Multilinguists Find Themselves a Hot Product : Language: As nations expand their diplomatic and trading borders, the need for sensitive and intelligent translation and interpretation mushrooms.
Argentine immigrant Marta Marquez had always dreamed of becoming a teacher, while her son, Alex, had his heart set on becoming a business executive.
So when the enterprising mother of four and her son started a language-translation and interpreting service in 1984, they counted themselves lucky to land 15 customers a month and ring up $10,000 in sales the first year.
But much to their surprise, Iberia Language Services Inc. grew so fast the following year that Marta Marquez, a homemaker most of her life, began working at the company full time. And her son quit his job as an advertising copy reader.
Last year, the Cypress firm averaged 500 assignments a month throughout California and registered sales of nearly $400,000. Since January, the company has been averaging 600 jobs per month and the calls just keep coming in, said Alex Marquez, Iberia’s chief financial officer. The company has assembled a roster of 300 linguists to help fill the demand.
“We never imagined that we would be this busy when we started the business,” Marta Marquez said. “I don’t even have the time to cook anymore. Alex and I start the day very early, and we don’t get home until late in the evening.”
The Marquezes say they stumbled into a business that was ready to blossom in an era of expanding economic globalization and international trade, sweeping political and economic changes in Eastern Europe, and continuing shifts in the demographic composition of the United States.
Similar tales are being told across the country as companies and organizations that specialize in foreign-language instruction and translation and interpreting services report a healthy surge in business.
Spurred by international changes unfolding all around them, companies anxious to tap foreign markets are scrambling to get their technical manuals translated into Japanese or Russian and to hire interpreters to help their executives say “Let’s do business” in Chinese or Spanish.
“Foreign competition has forced American industries to actively market their products overseas in a wise way,” said Martha Geller, regional marketing director of Berlitz Translation Services in San Francisco, a unit of New York-based Berlitz International, the world’s largest language-school operator.
“It’s not just taking the product overseas and selling it; it’s a matter of localizing the product to meet local needs,” she said. “And language is essentially a part of localizing and marketing products abroad.”
The growth of the translation and interpreting business is not just a U.S. phenomenon. During the 1980s, Berlitz, which operates 272 language centers in 25 countries, saw its worldwide sales from translation services roughly double. Company officials expect that trend to continue as global trade competition heats up.
As demand for translators and interpreters rises, schools around the country report that the study of foreign languages, which has been in decline for a number of years, is making a comeback.
Berlitz officials say Spanish and English remain the most popular languages for students, while Japanese has been the fastest-growing language in the United States during the past five years.
Outside the business world, language-service providers also have benefited from a growing demand for interpreters and translators in the U.S. court system. Since the mid-1970s, federal law has required courts to provide interpeters in criminal cases involving defendants who speak no English.
Most translators and interpreters in this country are highly educated immigrants who are attracted to the trade by high pay and flexible working hours. And many say they also get immediate recognition and respect from their peers. But not anyone can be an interpreter or translator, said Robyn Schlesinger, president of Japanese American Communications of Newport Beach.
Interpreters, for example, have to be sensitive to a culture and to the context in which a statement is being made, she said. “There are many ways to say no in Japanese and generally it’s not the word no as translated . . . since it’s very rude to come right out and say no in Japanese,” she said.
While the key to translating and interpreting is making a foreign language understandable to all parties, the two services require different skills. Translators tend to work alone and deal only with written documents such as contracts, technical manuals and legal papers. Interpreting is a verbal exercise that requires instantaneous understanding and correct translation of a statement.
Of the two skills, the job of an interpreter is considered the most demanding. Interpreters are under considerable pressure to quickly and accurately translate often-critically important statements during business negotiations or a public hearing.
And the need for accuracy is particularly critical in a language, such as Japanese, where subtlety and protocol makes translating very difficult. “A wrongly interpreted word or phrase could make or break a deal,” said Iberia’s Alex Marquez.
On the other hand, translating is tedious, labor-intensive and requires “a very human skill,” said Maria E. Valdez, who heads Berlitz’s Woodland Hills office. Some companies have begun marketing computer-software programs for translating documents, but the accuracy of these programs leaves something to be desired.
Demand for translators and interpreters, particularly in business and legal transactions, is expected to remain strong. In fact, many of them earn a substantial income from free-lancing. Translators charge between 20 cents and 35 cents per word, while interpreters charge upwards of $60 an hour.
Most translators and interpreters are foreign-born because few U.S. language students reach the level of proficiency needed for the job, said Bettina Huber, director of research at the Modern Language Assn. in New York, a nonprofit group that tracks foreign language studies in U.S. schools.
Tough competition has forced many language companies to combine translation and interpretation services as new businesses open and more executives go abroad to negotiate contracts. At the same time, many U.S. businesses are realizing that it can be equally important to understand the social and political culture of a prospective client. So language-service companies often are including a primer in cultural awareness in language classes.
