Spanish For Social Change

I am disgusted that huge sums of money are being misspent to send poor young people from the United States with few other options at home to...

My apologies for the silence - it is the end of the semester and I'm swamped. Above is a video of me interpreting a couple of weeks ago...

I am headed to the vigil this week! Proud to be part of the largest event against US Empire inside the belly of the beast. Again we will be...

el precio de la canasta basica: the cost of basic nutritional needs (for a family) NOT the basic basket, or even food basket or shopping bas...

people before profit: la vida antes del lucro This is my own invention. I got it from going *really* sideways - or what's it called whe...

so-called : mal llamado Just to clarify last week's post , I am not suggesting that you dramatically change the tenor of a speakers word...

I've posted about this term before , but want to call to your attention that there is a similar tragedy, and growing scandal, in India -...

My friend Jill made this great short video about medical interpreters. Can't figure out how to embed it, but it's 15 minutes long a...

cheapened: abaratado as in, the Nobel peace prize.

enslaved people: gente esclavizada Props to my compa Michael Rosen, who not only gives fantastic salsa classes, but even in a short intro in...

gente = people vs pueblo = THE people thought of it from seeing this comment at loquesomos.org: "This is what we have to confront. Thes...

accumulation by dispossession: acumulación por desposesión What's up with the US wanting to put in seven new military bases in Colombia ...

How's that for jargon? New to me. It seems to mean “all types of interlingual transmission, such as translation, interpreting, and subti...

Cinturon de miseria - slum belt This refers to the ring of slums around many (most?) cities in Latin America. Slum being rendered by Sebasti...

the commons: el en-común commonism: el en-comunismo One for the lefty theory geeks. Props to my compa Sebastian (te fuiste!), who (with a c...

vereda (Col): dispersed rural settlement In my previous post I argued for rendering it as township - which led to some interesting conversa...

rancho: shack - generally not ranch!! While on the topic, here is another dangerous false cognate. Ranch in English implies something total...

False cognates are always dangerous, but there are some that can be particularly bad news for movement interpreters: comprometido - certainl...

piquetero: piquetero (member of the Argentinian unemployed workers movement) Hoy el wiki lo define asi : Los piqueteros son activistas, que...

blockade - bloqueo (In Mexico sometimes tope de carretera - can also be piquete in Argentina - see note below) Barricade; road block - bar...

Unlike translation, interpretation is a performance art. You have to practice your scales - but then when you're on, it's not about ...

I am such a geek that sometimes while watching subtitled movies I write down translations I either like or don't. I recently sat through...

Guate - canche Panama - fulo/fula CR - macho (macha para mujeres?!) Nica/El Salvador - chele/ chele Mexico - güero/güera Colombia - mono/...

proceso: organizing process, organizing project Often proceso just gets rendered literally, as process, as it is in the video above by the N...

botín de guerra: war trophy "El cuerpo de la mujer no es botín de guerra" is a slogan of the Ruta Pacifica de Mujeres in Colombia...