in Japan, and I should add that such is never apparent in the Japanese-to-Japanese context, as too many issues of respect would be compromised – even questioning somebody implies you believe s/he is at fault. With foreigners however, those concerns fly straight out of the window and we are fair game for all sorts of unfair treatment.)
What puzzles me most is the inability of the Japanese to read this duplicity as at all negative. I’ve often asked them if the opinion of an Englishman (example) armed with a few years of Japanese, Google, and a pile of dictionaries should have the same weight as a native Japanese speaker on issues of the Japanese language. More often than not, this question elicits a hearty snort and (from the women) a giggle. Yet, the inverse sums up the situation of every native working in tech comm in Japan.
All in all, a fascinating experience.