International Business Communications in Los Angeles, for example, is offering courses to acquaint newly arrived foreign executives with Western business, cultural and social practices. In 1988, Agnew Tech-II of Woodland Hills created an intensive Russian language and cross-cultural orientation course for 30 Hughes Aircraft Co. engineers who were eventually sent to a Soviet missile base in the Ural Mountains to monitor compliance with the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Force arms-control treaty.
Competition among language-service firms has also led to the formation of boutique companies that tailor their services to specific business, legal or social groups. Japanese American Communications in Newport Beach offers interpretation services for U.S. firms negotiating business deals with the Japanese. It also offers Japanese language classes designed to promote understanding of Japanese customs and business practices.
Others, such as Language Connection in Laguna Beach, specialize in clients who want to become more familiar with Spanish-language business terms and Latin American business practices.
Another Orange County firm, Dora Clark Interpreting in Orange, specializes in interpreting and translation services for legal proceedings involving workers compensation claims.
Though less glamorous than interpreting, the business of translating is more lucrative. The state court system is flooded with cases involving non-English-speaking immigrants and many documents they file in court are not in English. Since the 1970s, federal law has required that interpreters and translators must be provided in criminal cases involving those who do not speak English.
As Japan has moved to open its domestic market to foreign goods and Japanese manufacturers have expanded their operations in the United States, the need for Japanese translation services has risen dramatically.
When Richard Hoshino, who heads American Marketing and Consulting in Santa Ana, started his Japanese-English interpreting and translating business in 1985, he had only two Japanese companies in Orange County as clients. “Now I have nine Japanese companies for clients from Southern California and I’ve hired two part-time translators because of the volume of work,” he said.
“There are at least 20 Japanese-English translating companies in Orange County alone,” added Junko Fuji of Fuji Translation and Interpretation Service in Santa Ana.
Berlitz reports that nationwide enrollment in its Japanese-language program rose 60% between 1986 and 1989; in Southern California, Japanese language studies were up 250% during the same period. Berlitz operates 49 language schools in Japan alone.
But the Japanese aren’t leaving the market to their U.S. counterparts. Japanese tour and language companies are staking a claim in the lucrative market.
“Japanese businesses are opening their own language schools and bringing hundreds and thousands of Japanese students here to study English,” said John Reichard, president of the National Assn. for Foreign Student Affairs in Washington. “The pattern in the last decade is more towards a short-term course of six months or less for intensive English courses than for regular degree programs.”
Tokyo-based Language Service Inc. recently signed a 30-year lease on a four-story waterfront building on Lido Isle in Newport Beach. Its subsidiary, Language Services West Inc., runs a two- to four-week intensive English language and American cultural program for Japanese high school students and offers interpreting services to selected Japanese executives.
Meanwhile, the same world events that are sparking interest in foreign-language services among corporations are apparently prompting more California students to enroll in foreign-language courses. A 1988 survey by the state Department of Education found that foreign-language enrollment had risen 3% among elementary, high school and college students since 1986. While that may not seem like much of an increase, state education officials say it surpasses previous years.
Like commercial language schools, Spanish continues to be the most popular language for students, followed by English, French and German. But the fastest-growing language in the country is Japanese, followed by Chinese and Portuguese.
“World events increase interest in certain languages,” said Jaimee Draper, acting director of the Joint National Committee of Language, a Washington-based organization representing 36 language-teaching associations in the country.
Demographic trends also affect language studies. Schools in California and elsewhere are reporting a rising number of students enrolled in English-language programs. Observers said this surge is largely due to two factors. The new immigration law has offered a reprieve to many illegal aliens in the country, allowing them to seek employment legally. Since many U.S. employers require employees to speak English, many non-English-speaking immigrants are enrolling in intensive English-language courses.
More important, foreign students seeking higher education continue to pour into the country. California, with 49,291 students in the 1988-89 school year, is the biggest recipient of foreign students in the country, followed by New York and Texas.
The latest National Assn. for Foreign Student Affairs survey show that foreign students studying intensive English language programs in the United States jumped by 24% during the 1988-89 school year, and the total number of foreign students studying in the country rose 2.9% to 366,354 during the same period.
FOREIGN-LANGUAGE STUDY IN CALIFORNIA
Here is the breakdown of the percentage and the number of students enrolled in language courses at public schools and universities in 1988-89.
Spanish: 70.4% (387,317)
French: 21.6% (118,699)
German: 4.3% (23,911
Latin: 1.0% (5,5120
Other: 1.2%
Italian: 1,12
Chinese: 1,662
Japanese: 1,600
Russian: 839
Portuguese: 490
Vietnamese: 115
While the total number of foreign-language students has remained about the same over the last four years, enrollment in advanced courses has increased more tha 14%
Advanced (In thousands)
1985-86: 89.7
1986-87: 97
1987-88: 101.2
1988-89: 102.6
Total (In Thousands)
1985-86: 532
1986-87: 554
1987-88: 547
1988-89: 550
Source: Californiia Deplartment of Education
Los Angeles Times
