never played with babelfish???

by Tara (no login)

 

http://babelfish.altavista.com/

..........just follow the instructions. If you switch to another language....and then go back to English...its pretty funny. You can see the mistakes are sometimes very logical.....and especially with Herc,which is so idisyncratic, very undestandable. Like "You gotit, baby!!!" turns into "You have achieved your goal, Small Infant Child"
I do believe the site offers serious translating duties that you pay for and actually have word for word perfect grammar happening, this level is free and for fun.And very interesting....if I were a langusge teacher Id probably have the kids mess with it for awhile as you sort of see how other languages perceive expression and descibe stuff.

A friend of mine once tried to translate some of this site into German, and had trouble with me calling Helen a "bubblehead". When I tried to explain to her Americans use the expression to describe a silly vacuous person she said bubblehead would have been translated as "she who dances in a dream" ...which isnt quite the same.



Posted on May 24, 2007, 2:39 PM

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  1. PS I dont know where phosphorus came from. Tara, May 24, 2007, 2:43 PM

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