As publicity puff pieces go it’s not bad, but notwithstanding Maoman’s above suggestion, I have to say this article irritated me with its rock-hard condescending tone toward “foreigners”
No, you’re absolutely right, the tone is very different indeed and a humble apology from me to the reporter in question. It always pays to double-check your source. 
Oh, and Dave’s Girl - no, there’s not really an easy English translation for waishengren aside from “foreigners”. It’s a hard one to handle properly. All things considered, I think ironlady did about the best that could be done with that sentence, although it did unfortunately have that side effect of making Hakka sound like “foreigners”.
The “foreigner” bit was definitely a judgement call, and I thought about it for a few minutes before making a final decision on how to write it.
The translation was NOT done for Forumosans with the aim of having them compare source and target; it was done for a regular client of mine who publishes it on an English-language-only Web site for people who are, at best, only semi-familiar with Taiwan and what goes on on the island. So I try to either put things in terms that a person with no Taiwan experience could understand, or else add explanatory notes. Too many notes kills your “fluff piece” style, so usually I try to take the first option. (Anyone doing an MA thesis for a translation and interpretation program can get a thesis out of this thread…Chris, are you there?? 
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Same thing goes to some extent for the part talking about the name of the site…obviously you have to say slightly different things in English than in Chinese on that one. In Chinese they call this kind of thing “xinwen bianyi” – “news editing-and-translation” – because it is expected that Chinese translators processing English news articles this way will take this sort of “liberty” to make it seem like a piece that was originally in Chinese, not just a translation from the English. (We got hit hard on this one in grad school one time, so it’s firmly etched into my psyche… 
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Also, I interpreted Maoman’s last comment as I did because otherwise it just didn’t make sense in English running on from the previous line. Of course sometimes this happens in Chinese reporting (go figure!!) – that is, a total lack of logical cohesion (actually, if you look in the middle part where they’re talking about the costs of the site, neither the Chinese nor the English cohesion is the best, but this is commercial work guys – write it and forget it to some extent, and there’s a fabulous English editor who sees this stuff after I send it to him, so it may not have gone out in such a shabby condition). I don’t believe that an English-speaking reader who doesn’t know Taiwan well would get the idea that “these foreigners are Taiwanese.” It doesn’t make sense. It might have been good to write something like “These foreigners are an intrinsic part of the island now” but that’s also a pretty big departure…oh well…this is why interpreters don’t allow people to tape-record them!! 
Anyway, despite some gaps in the facts and a failure to really solidly directg people to the site (saying “www.forumosa.com” several times, for example, instead of just talking about the site name) I was thrilled to see it being included on the government Web site. Not that we’ll get volunteer opportunities, fair residence rights or the like out of it, but at least it’s a start!
IMHO, waishengren is a political term and only used in Taiwan. This term doesn’t exist in other Chinese speaking areas, AFAIK. So, “foreigners” is not a good translation for that word because that doesn’t capture the nuances of why waishengren are considered “foreign”.
When I see that term used, I think it is a particular bias on the part of the author and its meaning is not a good one. Any further discussion of “waishengren” should probably go in Taiwan Politics.
Hakka’s are in many ways “foreigners” as they have historically been a nomadic bunch 
Hakka’s are in many ways “foreigners” as they have historically been a nomadic bunch :p[/quote]
Well if you’re going to be that anal about it everyone living here who’s not Aboriginal is a foreigner
See, two can play that game 
My translation of “waishengren” would be “ROC citizen of Mainland descent” – but that’s rather cumbersome!
Thanks for the translation, Ironlady! And thanks for the site, Maoman! 
But the problem with that is that the Hoklo and Hakka are of “mainland descent” too, they’ve just been here longer.
Upon reflection, I think that waishengren itself should be used in italics, and on first instance it should be explained in parenthesis as “an ROC citizen who either immigrated from mainland China following WWII or is the descendant of such an immigrant.”
Upon reflection, I think that waishengren itself should be used in italics, and on first instance it should be explained in parenthesis as “an ROC citizen who either immigrated from mainland China following WWII or is the descendant of such an immigrant.”[/quote]
Yes, but there are three problems with that here - one, it’s unnecessarily precise for a fluff piece like this; two, the whole waishengren thing is of no real consequence to the piece and so unnecessarily adding footnotes is kind of a waste of time; and three, IIRC waishengren here is being used in an almost pun-like fashion, using its literal meaning as well. If it were for a formal, professional piece of writing, where the concept of waishengren was of substantial import to the piece as a whole, I might be tempted to use your idea. But here, I think it could (and should) be worked around.
