Zulu for Business in South Africa

Zulu is the most widely spoken of the eleven official languages in South Africa. As well as the 10 to 11 million Zulu people, many other people speak Zulu as a second or third language. Zulu also has many similarities to Xhosa spoken by around 8 million Xhosa people. When we consider that at least 20 Million South Africans can speak or understand Zulu- roughly 33% of the approximate 59 Million inhabitants- we can see how important the Zulu language is.

Clearly any company wanting to conduct business in South Africa would do well to think about using Zulu for their promotions and advertising. A business not providing information about their products in Zulu is missing an opportunity to attract customers! Every human has a fondness for their own native language. When we are addressed in our own language we automatically identify with the speaker- and that is the icebreaker for finding common ground.

Zulu is, however, a complicated language with a complex grammatical structure. There is also no easy way to translate from English, for example, into Zulu. Internet tools like Google translate do not provide accurate  translation. They translate literally word for word which does not account for change of word order in different languages, grammar or correct word usage .

Additional difficulties arise from the tonal nature of Zulu. Many words having the same spelling have diverse meanings when pronounced differently.

This is where a human translation service will benefit any business with a product, service or concept to advertise. The Cape based Intelligent Verbatim has translators on their team who speak Zulu as a first language, have an excellent command of English, and are able to translate English to Zulu and vice versa. In fact with the resources at hand, a wide range of African and other languages can be translated into Zulu. Depending on how different to Nguni an African language is, it is often necessary to first translate into English, have the English translation proofread, then translated into Zulu.  SeSotho speaking people often also speak and write fluent Xhosa,  whereas Zulu speakers (like English speakers) often fail to see the necessity of learning another language when their language is the most prevalent.

By making use of a South African language service, business customers benefit from local knowledge. South Africans use many terms in everyday life which are derived from other languages – South African English contains Zulu words, Zulu contains English words. This is true of all our official languages. Terms such as ‘nyama’ (pronounced as it’s spelled) are a Zulu word for meat, specifically beef. However in South African society ‘nyama’ (or ‘shishnyama’) can have a more specific meaning; a spicy hot meat dish sold at local shebeens and taverns.  Shisanyama meanss ‘hot and delicious’.

Open the doors to a large portion of South African society, and get your web and printed advertising material translated into Zulu.

Rubber Duck Zen

Always a Rubber Duck

"In my family there’s always been a yellow rubber ducky in the bathroom, ever since I can remember – they even get passed down from one generation to the next."

From another post on my 'Language Blog' Zen of the Rubber Duck

My first tongue in cheek blog on bad grammar

My New 'English Language Blog'

I have been thinking about writing a blog about the English Language for sometime. Finally, I took the plunge and began writing.

BCUZ MY ENGLISH IS PURFECT is a satirical look at some common and annoying mistakes.

“I can’t make no promises” is a double negative.

What it means is that not only can you make promises, but that you have to. The use of the word “any” in the sentence (I can’t make any promises.) would mean you couldn’t make promises.

 Find more in a similar vein at Bcuz My English is Perfect.

Intelligent Verbatim

Here are some of the highlights of 2010 - Humans have GOT to take responsibility for the Earth we live on!

| View Infographic Full Screen

Transcription Translation Proofreading Editing

TRANSCRIPTION:

• Disciplinary hearings, etc

• Thesis interviews
• Focus Groups
• Civil and criminal procedures
• Medico-legal reports, drug trial reports, etc.
• Meetings
• Forensic hearings
• Security/Police audio

• Dictation
• Name it, we’ve transcribed it.

Documents are transcribed “intelligent verbatim” or to client’s request in any audio format,. We guarantee a 98% or higher rate of accuracy with decent to good audio.

We also split VIDEO to AUDIO for transcription.

We offer both standard and urgent service. Transcripts are emailed as a Microsoft Word document unless otherwise specified.

Time coding is not provided unless requested, and will come at a minimal additional charge.

PROOFREADING:

We look for surface errors such as typos, spelling mistakes and blatant grammatical  errors, punctuation, sentence construction and paragraphs and mark them on the text  for the client's attention without changing anything. This enables the client to decide which of the changes s/he wants to apply - without having to guess what we've done to the original document.

EDITING:

We first conduct a basic proof and then look for grammatical errors, spelling mistakes, punctuation, sentence construction and paragraphing, poor syntax, poor general structure, repetition, redundancy, contradiction or inconsistency – and fix them.

Understandably, copy editing costs more than proofing because it takes roughly three times as long.

Our billing method for proofing and editing is per page (360 words).

Medical terminology or industry-specific terminology / jargon is specific so will cost more.

TRANSLATION:

Language can be a barrier to communication. This applies to research, government, business, data dissemination, training, tourism and policing.  The lack of a common language can severely hinder progress or stall it completely - so translation services are a necessary tool for communication across language barriers. 

We translate to or from:- English, Afrikaans, Zulu, Xhosa, SePedi (Northern Sotho), Kigali, Shona, Ndebele, Swahili, French, Portuguese, German, Spanish, Czech, Russian, Turkish, Chinese and Arabic. If we don’t have the language listed, we will source, test and verify translators as required.

All translations are word-for-word unless client specifically requests otherwise, e.g. entry level language or specific terminology in local government documents, etc.

We also proof existing translations for syntax, grammar and correct word usage.

CONTACT LYNDA FOR MORE INFORMATION

Tel: +2721 788 1306 / +2772 5910052

E-mail: intelliverb@gmail.com