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Appendix to item 20.3, 21.3 and 26.3
LANGUAGES AND CULTURES IN FIG
- Discussion Paper for the Breakout Session in Seoul
Contribution of Prof. Michel Kasser, France (5-11-2000)
1. Elements of analysis for the problems due to the languages
For the Non English Speaking Countries (NESC), today the national
representants are selected first for their ability to speak English, and not for
the representativity of their national surveyors.
For the basic surveyors, there are at least 3 reasons not to attend FIG
meetings : (1) If they are liberal professionals, they have to choose between to
work (and thus to earn money) and go to the meetings (and thus to bear direct
expenses and miss opportunities to work) ; (2) The meetings are expensive, and
for many countries they are far too expensive ; (3) In NESC they are now unable
to understand the lectures and participate to the discussions. For western NESC
(1) may be solved, (2) is not a key point, but (3) is considered unbearable. For
developing NESC, (2) could be solved by a policy of selecting first such
countries for the meetings, but (3) is still unbearable…
In any NESC the obligation of using English drives to increase considerably
the proportion of attendants from universities (that are trained to use
English), and to lower correspondingly the proportion of surveyors. Even if
university people are welcome in such meetings, we observe a perversion of FIG
where the proportion of surveyors is far too low, because NESC surveyors no
longer attend. Why do the university people attend FIG meetings ? (1) to meet
other educators of their speciality, (2) to meet foreign surveyors and (3) to
participate to their mission of diffusion of sciences and techniques. Today, the
(2) is on the way to become impossible, which will increase the natural trend of
university people to stay together and not feel involved in the basic technical
problems.
What use is FIG if surveyors feel no longer concerned ? The linguistic
problem must be considered as the first to solve, far before the structures or
the permanent office : the FIG without surveyors would be completely useless, as
the university people have already their scientific associations (IAG, ISPRS,
ICO,…). The expenses for translation, even if they are important, must be
considered as having priority over any other ones. The 3 English speaking
successive Bureaux may probably not be aware of this priority, but for the NESC
(a large majority of countries), it is a key issue.
2. Propositions to explore
To encourage the creation of linguistic groups (at least 4 : Spanish, German,
French, Arabic, and more if possible) organised on a voluntary basis to select
the texts considered as important, translate them and put them on the FIG web
site, using mainly the networks of universities.
Each FIG congress must be simultaneously translated into the local language
and, if possible, into the language of neighbouring countries.
All official publications, paper abstracts, documents of the bureau for the
general assembly must be translated, either through the linguistic networks
(abstracts, official publications ?) or by paying commercial translators (bureau
documents, where things must go fast).
For each official position within FIG (chair-persons, bureau members, etc…)
a discrete but efficient check should be performed before any candidature is
accepted and proposed to the votes, to verify that the candidate is able to
speak in English with the following features : slowly, with a systematic
accentuation of all syllables, avoiding carefully uncommon words. Native English
speakers sometimes follow these rules (this is e.g. common for professors), and
sometimes not : in this latter case, they must be excluded from these positions.
For NESC people, to speak English is not a simple thing, and there are no
reasons why any native English speaker could escape the difficulty to speak so
as to be intelligible for anybody from NESC.
Any speaker should have the possibility to present his paper in his own
language, but in this case he should do the effort to present his slides
translated into English.
Bernard Bour and Hagen
Graeff
Co-Chairs of the Task Force on Cultures and Languages in FIG
7 May 2001
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