Upon reflection, I think that waishengren itself should be used in italics, and on first instance it should be explained in parenthesis as “an ROC citizen who either immigrated from mainland China following WWII or is the descendant of such an immigrant.”[/quote]
Agreed. But personally I find it really odd that there is not an official English ‘waishengren’ term. What word do writers of TaipeiTimes, say, use when they write stories on the animosity between ‘waishengren’ and ‘benshengren’? Anyone?
Since when has the Taipei Times actually covered anything of interest that might happen in Taiwan?
waishengren means one thing: mainlanders. period. case closed.
Actually, no, mainlanders are 大陸人 ‘da-lu-ren’, which is completely different than waishengren. Waishengren are almost always descent of the ones that came with jiankaishai(?). I can’t spell it. sorry. 蔣中正 is what I mean.
Actually, no, mainlanders are 大陸人 ‘da-lu-ren’, which is completely different than waishengren. Waishengren are almost always descent of the ones that came with jiankaishai(?). I can’t spell it. sorry. 蔣中正 is what I mean.[/quote]
in english, mainlanders means people who came from the mainland with the KMT around 1945-1949ish or so. dalu ren are dalu people, who live there now. waishengren came over 50 years ago, and there are first genereation mainlanders here, second gen and so on. do a google search and you will see. i think.
Are there chinese terms for words like ‘scouser’, ‘geordie’, or ‘cockney’? Or is that comparing different things?
Actually, no, mainlanders are 大陸人 ‘da-lu-ren’, which is completely different than waishengren. Waishengren are almost always descent of the ones that came with jiankaishai(?). I can’t spell it. sorry. 蔣中正 is what I mean.[/quote]
in English, mainlanders means people who came from the mainland with the KMT around 1945-1949ish or so. dalu ren are dalu people, who live there now. waishengren came over 50 years ago, and there are first genereation mainlanders here, second gen and so on. do a google search and you will see. I think.[/quote]
Rubbish. In English, mainlander means someone from the mainland. In this case, a PRC resident. Waishengren includes descendants of mainlanders. If you’re born in Taiwan, you’re not a mainlander.
EDIT: You could say xx generation mainlander, but that’s dealing with more specific contexts. If it’s just “waishengren” without saying anything else, “mainlander” is wrong.
Actually, no, mainlanders are 大陸人 ‘da-lu-ren’, which is completely different than waishengren. Waishengren are almost always descent of the ones that came with jiankaishai(?). I can’t spell it. sorry. 蔣中正 is what I mean.[/quote]
in English, mainlanders means people who came from the mainland with the KMT around 1945-1949ish or so. dalu ren are dalu people, who live there now. waishengren came over 50 years ago, and there are first genereation mainlanders here, second gen and so on. do a google search and you will see. I think.[/quote]
Rubbish. In English, mainlander means someone from the mainland. In this case, a PRC resident. Waishengren includes descendants of mainlanders. If you’re born in Taiwan, you’re not a mainlander.
EDIT: You could say xx generation mainlander, but that’s dealing with more specific contexts. If it’s just “waishengren” without saying anything else, “mainlander” is wrong.[/quote]
Good points, Tetsu. I stand corrected.
Maybe I should have capitalized the word – Mainlander. A Mainlander, in Taiwan, is someone who came over with the KMT army way back when, was born on the mainland, like Mayor Ma or James Soong, but it also has taken on an ethnic meaning here in Taiwan, if I am not mistaken, in that it now means – as in he’s a Mainlander – that that person is from that subculture. Not a Hakka, not a Bensenren, not an Aborigine, but a Mainlander. Look it up. Read the papers. That is how it is used today.
And children of Mainlanders are called second generation Mainlanders. Check.
The problem then is that one has to take into account the audience. If you’re writing for an English-speaking audience in Taiwan, mainlander might work. Although in that case, you could possibly get away with romanizing and italicizing “waishengren” and be done with it. If you’re writing for a foreign audience, as this piece (as translated) was, “mainlander” will be read to mean “mainland Chinese” ie PRC Chinese.
True. If you say “mainlander” to an English-speaking person living in an English-speaking country, they will most likely interpret it as “PRC Chinese”. If you say it to an English-speaker living in Taiwan, the might might ask you “Do you mean ‘Daluren’ or ‘Waishengren’?” because the distinction is not definite in English.
If you say “mainlander” to a resident of Hawaii, they will interpret it as someone from the continental US.