Of Note: National Parks Translations

A group of advanced language students has completed four translation projects now in use by the National Park Service. When the Park Service had a need to provide translated brochures for the Abraham Lincoln Home National Historic Site in Springfield, Illinois, they thought of BYU’s reputation in foreign language education. Their query made its way to Alan Melby, the linguistics professor in charge of a Winter 2010 course for advanced language students, who saw great value for his students in such a real-life project. He says, “The students were excited because this was going to be used by the public–it wasn’t just another assignment that would be turned in, graded, and filed away.” Over the semester, sixteen students in the class created translations, from English, of the 22-page booklet about the only home Lincoln ever owned, in German, French, and two dialects of Chinese. These are all now in place at the site, which is visited by a halfmillion people annually, many of them foreign visitors