Quoting Jordi Gutiérrez Hermoso (jordigh@octave.org):
> On 15 May 2013 14:19, Laura Arjona <larjona99@gmail.com> wrote:
> > In Spanish we have two forms for "you": "usted" (formal) and "tú"
> > (informal). We use the formal way in the translations of the Debian
> > documentation and website, but in this pages with an "outreach"
> > purpose, I was not sure if switching to the informal way to setup a
> > closer link with the reader. What do you think?
>
> I think "tú" would be reasonable.
Would it be for the French translation, I would stick to "vous" (aka
'usted'). And, actually, this even if it's commonly accepted behaviour
in the hacker community that the informal form ("tutoiement" aka use
of "tu") is most often used.
When it comes at written material, I personnally tend to avoid being too
informal or using any kind of spoken form.
But, of course, this is likely to vary depending on different social
conventions (for Spanish, don't forget to take into account possible
differences in social conventions between Spain and latin America).
>
> > "If you are interested..." (and other verb/adjectives) can be
> > translated as "si está interesado..." (male + neutral gender) or "si
> > está interesada.." (female). I've used the female form, but the Debian
> > Women project is for everybody, so I was not sure if keeping the
> > neutral (male) form.
>
> You can rephrase slightly with "si te interesa" or "si le interesa"
> and avoid gendering the noun. Also, I don't think the male gender is
> neutral at all, in any language. People argue both ways about that in
> every gendered language I know.
In all my own contributions in French translations, I try to do my
best to use neutral wording even if that implies reformulating the
original wording.
In the case of "If you are interested" (that literally translates to
"si vous êtes intéressé" or "si vous êtes intéressée"), that's indeed
not obvious to achieve without being too clumsy..:-)
And, then, I usually use the other possible trick : "si vous êtes
intéressé(e)".
(which has a big advantage : clearly show that the person who did the
translation obviously cares about gender neutrality)
And, well, all this is of course a big can of worms : just think about
manpages talking about "user" for which the translation is either
"utilisateur" or "utilisatrice". I bet most languages have such problem.
And, yes, I fully agree with Jordi that the idea that the male form is
a neutral form. It is not. And, contrary to what people who like to
make jokes about all this, this is *not* a minor problem.
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