Tuesday, March 9, 2021

plataforma: coalition not platform

plataforma: coalition not platform

In Colombia right now there are a lot of 'plataformas de paz' and I keep seeing this rendered in English as peace platforms. Please stop! That's a super confusing false cognate. In US English at least a platform is what a candidate or a party runs for office on. It is most certainly not a coalition of grassroots groups coming together to work for something, like peace. I highly doubt platform would work in British English either, but if you want it to be understandable in both, avoid it and use coalition instead. 


Asistentes al segundo congreso de la plataforma Lgbti por la Paz en Colombia

1 comment:

Sara Koopman said...

I recently heard someone render this as 'umbrella mechanism.' That sounds to me more academic and less like what we would use in actual organizing, at least in the US. But this person was European so maybe it's more common there?