German and Spanish: the particular features of translation

If you need translation from German to Spanish or the inverse, you may well be asked what makes these two languages different. Even if they may appear similar in certain aspects, we have decided to show you today how these two beautiful languages differ. Therefore, we will see the particular features which you must take into account when translating.

·       Accents

Even if you are familiar with either of these two languages, you have probably already seen accents on letters which do not normally have them. German predominantly uses the two dots, known as the Umlaut, on the a, o, or u (becoming ä, ö, ü). This impacts the pronunciation of the words in question. Spanish also uses various accents, but they are different. You will find acute accents: á, é, í, ó, ú. There is also the ñ, generally considered to be a letter or an accent. Accents in Spanish are indispensable because they change the pronunciation of the word, just like in German, but that is not all. In effect, the accents are indispensable because they can completely change the meaning of words. Whether in Spanish or German, one must therefore pay attention to the use of accents during translation to avoid completely changing the meaning of the phase.

·       Regions

Many countries use German or Spanish as their official language. This leads to the creation of regionalisms. Therefore, the Spanish used in Spain and in certain parts of Latin America are not the same. It is the same thing for the German used in Germany and Austria. Therefore. it is important during translation to start by analysing the text to figure out whether the language used is the German of Germany or of Austria and the same for Spanish. This allows you to avoid errors of translation or misunderstanding vocabulary used specifically in one region.

·       Pronouns

In German, a pronoun is often used before a verb to highlight what the subject is. Spanish is very different on this topic. In effect, the pronoun is very rarely used as the subject in Spanish. You must watch the ending to understand the subject concerned by the verb. During translation of a text of one sense or another, you must therefore pay attention to respect the particular rules in each language.

Now that you know more about the particular features of German and Spanish, do not hesitate to take a look at our other articles to understand the particularities between the other pairs of languages.