Parallel Text

In his book Non-Literary Translation, Teacher Li Changshuan provides the following definition of parallel text. Parallel text originally refers to original texts and their translations that are placed side by side for sentence-by-sentence comparison. When a large number of parallel texts are collected and organized according to specific standards, they form a parallel corpus. These materials can be thematic articles, entries from encyclopedias, or even explanations and example sentences from dictionaries. This is a narrow definition of parallel text. In a broader sense, parallel text also includes translated materials similar in content to the original text, primarily used for a deeper understanding of the original. Simply put, parallel text refers to any reference material closely related to the content of the original text.

Finding parallel texts requires first browsing the original text to identify the central topic expressed therein, followed by searching for keywords to find relevant materials in the same field. If we correspond it to the translation of a specific term, further searches through the original text, adjusting keywords continuously, are needed to find the most accurate translation.

Not all articles have 100% bilingual parallel texts, so typically, we will search separately for Chinese and English reports on the same event and compare them. How do we conduct these separate searches? The simplest method is to replace the Chinese search keywords with their corresponding English terms and input them into Google, Bing International, or other English search engines. By comparing the Chinese news articles with the English ones found, we can generally grasp the bilingual description of the event. For example, when there’s a data leak involving Facebook users, we can search “Facebook信息泄露” (Facebook information leak) and “Facebook information leak” to find relevant Chinese and English reports respectively.

What if we only know the Chinese keyword but not the corresponding English one? Here are some solutions:

1.     Use the Chinese version of Wikipedia; enter the keyword followed by “维基” (Wiki) to click on the entry explanation in the Chinese version. On the left sidebar, find “其他语言” (Other languages) and click “English” to access the corresponding English entry, which will provide the English term for the keyword.

2.     Search for other nouns related to the news, such as names and places, etc. In fact, truly 100% bilingual parallel texts are quite rare, as most are single-language texts. This is entirely normal. Even Wikipedia does not have an English entry for every Chinese term. Therefore, it’s best to replace several keywords and search for multiple parallel texts for comparison. Regardless of whether it's Chinese or English, while individuals may have differing subjective views on certain events, the descriptions of objective facts are fundamentally consistent. Thus, in translation, one only needs to refer to the original text, make slight modifications to the Chinese expressions in the parallel text, and then apply them, which essentially completes the task.

The advantages of parallel texts are generally as follows:

1.     Making translations more authentic: Whether translating from English to Chinese or vice versa, parallel texts can help improve the quality of our translations. As the saying goes, "the stone from another mountain can serve as a tool for carving jade." When uncertain about words, expressions, or even structures, consulting authoritative articles can help us learn from their strengths and enhance our translations.

2.     Aligning translations with context: We can also use parallel texts to learn specialized terminology. For instance, in the sentence “Microsoft has accused the NSA of losing control of the digital equivalent of a cruise missile,” many students might not understand the meaning of “cruise missile” here. However, with the help of parallel texts, we can infer that this term refers to something “capable of precise strikes.”

3.     Filling knowledge gaps: This is one of the most significant roles of parallel texts. For example, if we encounter the topic of the WannaCry ransomware virus, we can find all related Chinese and English materials to study side by side. This knowledge will be useful when we come across topics related to computer viruses in the future.

Finally, we need to clarify that the ability to search for parallel texts is a crucial skill in the translation process, and no translation effort can be devoid of this capability.

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