Digital publishing offers authors access to far-off audiences, but fostering an effective international presence takes precedent once an author crosses that bridge. Many publishers implement multilingual translations to gain new clients and establish a global identity. Engaging people across the globe requires the publisher to speak their language.
Publishers diversify content with technology by “identifying and defining which aspects, desires and interests conform to your target customers,” State of Digital Publishing claims. Information drives the digital market. Promoting catered content guarantees the intended audience’s interest.
Why Multilingualism is Important
Providing e-books and other digital content in the native tongue, and on culturally relevant topics, ensures a natural, intimate relationship between audience and author. Multilingual editions not only promote access for communities often overlooked but also create authentic connections with a multicultural audience.
ThoughtCo defines multilingualism as “the ability of an individual speaker or a community of speakers to communicate effectively in three or more languages.” Experts debate this definition, though. Various factors, such as a person’s environment, can change what defines multilingualism in a society.
In an official capacity, programs such as the United Nations (UN) and the World Health Organization (WHO) require multilingualism. According to the WHO website, “Multilingual communication bridges gaps and fosters understanding between people.”
Marianne Kay pushes for multilingualism in the publishing world saying:
At the end of the day, it’s companies that put the multilingual requirement at the heart of their strategy that reach the widest global audience. Google’s search page is available in more than 100 languages, Wikipedia has more than 300 language editions, and the most translated website in the world is Jehovah’s Witnesses (jw.org), with extraordinary linguistic diversity of more than 900 languages and dialects. If you want to engage with people around the world, you need to speak their language. There is no shortcut.
Both the UN and WHO sites publish in six official languages: Arabic, Chinese, English, French, Russian, and Spanish. Fostering functional relationships with other nations, an essential resource, dictates the publishing language. As a result, the “decisions on what content to publish in which language(s) are made based on an analysis of the target audience needs,” WHO explains.
Organizations such as Multilingual Matters Publishers, Worldreader, and Mantra Lingua also tap into the multilingual demographic. Each brand tailors e-books and textbooks to the language needs in classrooms and communities around the world.
How Publishers Become Multilingual
According to Yousef Elbes, writer of “Why Multilingual Communication is Important,” “Language is still the main instrument used to convey ideas and to communicate messages.” Translators use the mother tongue of an audience to tailor the language of the content to consumers who, in turn, become devoted clients due to the accessibility and security of reading literature in their language.
Translators help authors and publishers access a multicultural environment. Effective translators ensure publishers portray an accurately represented message to their audience and maintain a professional image. Translators provide multiple translations to ensure as many languages as possible are accessible to the audience.
What Multilingualism Means for Translators
Multilingualism breaks down into three categories. According to Kay, author of “Changing the World Wide Web, One Language at a Time,” dividing Multilingualism into three broad categories “doesn’t reduce the amount of work involved, but it creates structure and emphasizes the need for a range of skills required for successful delivery.”
Global content refers to languages translated for different regions; regional content, specific, regional areas or items, such as currency; local content, a local setting. Digital publishers must pick the best translators to guarantee the message will be well-received.
Multilingualism in a Truly Digital Environment
ThoughtCo’s Richard Nordquist stretches the idea of multilingualism even further. “As computers communicate with humans—and with each other—the meaning of language may soon change.” He continues saying,
Language will still always be what makes us human, but it may also become the tool that allows machines to communicate, express needs and wants, issue directives, create, and produce through their own tongue. Language, would then, become something that was initially produced by humans but then evolves to a new system of communication—one that has little or no connection to human beings.
Though Nordquist describes a science fiction future, the relationship he portrays illustrates the transaction between users that occurs when the industry offers true accessibility. When full multilingualism enters the digital environment, the audience constraints placed on publishers disappear.
Multilingualism serves as an excellent tool for reaching multicultural audiences in the digital world. As the digital publishing market rapidly develops, more and more publishers are partnering with translators. International expansion determines the content relevancy for both audience and publisher. Refusing to engage in Multilingualism might mean failure for publishers.