Considering
1) the balance you make with pros and cons of writting your research in English, when it is not your first language.
2) the gigantic profits constantly made by Publishing Enterprises.
3) the endless ad honorem contributions we make to these enterprises by actings as authors, reviewers, editors, commentators, etc.
Do you think everybody should publish in their own language, and have the #EditorialEnterprises take care and pay for the translations?
Yes or No?
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Nice idea for discussion. My answer is Yes.
Next, for your information, there exist journals with such practice - authors submit article in their own language, and journal publish them in both, domestic and English language. For example, for all Croatian speaking researchers in the fields of Civil engineering, architecture and urban planning, I recommend e-Zbornik - the electronic journal of the Faculty of Civil Engineering University of Mostar.
http://e-zbornik.gf.sum.ba/en/
I think not for several reasons. One: in the translation by a non specialist many of the meaning could be lost, and then, who would be responsable? How do how do you know if translations are adecuate if you do not know the language?
If we think in that enterprises should be responsable for translations, they would surely encommend that task to others, so, others would be taking the hard work for you, while enterprises keep earning huge profits. I simply think it is not ethical nor just for translators.
I partially agree Cristian. An intermediate solution would be sending the paper in English and that the journal makes the style-grammar review once accepted. Rejecting a paper because is not written in perfect English is a kind of racism. Indeed, that solution would benefit the journal, given that , for example, even those anglosaxon journals where non-native English speakers publish more profusely, they are highly cited journals.
(see Article Language bias in ecological journals
)
I agree with most of what you have said, Javier. I actually think that the solution you state is what actually happens in most journals (we send the ms in our English and they improve it a bit with the help of the reviewers).
However, even if our English is good enough to be accepted by an Editor, there is a risk that our ideas are not fully understood by the readers after the paper is published. Especially our reasonings in the discussion section.
I was hoping somebody (in this RG space) could enter info about the many translation apps (including Google translator) that are making so much progress. I was wondering how expensive could be for an international Journal to have/provide an electronic service to improve the translations from the original language.
What do you think?
Yes, translations are also a bussiness for editorials, and sometimes they're kind of xenophobes with foreign authors, even when an English reviewer corrects them..In my case, I can write 100% better in Spanish that in English, and I'd avoid akward comments towards my articles and my writing.
N'estic completament convençut. La llengua amb la que cadascú ha après a parlar i a escriure, és la llengua amb la que millor transmetrà les seves idees i les seves conclusions. Obligar, perquè és obligatori, a escriure en una llengua que no és la teva per a fer difusió del coneiexement científic amb que vols aportar el granet de sorra que et pertoca, és racisme (com bé dius). Als esclaus africans els possaven morrions de ferro per a què no es puguessin alimentar de les collites en les que estaven esclavitzats. Aquest mateix morrió servia també per a evitar que parlessin en les llengües pròpies d'aquests esclaus i evitar que fossin apreses per les seves filles i fills. Aquesta obligatorietat és el nou morrió.
Que la llengua vehicular sigui l'anglès en les revistes científiques és producte d'un estrany consens, d'una elit educada quan no tothom hi tenia accès a les llengües estrangeres. No és el mateix llegir-la i entendre-la, que escriure-la i parlar-la per a transmetre coneixement. No és el mateix dir que fa un coudy day que explicar els detalls del per què unes restes són d'un o altre taxó.
Un servei de traducció, amb persones expertes per part de les editorials d'aquestes revistes, no hauria de ser res estrany (als preus que es paguen algunes publicacions).Tota l'obra literària està traduïda a quasi tots els idiomes. Per què no es fa amb la científica? Per racisme lingüístic i comoditat d'aquelles editorials.
També s'ha de dir que els col·lectius de ciència dels països amb parles diferent de l'anglès, no hem sabut generar editorials prou potents com per a fer-nos amb els coeficients de citació dels que se n'han apropiat aquelles les editorials anglòfones. Fins i tot, en aquests països existeixen centres de recerca amb revistes pròpies que publiquen només en anglès.
De totes maneres, també haig de dir que possiblement hagi de meditar una mica més sobre el tema.
Dear Josep, thanks for your reply.
I was wondering when someone would write in his/her own language or, at least, one other than English. I agree with you. Using our own languages is crucial to make our ideas as clear as we can (which is not always very clear). Of course, we all need an international working language to communicate with other cultures/societies/countries, and English covers that place now (like Greek, Latin, German, French, etc did the same in the past). But many non-English speaker scientific communities seem to have lost their ability to communicate in their own language. This will inevitably end in the deterioration of the local language (no new or more accurate concepts, terms, words), local science (those not mastering English will be progressively displaced from the scientific community), and ideas, among other things. Let us remember that a "local idea" may bring a "global solution", for instance, by finding/creating new vaccines or better hypotheses in any field.
I agree especially with the fact that our societies are partially responsible for this. We tend to blame external nations for it, eluding our own role in it. For instance, many Scientific Academies in Latinamerica seem to be more willing to get involved in socializing issues on the social-media than in caring about local scientists' needs and ideas. Newspapers often publish on prizes and awards winners, but less often they wonder about what the majority of scientists need or want. What our Scientific Academies really do? who runs them? where they get the money from, what they do with it, what they do to advance Science and how they do it? ... who knows. Meanwhile, we often lack local national journals or bulletins to express our ideas about topics others than our research, in our own language (leave the newspapers alone. That's a topic for another forum).
How science is doing? What horizon we are/should be directed to? debates on what should we do to improve our science? etc. These are all topics only/mostly addressed by governmental offices and when the government in office decide it. This very discussion we are having on RG, we should be able to have it within our own scientific communities, in our own language.
Publishing is big business. Everybody knows that. But, then, why is that they don't use translators to have more "clients"? this is difficult to understand in this era of digital (cheap) translation we live in. Perhaps it will happen soon...?
This article may bring some light to our debate:
Publishing in English Presents Challenges for International Authors
When submitting manuscripts to Western journals, authors face issues that go beyond language barriers.
https://www.the-scientist.com/news-opinion/publishing-in-english-presents-challenges-for-international-authors-67241
Perhaps in future we all shall publish differently. As you can see in some fields of science, e.g. medicine, prepublications are common and the paper can "mature" from the comments and critique (incl. language editing) of colleages.
And... dear Alejandro, you are completely right regarding the other points in your intro to the discussion: the publishing companies are exploiting us scientists: we do all the writing (submitting ready to print manuscripts), reviewing, editing, then have to pay page charges and finally our libraries have to buy the products that were completely fabricated by scientists.
No.
But I believe that although English is the main language of the manuscript, authors should (if they wish) provide a version in their native language, based on the original English version. Thus, authors may agree that the translation made by them (from English to their native language) is also their responsibility.
Publications in mainstream journals have a disproportionate impact on an academic's career in terms of promotions, collaborations and other opportunities. Hence, you may treat writing in English as a non-native speaker as an investment in your future rather than an expense. Just my two cents!