花博絮語：從不請專業口譯到官網文宣菜英文——臺中宣言

花博又「花現」問題！
（「花現GNP」是花博宣傳口號 XD）

談談臺中市府官網宣傳《臺中宣言》的英文標題，見圖。

原版：累贅、不像樣的的台式菜英文：

《Taichung Declaration》has redefined the GNP Promote and raise the proposal for Green, Nature and People

設法順著原標題想表達的意思改成及格的英文：

The Taichung Declaration has redefined the pursuit of GNP growth in a new proposal of Green, Nature, and People

英文雖然對了，但仍累贅，沒有標題的樣子。

再改，使其精簡易懂，有標題樣：

The Taichung Declaration redefines GNP as Green, Nature, and People

最後這標題比較令人滿意，簡明、有重點、有哏。

* 重點明確：臺中宣言提出GNP新定義
* 明示GNP所代表的新名，但細節賣關子
* 藉此吸引讀者閱讀內文一探究竟

原標題在文法、寫作上的問題：

* 英文不存在中文新式書名號《……》

* 亂用動詞原形raise，不合文法

* 「GNP Promote」是啥？看似想表達「GNP提升」、「提升GNP」？就算視爲一個方案名，這也是糟糕的台式英文，正如Taiwan(,) Touch Your Heart 給人的感覺，無法端上國際。
問題出在把不合文法的動詞原形 promote、touch 一路用到底，不管意思如何，這顯示英語尚在牙牙學語階段，尚無動詞變化的意識和能力。

爲何 GNP Promote 是菜英文？進一步佐證：

請上 Google 搜索 "GNP Promote" （記得加英文引號），出現百餘條結果，清一色與「臺中宣言」有關，細查其實皆出自同一則臺中政府官方英文新聞文章，即本文探討的文章標題。難道「提升GNP」這概念在全人類有英語記錄的歷史中，是臺中市府首推？當然不！更合理的推論是：

一、像樣的英文不是這樣寫。
二、不像樣的這個英文表達，在全宇宙為臺中市府獨創。

這篇文宣，判斷又是不重視翻譯專業的結果。其實，有待批評的英文書寫問題還多著，有興趣的讀者不妨一讀，親自感受一下。

正如不久前逢甲大學一位外國英語教授針對「英語列爲第二官方語言」的計畫投書賴院長，批評這做法是緣木求魚，我也認爲台灣政府各層級應該檢討是否真已準備好，有能力拿出像樣的對內、對外的英語書寫。答案好像不證自明。

以下轉錄臺中官網全文，先是介紹何謂臺中宣言，後是臺中宣言英文版。（連結見留言）

～～～～～

《Taichung Declaration》has redefined the GNP Promote and raise the proposal for Green, Nature and People

Issued by Information Bureau Date:2018-04-19

Taichung will conduct World Flora Expo in November. Green productivity proposed by the City Government was based on the Flora Expo addressed concepts of Green productivity, Nature sustainability and People with Green-ability.「Taichung Declaration」is aiming for inviting 100 cities to sign up. Taichung City Mayor, Chia-lung Lin has signed the declaration with Changwon City Mayor, Ahn Sang-soo tonight at Masan Baseball Stadium in South Korea, he also kicked off the starting game for the Taiwanese baseball pitcher, Weichung Wang, who is working currently in South Korea. It’s very meaningful to have Changwon City as the first city to sign up to the Taichung Declaration.

The theme of 2018 Taichung World Flora Expo is「Exploring GNP」 which change the old meaning of GNP as Gross National Product. Redefined GNP now means Green productivity, Nature sustainability and People with Green-ability for pursuing green productivity and facilitating the ecological eternity and embrace the nature in addition to pursuing the technological development. to make people’s living better. We wish to promote and raise the awareness of enhanced collaborations between international societies because this is the only way to connect people to help each other for sharing the goodness and prosperity for the world. (4/11*11)*Information Bureau.

～～～～～

Taichung Declaration：

《Taichung Declaration》
A New Proposal for GNP

Have you ever thought about that, sound of blooming, could be heard?

Modern people are busy in earning their livings when they are pursuing the development of economics and technologies. They’ve been too busy to see things through so they’ve forgotten to listen to the hearts, realize the nature how close they are relying on the environment.

In 2018, let’s find out the balance for ourselves, let’s listen to the whispers of the nature, let’s listen to the happy sounds of the blooming, we can feel the the value of life and how great to be alive. After all, the meaning of life is to make the world better.

2018 Taichung World Flora Expo will raise a new proposal for GNP. GNP has it’s own life and means Green, Nature and People so it is no more a neutral number of Gross National Product. GNP stands for green productivity and facilitating the ecological eternity to make people’s living better.

It’s the time to move forwards, it’s the time to look back to the past. When we move forwards to develop the smart technologies in the future, we should remember to turn to embrace the nature again to facilitate the ecological eternity. We believe the prosperity and environmental protection can exist concurrently while the technologies can live with the nature.

Green Productivity

City in green and green in the city. The economical growth traded off by the environment will no more last as we know quite well how to play the role as one of the members in the global village. By applying green technologies, reducing energy consumption and create the shared resources to construct a sustainable city with green production and green economics as the backbone.

Nature Sustainability

The mountain geography left from the ice age and the recent wetland scenes formed by the waves and tides are all the low polluted ecological environment and diverse biological systems we would like to sustain. We will never pay the price of nature to pursue the technological prosperity again. We will rebuild the tight connections between people and nature to find back the harmony and balance between people and nature.

People with Green-ability

We are anticipating people will develop their green concepts and capabilities. Such trivial things as personal thought, diet, living and action or big scope as urban construction and future development, all of them will become the group energy of Green to contribute to the international society. So-called green concepts is to implement the actions, including respect the varieties and embrace diversity. No matter in the aspects of culture, race, politics, education or religion, we will maintain the old traditions and develop the innovations to share a better future with everyone. The aesthetics of living is to live with varieties and grow with the compatibilities.

We believe,
The perfect balance among production, ecology and living can be obtained.
Listen to the nature, connect with the society and link to the world.
Collaborate and facilitate the development of international non-government organizations.
Create the new model of urban management.
Because we connect with each other,
We will share the achievements and good results.

～～～～～

大家對於搭配詞 collocation熟悉嗎? 其實英文要用的好，搭配詞可是非常重要唷! 像是「擴大投資」英文要怎麼說呢？小編查了一個知名的Y牌線上英漢字典，「擴大」有這幾個英文「to broaden the scope; to magnify; to dilate; to enlarge; to expand」，「投資」有這幾個「to invest; to put money into；investment」，那因為這個的「投資」明顯是「名詞」，所以我就選線上英漢字典唯一給的名詞，就是「investment」，那擴大要選哪一個呢？可絕對不是第一個跑出來的「broaden」，變成「broaden its investment」唷! 看看這五題，你都會嗎?

*註: 一個字會有好幾個類似意思的搭配詞，舉例來說，例題一原文的新聞原文是用expand，但investment還有另一個近義的搭配動詞，就是increase，所以在英文翻譯或寫作時也可以考慮使用，不一定只有絕對的一個答案唷!

想要學更多搭配詞collocation嗎? 抽獎送出《新聞英文搭配詞：學會collocation，擺脫中式英文》，到網址的貼文完成三步驟就有可能抽中這本書唷! https://goo.gl/2RaKBy