Brussels, 01/09/2010 (Agence Europe) - Registration is open for the 2010 Young Translators competition. The “Juvenes Translatores” (“Young Translators” in Latin) is open this year to students who were born in 1993. Applications will close on 20 October and the competition will be held simultaneously in all of the schools selected, on 23 November. “The contest is designed to promote the use and learning of foreign languages in Europe, as well as the specific art of translation”, explains Androulla Vassiliou, the European commissioner with responsibility for education, culture, multilingualism and youth, in a press release.
The total number of schools allowed to take part has been increased from 690 to 751 to take account of steady demand since the contest was launched in 2007. The number of schools selected in each member state will be the same as the number of seats allocated to that state in the European Parliament in 2014. If a member state has too many applications, the Commission will draw lots to decide which schools will take part.
The schools selected will be invited to enter a maximum of five students. All students enrolled at a school in a member state of the European Union are eligible, irrespective of their nationality. They may choose the source language and target language of their translation from the 23 official languages of the Union.
The participants will have two hours to translate a text, which the Commission will send out to the schools shortly before the competition begins. The use of dictionaries is allowed, but the use of electronic devices is not. The work will be marked by translators of the European Commission and the winners will be invited to Brussels in spring 2011, for a prize-giving ceremony. For more information and to register: http://www.ec.europa.eu/translatores. (A.B./transl.fl)